IU Global – Page 3 – Passport to the World

Strengthening Ties and Expanding Horizons: The IU-Moi University Partnership Renewal

Posted on March 14, 2024 by Taylor Lee

Indiana University (IU) has long been a pioneer in forging global academic partnerships that transcend borders, cultures, and disciplines. The partnership with Moi University in Kenya is a testament to this enduring commitment, characterized by mutual respect, shared goals, and a collective dedication to advancing global health, education, and innovation. The journey began with the foundational AMPATH (Academic Model Providing Access to Healthcare) Kenya program, and has evolved into a multifaceted collaboration, benefiting communities in western Kenya and setting a global standard for university partnerships. This strategic alliance is one of Indiana University’s most significant international collaborations and the IUPUI-Moi University partnership was the recipient of two major awards: the Paul Simon Award for Campus Internationalization and Andrew Heiskell Award for Innovation in International Education. This relationship has been described by US Ambassador to Kenya, Michael Ranneberger, “…as the most comprehensive partnership anywhere on the African continent between American and indigenous educational institutions.”

We embarked on yet another chapter earlier in 2024, sending an IU delegation to Moi University to underscore our commitment to reinvigorating and expanding our partnership. The IU delegation, led by the Office of International Affairs (OIA) at Indiana University Indianapolis, now aims to explore new avenues for collaboration that extend the impact of our joint efforts into arts, social sciences, post-graduate studies, research, innovation, and more.

Two people stand and exchange gifts, smiling at the camera — Interim Vice President for International Affairs Hilary Kahn, IU; Vice Chancellor Isaac Sanga Kosgey, Moi University

Three people hold a watering can that moistens a newly planted tree — Interim Vice President for International Affairs Hilary Kahn, IU; Vice Chancellor Isaac Sanga Kosgey, Moi University

Photos provided by Moi University

Empowering Tomorrow’s Leaders: Inside IU’s International Development Fellowship Program

Posted on March 5, 2024 by Megan Straughn

The International Development Fellowship (IDF) provides opportunities for IU students to support international projects managed by the Office of International Development (OID) and actively engage with visitors from different parts of the world. This fellowship gives students an opportunity to expand their perspectives, understanding, and exposure to global situations, cultures, and people.

This year, the International Development Fellowship supported the IU Partnership for Higher Education (PHER) project in Vietnam. This is the first time this fellowship has coincided with the PHER project; previously in 2022, the IDF took place alongside the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders. The fellowship was granted to two internationally-focused IU students who got the opportunity to attend both week-long workshops that took place on September 18-22 and October 23-27, 2023. During this time, OID hosted more than 60 visitors –about 30 per workshop–from Vietnam National University Hanoi, Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City, and the University of Đà Nẵng.

International Development fellow Daniel Farrell with PHER participant Kim Anh.

The PHER project, funded by a grant from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), aims to strengthen teaching, research, innovation, and governance within Vietnam’s three largest national universities. Spearheaded by O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs professor Anh Tran and Teshome Alemneh, Associate Vice President for International Research and Development, and Head of IU’s Office of International Development, the project embodies a collaborative effort between IU and Vietnamese academic institutions.

The fellows were brought in to work alongside this international project as a valuable learning opportunity. They had the chance to glean insights directly from the PHER delegation, learning about Vietnamese educational systems, programs, and unique aspects of their participation. This exposure contributed to their understanding of international higher education and fostered cross-cultural learning experiences. It also allowed the IDFs to engage with the project team, actively support project management and leadership activities, and to learn how to apply their knowledge to future projects.

Growth, Learning and Discoveries: Global Gateway for Teachers in Mexico

Posted on February 12, 2024 by Lía Albarrán

It is very common to receive the recommendation to pursue studies abroad during an academic journey. The underlying idea behind this suggestion is that through the course of studies in another country, one can gain highly enriching experiences; new perspectives, personal and professional growth, as well as discoveries about what can be appreciated both as a student and as an individual. This growth and the potential for transformative experiences is why education abroad is considered a “high impact practice.”

Kaia Krejci, a recent undergraduate alumna who studied Spanish Language at the Indiana University School of Education from 2020 to 2023, shared with IU Mexico Gateway and IU Global the experiences she gained at La Palapa in Todos Santos, Mexico, while teaching English to Spanish native speakers; a charming place she discovered through the Global Gateway for Teachers program. Along with her training to teach Spanish, Krejci was certified to teach English as a new language, a skill she put to immediate use in this program. Through this experience, she hoped to gain more familiarity with the field of teaching a new language in Mexico and bringing those skills back to the U.S.; however, while being in Mexico, she discovered new horizons and fell in love with teaching English to native Spanish speakers and learning more Spanish in exchange.

