3/09/2009 02:16 pm

By Ellen Ashdown

Today’s college graduates need to be world citizens — knowledgeable about international affairs and comfortable with cultural differences. They must also grasp globalization: the increasing interdependence of economies and governments worldwide.

Florida State University has a deep well of international opportunities: a 50-year-old study abroad program, specialized research centers, departmental courses, exchange programs, social events. Yet, according to Cynthia Green, director of the FSU International Center, “in many ways they have been working in vacuums.”

That’s no longer the case, thanks to a program spearheaded in 2007 by Ms. Green and Dr. Stephen D. McDowell, chair of the Department of Communication. Administrators, faculty, staff, and student advisors from every corner of campus collaborated.

The Global Pathways program steeps undergraduates of any discipline in cross-cultural studies and experiences. The certificate requirements include coursework, language study, an intensive cross-cultural experience in the U.S. or abroad, many extracurricular activities, and a capstone project. Each student defines a focus area — for example, economic change in post-Communist Russia or news media in Zimbabwe — that guides coursework and experiences.

A distinctive feature of the new program, for McDowell, is that “students must demonstrate not only academic knowledge but also openness, respect and the ability to communicate outside their culture.”

Although travel abroad is a key component for many students in the program, other students can’t afford it. But many service learning opportunities exist in the U.S., he said. For example, the Department of Communication Science & Disorders conducts outreach and research projects with communities of migrant workers, almost all of them from Mexico and Central America, near Tallahassee.

“Americans can have their perspectives widened just getting to know others.” Ms. Green said. “It’s life-changing.”

A jolt out of being “complacent and close-minded” happens even in other English-speaking nations. That was the case with Lindsay Shaw, who spent a semester at FSU’s London Study Center, analyzing communication issues in Great Britain. Shaw went to England as a senior, “thinking I wanted to be a reporter the minute I got out of college. Now I’d love to do more research in the field. Who is saying what, and why?”

Mark Zeigler, the Associate in Communication who directs the program, relishes students’ transformations.

“Whether they are in class, touring Parliament, delivering speeches at Hyde Park, or just chatting in pubs, the students see their own ethnocentrism,” he said. “Also, phrases like ‘the globalization of the economy’ take on fundamental meaning. They are citizens of the world.”

At the London Center, students pursue coveted internships at Parliament, the BBC, theatre companies and PR firms. Public relations alumna Cassie Eberle interned with the publisher of Elle magazine during her semester in London. “I took on senior-level challenges like organizing a cross-country modeling competition. I came away believing I could handle anything.”

FSU’s London Study Center is near Piccadilly Circus, but when Dr. Lisa Scott visited the city, she was closer (metaphorically) to Monty Python’s Flying Circus. The Michael Palin Centre for Stammering Children (MPC) takes its name from the celebrated actor in Monty Python’s troupe. Palin contributed significant funds to the Centre and actively supports its work.

Scott seized an opportunity to train in the Centre’s Palin Parent-Child Interaction Approach and other methods. A recognized expert in stuttering, she teaches graduate students in the Department of Communication Science & Disorders and in the Schendel Speech and Hearing Clinic.

“I want to know as many evidence-based approaches as possible,” she said. “Although some interventions were similar to U.S. therapies, many aspects of it were novel.”

Scott not only returned to Tallahassee with plans for new therapy programs, she also established a research collaboration with the MPC. FSU graduate students will help the Centre analyze its therapy data. “It’s exciting,” she said, “an international collaboration spanning both research and clinical practice, especially when it translates to research opportunities for students.”

If culture shock can happen in London, imagine the epiphanies of Asian exchanges. For several years the Media Studies Program has exchanged teaching faculty with Sookmyung Women’s University in Seoul, South Korea. Korean students also study at FSU. In summer 2008, a group of Sookmyung students took an intensive PR course with Dr. Gerry Gilmer, followed by fall internships at Disney World.

The Department of Communication Science & Disorders also has a wide reach — and impressive reputation — East and West. Invited by the Education Bureau of Hong Kong, Dr. Kenn Apel traveled there to work with school speech-language pathologists in his specialty, language and literacy assessment and intervention: “I love the idea of teaching in a different culture and learning about its educational system.”

Apel seized that opportunity again in February at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand as an Erskine Fellow, a prestigious international visiting professorship. Apel lectured, consulted with faculty and investigated a research partnership.

Already well known at Canterbury is FSU’s Dr. Leonard LaPointe, Eppes Professor of Communication Disorders who holds a recurring summer appointment. LaPointe lectures in many countries, most recently Japan and Australia. In turn, he has hosted delegations to FSU of clinicians and researchers eager to visit the department’s laboratories and collaborate with him and other faculty.

“It’s good for the College and great for students,” he said. “There’s a wonderful awareness of FSU and our work, especially on deep-brain stimulation and on working memory.”

Such interconnections have now generated intercontinental co-authorship for a coming textbook, Introduction to Brain-based Communication Disorders. LaPointe and FSU colleague Dr. Julie Stierwalt are collaborating with Dr. Bruce Murdoch of the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia. Stierwalt, who traveled recently to Brisbane, noted that the two universities’ long history of collaboration includes a sense of place. “I attended the 130-year-old, impressive Ekka exhibition that gave a real taste of Queensland!” she said.

Whatever the discipline, nationality or culture, education is enhanced by the panorama of cross-cultural opportunities within the College and throughout FSU.

“College of Communication faculty and students are dedicated to this university-wide movement,” Dean John Mayo said, “because of the value it brings to the classroom. It is an important endeavor that ensures our students become outstanding global citizens.”