Global Learning through Short-Term Study Abroad

Abstract

Short-term study abroad experiences - those in which students are engaged for fewer than eight weeks - are the most common type of undergraduate study abroad in the United States. According to the Institute of International Education's 2008 Open Doors report, more than half of all American students who studied abroad in the 2006-07 academic year (55.4 percent) participated in short-term Shortterm programs are increasing in popularity for many reasons: they are generally more affordable than programs, they appeal to students who might not be able or willing to commit to a semester or a year and they allow students in structured academic programs like engineering, nursing, and education to study abroad without falling behind in their But because widespread participation in short-term study abroad programs is a relatively new phenomenon - (during the 1996-97 academic year, only 3.3 percent of students studying abroad participated in short-term programs) - there is litde formal research describing either the best practices for short-term study abroad or the learning outcomes that can accompany it. DEFINING AND DEFENDING SHORT-TERM STUDY ABROAD While nearly all institutions define short-term study abroad as programs that last less than a semester or quarter, there is a great deal of variation within the short-term category. Short-term programs can range from weeklong programs conducted during spring break in conjunction with a single course, to three- or four-week programs conducted during January term or in the summer, to programs of up to eight weeks that can involve homestays, travel to multiple sites, and service or research experiences. Many shortterm programs include several or many of these elements. There is no average short-term study abroad program; the variations are as numerous as the institutions that host them. For the majority of the twentieth century, students who studied abroad were from wealthy families who could afford to send those young adults to study foreign languages or the humanities in European capital cities (Lewin 2009, xiv; Dessoff 2006, 22). The explosion of globalization at the end of the twentieth century helped encourage greater numbers of students from more diverse backgrounds and fields of study to go abroad. However, not all of them desired or were able to dedicate a year or even a semester to an in-depth experience and institutions - and for-profit companies - began offering shorter-term programs that appealed to greater numbers of students. But because longer-term programs had been the norm for so many years, short-term study abroad has suffered an often unjustified reputation problem. Short-terms have kind of been the stepchild of study abroad, says Lisa Chieffo, associate director of the University of Delaware's Center for International Studies. They were initially often summer programs with a 'vacation-y' image. And a lot of purists don't believe a month is a long enough time for a significant experience abroad. All this is even more reason that institutions must have strong academic foundations for their short-term programs. Sarah Spencer, director of short-term programs at the University of St. Thomas, says something as simple as how institutions frame their short-term programs can go a long way toward helping counter the stereotypes. Avoid two four-letter words: trip and tour, she recommends. trip is a one-time, isolated thing. A good short-term program is strongly connected to coursework and an integral part of a larger learning experience. Though many faculty members still feel that longer is better when it comes to study at least one study has found evidence that duration of stay is insignificant in terms of the degree to which students who study abroad are globally engaged. A 2009 study from the University of Minnesota (Paige et al. 2009) surveyed more than six thousand alumni from twenty universities who had participated in study abroad over a period of fifty years. …

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