Broadening Study Abroad Opportunities: Diversity Issues and Study Abroad

Gary Rhodes
Associate Dean, International Education & Senior International Officer,
College of Extended & International Education
Director, Center for Global Education
California State University at Dominguez Hills

For many study abroad offices, summer has changed from being a time of vacations and relaxation to the busiest time of the year. The biggest growth in study abroad continues to be in short-term programs and most of those programs take place during the summer.

However, we hope there is also an opportunity for study abroad staff and faculty to take some vacation time before the fall 2014 academic year begins. One of the issues that comes up regularly in study abroad circles is the question of how to serve all types of students through study abroad. This has resulted in many presentations and discussions about diversity issues and study abroad.

Importance of Diversity for the Future Growth of Study Abroad

IIE’s Generation Abroad Initiative promotes doubling study abroad participation. Their goal is to have 600,000 students studying abroad in credit and non-credit programs by the 2017/18 academic year. IIE highlights the following challenges:

International experience is one of the most important components of a 21st century education.
Less than 10% of U.S. students study abroad.
Globalization is changing the way the world works, and employers are increasingly looking for workers who have international skills and experience.

To double the number of study abroad students, it will be necessary to broaden the reach of study abroad programs to students of all types of diverse backgrounds.

Types of Diversity

The Diversity Abroad Network Task Force on diversity and underrepresentation includes the following areas:

Race/Ethnicity
High Financial Need
First-Generation
Disabilities
LGBTQ
Religion
Males
STEM
Leadership

However, this is just the start of a potential list of issues that could come under study abroad and diversity. There are other diverse areas of importance on your campus. The important question is whether you have some resources and support in place to respond to the various diverse communities on your campus and their diverse needs and figuring out which areas of diversity are priorities for you and your institution.

Start with Something

Summer provides some opportunities to review your strategic plan and mission for study abroad offices. It is a good time to think about how diversity and inclusive good practices are incorporated into your strategic plan. An analysis of your policies with respect to diversity and inclusion will help you find ways to support and engage students, faculty, and staff to support the various types of diverse groups and programs that a study abroad office can support.

Important questions to ask as 2013/14 comes to an end and planning for 2014/15 takes place include:

How does our mission and vision statement emphasize diversity and study abroad?
How does our website highlight diverse program options and diverse students?
How do our print publications highlight diverse program options and diverse students?
What special funding is available to support students from diverse backgrounds for whom cost is a special limiting challenge?
What special support is available to address special issues of students from diverse backgrounds before, during, and after study abroad?

Following are three areas where every study abroad office can implement and/or enhance diversity and inclusive good practices:

Outreach/Marketing
A general outreach/marketing campaign will not speak to diverse students in a way that a targeted one will. A successful diversity outreach campaign starts with learning about your audience through focus groups and surveys. Then, it is important to tailor your print and online messaging so that it resonates with your targeted audiences.
Advising
In the same way that diversity provides challenges for students on campus, the world isn't always as welcoming a place for all students. This can result in special challenges for students from diverse backgrounds. Implementing diversity and inclusive good practices into the advising process in part entails identifying areas of concern unique to diverse students and then advising them on how to address these concerns. Proper training is essential so that advisors feel knowledgeable and comfortable enough to broach sensitive diversity-related topics during the advising process. While we can't protect our students from the bias and discrimination that exist in the world, we can prepare them to manage these situations in a way that it doesn't rob them of the learning outcomes derived from education abroad. The Diversity Network's Advisor Guides for African-American and Latino students offers detailed guidance on reaching out to these two diverse populations.
Health & Safety
Student diversity is an important facet of health and safety in education abroad. A students’ race, gender, sexuality, religion, and other special issues can make them more prone to negative statements aimed at them as well as physical attacks in certain destination. From the mental health perspective, it is well documented that those who face discriminatory situations have heighten risk of depression and other mental/emotional ailments. By integrating diversity-focused and inclusive good practices into the health and safety aspect of education abroad, study abroad offices help ensure that their students are going to destinations that as well suited for them and if faced with racial or discriminatory issues they are well supported. The Center for Global Education at UCLA’s SAFETI Clearinghouse (www.globaled.us/safeti) provides resources for faculty and staff. The Center’s AllAbroad.us, StudentsAbroad.com, and GlobalScholar.us websites provide resources for students.