A woman stands on the beach on a sunny day — Krejci by the ocean

A woman gestures to a banner of the Mexican flag hanging on a brick wall. — Krejci by the ocean

From a fleeting idea to a connection between the academic and the professional

Krejci decided to apply to the Global Gateway for Teachers program to challenge herself to expand her teaching knowledge with an international perspective. With programs in over 20 countries, she had her pick of destinations in which she could explore methodologies and pedagogies from a new angle, so why Mexico? Kaia was interested in delving into Mexican culture and the education system of the U.S.’ southern neighbor. Despite having a completely different perception before visiting Mexico, instead of feeling homesick, Kaia gradually fell in love with the cultural differences, idiosyncrasies, and even habits unique to Mexico. “Now that I have been here for a while and understand what I am doing, I am in love with the country,” says Kaia. She even got certificated in teaching English as a second language, a tool that increases her ability to connect with students and educators in the U.S. and across Latin America.

Re-designed graduate grant program brings opportunities for international research, creativity

Posted on January 25, 2024 by Miguel E. Ayllon

IU Global is proud to announce our new Primary Partner Graduate Student Grant. The goal of this new student-centered grant is to provide IU graduate students -from all campuses and across academic disciplines – with world class opportunities for meaningful global research experiences with our top partners around the world. IU graduate students will have the opportunity to receive up to $10,000 and spend up to 5 months at one of IU’s select international primary partner institutions in just about every continent of the world.

IU has had a long-standing commitment to excellence in the internationalization of student learning providing students with the tools necessary to excel in a variety of multinational fields . This new graduate research mobility model will continue to set us apart as a leading institution that provides transformative learning experiences to our graduate students. While IU has had a distinguished history offering robust international research student exchanges with our university partners around the world, our new model will increase access to the program by welcoming applicants to all terminal degree seeking students from all nine IU campuses in any discipline. This new model will also allow us to welcome a more diversified population of outstanding graduate students from our partner institutions for short-term intensive research experiences.

The new Primary Partner Graduate Student Grant is a fantastic expansion of opportunity to enrich the graduate experience. I strongly encourage graduate students to familiarize themselves with the newly expanded list of 40+ international partner institutions and to consider how they could incorporate a global research experience at one of them into their graduate course of study not only to conduct research and but also to build new skills abroad through unique international collaborations.
Trevor Verrot
Assistant Dean for Student Development
Indiana University Graduate School Bloomington

Read the full announcement

IU students advise US Consulate in Canada on natural hazards

Posted on January 8, 2024 by OVPIA

The West Coast of Canada is host to thousands of US citizen visitors each year. Unfortunately, it could also be the home to a devastating suite of natural hazards. Now, thanks to the work of students at Indiana University Bloomington the US State Department has a new source of disaster response information and analysis to draw upon.

As part of IU’s contribution to the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomacy Lab program, 15 IU Bloomington students spent their fall semester producing a report on policy challenges and opportunities related to natural disasters for the U.S. Consulate in Vancouver, British Columbia. The students capped the project with a December 8 briefing to several of the lead members of the consular team, including U.S. Consul General James DeHart.

*IU Bloomington students and faculty from IU’s “Environmental & Energy Diplomacy” course brief Embassy officials during a Zoom meeting with US Consul General James DeHart.*

Diplomacy Lab helps the State Department “course-source” research and innovation related to global policy challenges from the nation’s top universities. Michael Hamburger, a professor in the IU Bloomington’s Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, helped bring the program to IU Bloomington after spending the 2015-16 academic year as a Jefferson Science Fellow at the State Department. IUB’s Diplomacy Lab program is managed by the IU Office of the Vice President for International Affairs.

Under the program, IU and other universities “bid” on topics posted by the State Department, which selects the best proposals and assigns students as consultants to their foreign embassies. In this case, the client was the U.S. Consulate in Vancouver, British Columbia, which is responsible for the health and safety of the hundreds of thousands of American citizens who live in, work in or travel to western Canada, including British Columbia and the Yukon.

