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What's better than spending a semester abroad in a foreign country? How about spending a semester abroad in 10 countries? That’s what students who participate in our distinctive Around-The-World Semester® (ATW) get to do. Together with about 20 other students and two professors, they travel the world as they complete five courses devoted to cultural study, service-learning, and travel writing. They come home with a minor in cultural studies and a new perspective on what it means to be a citizen of the world.
In the past, students have tutored elementary-aged children in South Africa, volunteered in the Mother Teresa Homes in India, held impromptu classes in the foothills of the Himalayas, discussed literature on the rooftop of a hotel in Kolkata, and visited a Sufi School in Turkey. “We go looking for the most epic places to have class,” says English Professor Adam Lee, who helped found the programs. Each ATW group goes to different destinations to help keep the “pioneer spirit” of the semester alive and well for students and professors alike.
Professor Lee says “people who are hungry for learning, disciplined, and doing well in their classes” are the best-fit students for ATW. International Studies major Noah Menke is one such student. He saw ATW as “an opportunity to see what life is like outside of what I’ve always known it to be.” Upon returning from the trip, he said it was all of that and more.
I want to continue to travel and meet people. I don’t want to limit the call of my life.
Learn More about Around-the-World Semester®