Funding is Not Enough

Often, the diversity discussion highlights scholarship and funding opportunities. Although scholarships and funding opportunities are important, they are only one piece of the puzzle. One important area where students are from many diverse backgrounds is the community college sector. At the present time, the number of programs available through community colleges is very small. Even if there was funding to cover all the costs of community college study abroad program, there are currently not enough programs to support even close to 1 percent of the U.S. community college enrollments.

Finding Resources

There are resources out there, including those by Diversity Abroad and the Center for Global Education at UCLA, and NAFSA. The Center for Global Education and Diversity Abroad have also included content to support diversity and study abroad in the Terra Dotta Community Library. If you have areas you would like us to develop additional content to support the use of Terra Dotta Software resources to positive impact study abroad, we would look forward to your feedback and requests. If you’ve developed resources that others can learn from, sharing them in the Terra Dotta Community Library can be a big help.

For Professional Development, the NAFSA Regional and National Conferences, the Forum on Education Abroad Conference, Terra Dotta University, as well as the Diversity Abroad Conference provide useful resources and opportunities for information sharing and networking.

Institutional Collaboration

This is an area where one size does not fit all institutions. Each college and university has special areas of focus and special strengths and challenges. Getting support for diversity and study abroad, like most other areas in higher education requires putting together a team (for those who are tired of all the committees, you can call it a team) of faculty, staff, and students from across campus with a similar interest in a diverse area. Many of them may not have previously collaborated to connect their diverse interest to study abroad. If your office is able to cover the cost of lunch and make the connection to campus colleagues, you may be able to get their help in all aspects of developing special programs and support and providing those to potential participants.

We suggest that you don’t necessarily wrap all issues around “diversity” as that may become too general. You may find people that are willing to support diversity in terms of race and ethnicity or students with special needs and disabilities. However, just because they are interested in working on one area of diversity doesn’t mean they support all types of diversity or see each as important as another. Based on the usual challenge of so many tasks in a study abroad office and limited time, it may be important to highlight a few areas of diversity that you want to focus on and to bring campus teams together to collaborate on those during 2014/15.

An Important Initiative: Recognizing Excellence in Diversifying International Education Awards

While it may not be possible to provide sufficient resources to change study abroad at every U.S. college and university, one important initiative is the effort by Diversity Abroad to recognize and honor colleges, universities, and study abroad providers who are making an impact in supporting diversity in study abroad. Regional organizations and individual campuses can also make an effort to recognize quality practices that support diversity in study abroad.

Do you provide any special recognition for students, faculty, or staff on your campus for the support they provide to study abroad? We would suggest that annual recognition for the positive support provided can make an impact on engaging faculty, staff, and students to do more to support your office. As you probably don’t have funding to pay faculty to review applications and do outreach or getting the financial aid office to administer special scholarships and grants for study abroad, having special recognition for efforts to support diversity can make a difference.

Following is the language that Diversity Abroad uses. This may help you design a special recognition or award regionally or on your campus:

The Excellence in Diversifying International Education Award for organizations and institutions highlights outstanding achievements of institutions and organizations that have developed practices that either foster diversity and inclusion in international education and exchange or promotes an inclusive environment for international students on campus. The award recognizes innovative on/off campus partnerships, curriculum, programming, and outreach that increases access and fosters diversity and inclusion in international education and exchange.

Appreciating Your Efforts

As with many areas of study abroad, there is only a limited amount of time and study abroad offices continue to run university programs around the world with limited staff. As the summer winds down, although you may not be getting any formal reward, take the time to look at the efforts you have made in the past, the positive impact you have made on students, faculty, and staff from diverse backgrounds and although you have limitations on what you did in 2013/14 and what you can achieve in 2014/15, study abroad is an area that is continually growing and as you can make a significant impact! Maybe you and your institution will be the next awardee by Diversity Abroad for your efforts on diversifying your study abroad programs.