Read the full story

Showcasing IU’s international student community with the Global Citizen scholarship

Posted on December 19, 2023 by Marielle Petranoff

Since 2018 the annual tradition of International Education Week on Bloomington’s campus has had a special addition: the Global Citizen Scholarship. Started as a way to bring students into the Office of International Services’ 75^th anniversary, the video competition and scholarship was so popular it has continued each year since. A one-time scholarship, the award asks students to answer a new question each year. This year’s theme “What does the Indiana University community mean to you?” came from a September meeting of staff across the Office of International Services (OIS) areas. With representatives from each area of the office that supports international students and scholars in Bloomington, the selection committee works to make sure each year’s topic is relevant to what students are experiencing right now.

Once the topic is selected, the team of volunteer staff members sets out to review each video submission and winnow down the finalist list to just 10 videos. Both the quantity of submissions and spectacular quality of what students produce makes the judging process difficult, says Rendy Schrader, the committee’s lead, “It’s so hard! I wish we could recognize them all!”

However, there are only three winners who can claim the title of IU Global Citizen Scholarship awardee. This year the winning entries include an exchange student who had never created a video before, a violinist whose journey at IU allowed him to share research not just in Indiana but around the world, and a film student whose thesis project also explored the idea of “home.”

Meet the Winners

Thomas Mathias

Performer Diploma student, Jacobs School of Music 2024

Two people in a kayak on lake Monroe. Links to global citizens scholarship video.

Thomas Mathias’ journey at IU has been full of opportunities and his video reflects that. Originally from Wales in the United Kingdom, Mathias arrived in Indiana three years ago to pursue a Performer Diploma at the graduate level. “I was inspired to apply as it seemed like a good way to bind together my time at IU and show what I’ve learned and accomplished. I chose to highlight the ways in which IU has supported me in my personal and professional goals.” As he shares in the video, his time at the Jacobs School of Music’s Music and Mind lab has expanded beyond performance, diving into the world of research and performance. His advice for future students? Take the plunge into IU!

IU can offer so many new opportunities and gives new perspectives on education and life that our home countries may not.
Thomas Mathias, 2023 Global Citizen Scholarship winner

Vladislava Lodesk

Graduate Student, Media School 2024

Read on to meet the rest of the winners

IU partnerships in India: creating a better world through education

Posted on December 12, 2023 by Zafeena Suresh

IU’s India Gateway recently welcomed Interim Vice President for International Affairs Hilary Kahn and a delegation of faculty and colleagues from the Office of International Affairs in Indianapolis. The gateway was thrilled to coordinate visits to Dehradun, Bengaluru, Mysuru, and Kochi with a focus on strengthening existing partnerships and exploring collaborations for future projects that will drive transformative research, student success, and global collaborations that drive economic development at home and abroad. To quote Kahn, “International delegations allow IU to extend its primary strategic priorities to our vast global network. Pursuing experiential learning, interdisciplinary global research, and connections with businesses and alumni in India is critical in strengthening IU’s commitment to students, research, and serving our state and beyond.”

Visiting IU’s university partners like the University of Petroleum and Energy Studies (UPES) in Dehradun heavily emphasized internationalizing college campuses and advancing shared goals. For faculty like Sharon Kandris, Executive Director of the Polis Center, who was visiting India for the first time, this visit, “expanded her worldview to new opportunities, to learn from and collaborate with colleagues in other parts of the world.” On campus, she presented a lecture on Crisis Informatics: Innovative Solutions for Disaster Resilient Communities to students at UPES and looks forward to opportunities to collaborate and share expertise and data resources to tackle computing challenges associated with the use of data for community good. Conversations over the last few months led to the signing of an agreement for mutual cooperation around joint degree programs between UPES and the Luddy School of Informatics Computing, and Engineering, IUPUI.

Two people sign an official agreement — *UPES and IU’s Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering in Indianapolis sign an MOU*

Ian McIntosh, who leads a joint 14-week virtual exchange program between the IUPUI Honors College and UPES on the UN SDG agenda with a specific focus on how their chosen professions make a difference in the world, met in-person with UPES students with whom his students have been connecting all semester. McIntosh shared that it was a sheer delight learning about the life and times of students, including their favorite foods, music, movies, sports, and holidays through these meetings.

Hear more about the delegation

IU, Universität Hamburg awarded funding for international social science research

Posted on November 9, 2023 by Marielle Petranoff

For nearly 60 years, Indiana University and Universität Hamburg (UHH) have collaborated on research, exchanged students and faculty, and strengthened both universities’ contributions to their regions. The top tier research universities’ partnership continues this year through Universität Hamburg’s Next Generation Partnership (NGP) Thematic Networks, a multilateral research funding program administered by the Department of International Affairs that seeks to expand long-term investment in research with strategic partners.

