The Brown & White

The Global Lehigh Advisory Committee is continuing with the proposed addition of a required international experience for all undergraduate students in order to help internationalize Lehigh.

The idea of a required international experience was introduced in the "Getting to Global Lehigh" report released in May 2007.

The required international experience would mandate students to participate in some form of international experience during their undergraduate years of study.

"My opinion is that it is one part of a remarkable proposal," said Michael Raposa, associate dean of the College of Arts and Science.

President Alice Gast and Provost Mohamed El-Aasser are the main proponents of the proposal.

"I have no doubt that this area will truly become one of Lehigh's intellectual signatures," El-Aasser wrote in an e-mail.

"We are committed to providing both short term and long term support, including financial, to ensure sustainability."

The international requirement could be fulfilled in several different ways.

The report suggests students study abroad, gain proficiency in a language or participate in research or an internship abroad.

"What the required international experience is, is a very modular set of international experiences," International Relations professor Rajan Menon said. "It's meant to accommodate a variety of interests."

The report emphasizes the importance of providing a flexible learning experience that will fit each individual students need.

There is a five-year time line set for the globalization of Lehigh, intended to be completed in 2013.

Currently, the proposal is being discussed by the deans and faculty of all of the colleges.

Each college will decide how to best incorporate the required international experience into each of the schools.

"I want to come up with a substantive and transformative experience for our students, but I want to do it very methodically," said Paul Brown, dean of the College of Business and Economics.

For business students, Brown explained that a strong international perspective is important to succeed in today's business world.

"I think the right place to start is to think about what would be the type of experience that we think would be truly transformative for our business students," he said. "And after that experience you're a different person."

A program like the required international experience would revamp the university's relationship with other countries.

David Wu, dean of the P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science, explained the importance of connecting Lehigh to the global community.

He said Lehigh is rich in international professors and students, and their background could be utilized to make Lehigh more global.

"We should take advantage of that international connection to make this a way to enrich the undergraduate experience," Wu said.

A common concern in the engineering department is the debate of whether engineering students could accommodate additional requirements.

Wu said this is a common misconception because the required international experience would supplement the students learning, not take anything away from it.

Students could intern, do research, or study abroad during summer or winter break.

Another option for engineers is studying abroad and taking the same classes they would be taking during a semester at Lehigh.

"I think actually a bigger problem is that a lot of students are not willing to unplug themselves from their friends, social connections, and so on for that long of a time," Wu said.

Because students are going to leave Lehigh and head into a global work environment, Raposa said, Lehigh must adapt in order to prepare students.

"You can't get a liberal arts education in the 21st century without this international dimension, it's just a function of where we are in human history," Raposa said. "That kind of global or international literacy is as important now as basic math, science and English has always been traditionally.

"I think Lehigh would be cheating its students if we didn't look to strengthen ourselves in these areas," Raposa said.