This week’s readings looked at policies surrounding institutional collaborations across borders. “A Process for Screening and Authorizing Joint and Double Degree Programs” is a document by IIE that explores Rice University’s policies and processes for evaluating proposals for dual and joint degree programs. A dual degree program is when each institution involved awards a diploma, resulting in two degrees. A joint degree program is when one degree is recognized by two institutions. The reading titled “International Higher Education Partnerships” looks at common themes in the existing partnership standards of conduct for various organizations and analyzes their best practices. Some of these themes include transparency or clearly articulating and publishing a description of the goals, rules, and policies of the partnership, and quality assurance, which entails risk assessment of potential institutional and personal risks.
My alma mater, Fairfield University, has a partnership with Universidad Centroamericana (UCA) in Managua, Nicaragua. I took advantage of this partnership when I was an undergrad and studied abroad in Managua for a semester. According to an article in NAFSA, the relationship goes back to the 1990s, starting with research ties between faculty at Fairfield and UCA. The two universities signed a collaborative partnership agreement in 2004, which has evolved during more than a decade of collaboration. Fairfield’s website notes that the partnership “provides opportunities for scholarly collaborations, service learning opportunities, faculty/student exchanges, and curricular projects.”
Although both Fairfield and UCA are Jesuit universities, the two institutions are quite different. UCA is located in the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, and Fairfield is located in an affluent suburb of NYC. Therefore, many of the challenges listed in the reading are relevant to this partnership. The first theme that was highlighted by ACE was cultural awareness, which applies not only to national and regional cultures but also the difference in academic cultures across institutions. Within that category falls the dilemma of deciding which language to use for instruction and administration purposes. UCA had a very small international student population, so all of my courses except one were taught in Spanish. I think this is a great way for students to increase their language skills and engage in the local culture. Of course, this does limit the number of possible participants.
The second theme highlighted in ACE was the problem of access and equity. According to a survey cited in the reading, limitations due to financial barriers were big concerns surrounding the feasibility and accessibility of international opportunities. Although internationalization at home is a potential benefit for both Fairfield and UCA, financial disparities could pose challenges for the partnership, especially since Fairfield provides a scholarship for one Nicaraguan student to study at Fairfield each semester. I really like the fact that it is a true exchange and that students that may not otherwise be able to study abroad have the opportunity to do so, but the administration will have to keep communication open with UCA leadership to not cause any imbalances of power due to uneven financial resources. Although Fairfield and UCA have many differences that could potentially cause administrative and logistical challenges, I think students have the most to learn by experiencing cultures that are quite different from their own.
Your example of the partnership between UCA in Nicaragua and Fairfield University is a great one and I think highlights many of the themes discussed in this week’s reading. Particularly interesting was the ability of the two schools to broach the equity and access theme where one school is considerably poor and the other rooted in an affluent environment. The article you reference also demonstrates the kind of “up-front” and “heavy-lifting” work has to be done to articulate goals and challenges to enter into productive, focused and well-thought out partnerships between otherwise seemingly disparate institutions and locations. My guess is the five year agreement governing this partnership is a solid one and perhaps a good case study for effective legal agreements governing international partnerships.
It is great to read your firsthand experience of international partnerships and hear a personal perspective on the topic. A large challenge facing US institutions seems to be the issue of the language of instruction. How many American students have the fluency required to follow a semester or year long curriculum taught in a second language? This would seem to limit where US institutions can send their students for longer term study, and neccesitate exchanges with English speaking countries (or English language instutions within countries). I am curious about the Spanish language instruction the OP recieved prior to attending UCA, and the experience of studying subjects like math, science or history in Spanish.
Hi Kristen, thanks for your post! It’s great to see that Fairfield and UCA have had such a long relationship. I would imagine that the longer two institutions have had a partnership, the more effective the internationalization initiatives would be. At my alma mater, UW-Madison, most of the study abroad programs were through third party providers like CIEE. Study abroad is just one component of internationalization, but I’d be curious to see what is more common in American higher education study abroad programs — a direct relationship, like UCA/Fairfield, or a relationship where a third party organization facilities the program? I definitely see the benefits of working with a third party provider, whose sole responsibility is to facilitate these exchanges and who would likely be more knowledgeable about the regulations and other legal aspects, but I also wonder if universities are missing out on the other aspects of internationalization (research, visiting faculty, etc) when they chose to work with third party providers for study abroad. Additionally, I have to imagine that the programs are even more expensive, since students will be paying for their credits and paying extra fees to the third party provider.
Hi Kristen,
Thanks for your post! I loved learning about your own experience abroad at Universidad Centroamericana in Managua, Nicaragua. Personally, I would love to hear more about what you learned and the new things you experienced. (I bet the food is great!) I wanted to take a deeper look into your experience so I started researching dual degree programs from Nicaragua. I found Aztec University and their website: http://universidadazteca.net/doctor_programmes/dual_degrees but honestly found it very confusing to look at. While all of the information is clearly there, it was interesting to me to see how much clearer U.S websites are when it comes to explaining programs abroad, where as this site was not really catered to easy-viewing. In a previous post I wrote, I took a look at dual degree programs from NYU. I found this website so much easier to understand! The fonts and colors were very easy to absorb unlike this site with pale gray writing. I wonder if it is because the Universided Azteca lacks the money and/or technology to make their site more visually pleasing, but I do find that the website truly makes a difference in my motivation to understand (and potentially enroll) in these programs.
Warm Regards,
Melissa