Two new Study Abroad programs launch this January as hundreds of Elon University students take part in Winter Term overseas experiences. The Isabella Cannon International Centre is hosting a blog for parents and friends to stay connected with students traveling to nations such as Ghana, Peru and Australia.
Read more about some of the 25 programs (not including Project Pericles scholars who will also be overseas) by clicking on the blog link to the right of the page.
Faculty and staff members are traveling overseas with 608 students. Programs will be on every continent except Antarctica. Courses range from culture, sport and media (Barbados) to field biology (Peru) to indigenous studies (Australia).
New Study Abroad programs in 2010 include the following:
– “Italian Comedy: Literature, History, Performance, & Legacy”
– “Business in the Caribbean Islands”
A third Study Abroad program returns after a decade hiatus. English faculty members Kathy-Lyday Lee and Richard Lee are leading 29 students to Europe for their program, “Holocaust Journey,” last offered in 2001 before Lyday-Lee began serving as chair of the English department. The class will visit several museums, cemeteries, former concentration camps and the Anne Frank house.
“I’m really passionate about making sure that a new generation understands what the Holocaust was all about. Survivors are leaving us. All we have left is the literature, and places to see,” Lyday-Lee said. “It’s wonderful to watch students travel, especially places they’ve never been, and its even more wonderful to see them grow and develop and appreciate not just the literature, but the history and the struggles people have gone through.”
“Traveling aboard is something I think everybody ought to do. It takes you out of your comfort zone,” she added. “That’s one of the best experiences you can have if you want to grow as a human being, to test your resolve.”
Students echo the same sentiment. Kaila Robertson, an international relations and political science double major from Chapel Hill, N.C., said her three-week program to London to document immigrant communities will help prepare her for future undergraduate research interests.
“I want to get a better feel for not only representing stories accurately and fairly, but being in an environment that you haven’t grown up in, and being able to talk to other people who have come from different backgrounds,” Robertson said.
Students interested in applying for the Winter 2012 programs abroad will first be able to register in March 2011. Please visit the Isabella Cannon International Centre website for more information about these and other programs.