2023 marks the second round of the three-year grant cycles, with Indiana University participating in four research collaborations since the NGP’s inception—half of all funded projects. Led by Prof. Dr. Juliane Degner of Universität Hamburg Social Psychology and Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Brigitte Röder of Universität Hamburg Biological Psychology and Neuropsychology, Indiana University Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences Kurt Hugenberg and Prof. Dr. Gijs Bijlstra of Radboud University Nijmegen, aim to answer the question How does social categorization and stereotyping affect emotion perception in faces? The NGP funding will support this research through 2026 as the faculty work towards designing and implementing research to answer this universally applicable question.

Prof. Dr. Juliane Degner: a woman with light hair wearing a blazer over a light blue top. — Prof. Dr. Juliane Degner

Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Brigitte Röder: A woman in in a black shirt wearing glasses. — Prof. Dr. Juliane Degner

Indiana University professor Hugenberg explains the basics of the research that has already been completed and how the funding provided by the NGP grant will broaden the scope of the project. “We’ve found that when facial expressions are ambiguous, we use our stereotypes to read others’ emotions. This can distort how we read both simple and complex expressions… Our research as part of the Next Generation Partnership will help us better understand the nature and extent of these misunderstandings across multiple countries.”

Leading the collaboration, Prof. Dr. Degner shares a similar sentiment on how the partnership allows for a more comprehensive approach to the universally applicable topic. “The NGP presented an excellent opportunity to initiate a research collaboration with Kurt Hugenberg from Indiana University, a prominent social psychologist specializing in the interplay between social categorization effects and emotion processing. By securing funding for a network including Gijs Bijlstra, social psychologist from Nijmegen and Brigitte Röder, neuroscientist from Hamburg, rather than pursuing single bilateral collaborations, we can bring together a broader spectrum of theoretical and practical expertise. This, in turn, holds the promise of advancing research in both social psychology and socio-neuroscience.

Read the full story

How Diplomacy Lab at IU builds real-world skills for students and faculty

Posted on October 30, 2023 by Lexi Baker

Since 2016, Indiana University has been one of a handful of universities actively involved in a unique program that brings the U.S. Department of State and the academic world together. Through the Diplomacy Lab program, IU students have had the extraordinary opportunity to contribute their knowledge, skills, and perspectives to real-world diplomatic challenges. It’s not just a valuable academic experience, but also a meaningful way to make a difference on the global stage.

Diplomacy Lab is a distinctive initiative that provides faculty and students at participating universities across the nation the chance to take on real diplomatic projects identified by the Department of State. It’s an immersive approach to education that not only engages students in hands-on experiences but also offers fresh insights into modern economics, society, diplomacy, and international relations.
In the fall of 2023, a new cohort of students and faculty at Indiana University eagerly joined the cohort of over forty classes at IU that have participated in Diplomacy Lab in the seven years since the program’s start at IU.

Diplomacy Lab has a unique approach to faculty involvement. It encourages faculty members to take on specific projects, weaving them into their existing courses. This isn’t just theoretical learning; it’s a tangible, impactful application of academic knowledge. Four official “models” for participating guide the process, giving faculty and students a clear roadmap.

A limestone building is reflected in a floor-to-ceiling glass window. Through the — *The Global and International Studies building*

Learn more about This Semester’s Projects

IU Global announces new Global Gateway Network Director

Posted on October 16, 2023 by Marielle Petranoff

The Global Gateway Network welcomes its second Director in its history today. Cathie Carrigan joins the IU Global team after nearly two decades of experience in international education across IU campuses. Her most recent work as Managing Director of International Programs with the Lily Family School of Philanthropy saw her lead the international dissemination of the Global Philanthropy Indices, which draw on contributions from research partners around the world to analyze the scale of the global giving landscape.

The global nature of philanthropy and her work with the Indices as well as her time in international affairs at IU’s Indianapolis campus brought Carrigan in contact with the Global Gateways regularly. Her academic pursuits also connected to the Gateways: she is one of twelve students in the United States to receive the China-U.S. Scholars Program Fellowship, a one-time initiative designed to fill the gap after the Fulbright Program in China was canceled in 2020. The IU China Gateway was a key resource during her month-long stay in the region.

“Having worked with IU Global Gateway Network colleagues in several capacities over the years, I am thrilled to move into this new role. I am excited to work with the teams across IU’s Gateway Offices, at OVPIA, and with colleagues across IU campuses to build new and strengthen existing relationships that support Indiana University’s 2030 strategic plan to advance student success and opportunity, transformative research and creativity, and service to Indiana and beyond,” Carrigan said.