The Brown community is increasingly familiar with the broad range of collaborative research and course development that students and faculty undertake together under a variety of programs: UTRA/Odyssey, Women in Science and Engineering, the Hughes program for students in biomedical research areas. With more than 80 percent of the faculty involved and 180 grants awarded in 1996-97, there is substantial discussion about these opportunities across the campus.
Fewer people, however, are aware of the opportunities that have emerged for students and faculty to work together abroad.
International UTRAs (Undergraduate Teaching and Research Assistantships) have developed gradually in recent years as opportunities have presented themselves. Students have worked on archeological projects at the southern Temple of Petra, Jordan, with Professor Martha Joukowsky; at the medieval Abbey of Saint-Jean-des-Vignes in Soissons, France, with Professor Sheila Bonde; and at the Cerro Cocoyo Archaeological Project in Cholula, Mexico, with Professor Geoffrey McCafferty. Some students have worked in Thailand with Professor Patricia Symonds on an "HIV/AIDS Prevention through Empowerment" project. One student has worked in rural Mali with Professor Sarah Castle on a project assessing "Women's Status and Family Planning Use." All of these projects are the easiest for the UTRA/Odyssey selection committee to assess, because given well-developed proposals it is clear that the work of the two individuals will be conducted in close proximity and with constant interaction virtually every day.
Other projects have been approved when the faculty member is to be present for some of the time, and another colleague or resident collaborator of the faculty, working on site on the project, with whom the student can confer in the absence of the faculty. This would characterize projects that have taken place in American Samoa with Professor Stephen McGarvey on "Knowledge, Attitude and Belief of HIV/AIDS;" at the San Lucas Health Project in Guatemala with Dr. Stephen McCloy focusing on the prevalence and risk factors of anemia among women; in Ireland gathering material on Irish landlordism in the National Library of Ireland and Trinity College with Professor Perry Curtis; and in Ghana with Professor Michael White working on the social support and the reproductive health of adolescent mothers. One student went to Russia to study a specific branch of the Old Believers in Siberia. There, the student worked with Professor Patricia Herlihy, drew on the resources of the Moscow Historical Library for access to significant written materials, and interviewed key individuals whose unique experience made them crucial to the research.
Feedback from the international projects has been uniformly high from both faculty and students. Typically, ongoing work results in the form of honors theses, presentations at national meetings, and publications. In most cases, the even greater impact for the students has been the richness of the learning about the other country, the other culture, and about themselves. If the country is a developing one, the experience is particularly powerful. As one student commented, the experience "put things in perspective and helped me to focus on what is important in life." Another observed that "my humility grew as a result of the fact that I could not rely on any measures of social status to which I was accustomed. They say that difficult situations strengthen character; until this experience I did not realize that this meant difficult situations can give someone the strength to be open to humbling experiences."
Not all situations are easy, nor hazard-free. One student found her patience tested by the village elders who thought they were doing her a favor by finding her a husband. Another observed that she had contracted amoebas and hookworm while on her project. Nonetheless, she returned from the experience committed to pursing a career in international health with a focus on infectious diseases, nutritional deficiencies, and diarrheal disease. Another summarized her experience: "You ask me to discuss the ups and downs of my summer, but I feel like the joys overwhelm any problems that I may have faced."
We have begun to exploit the international UTRA opportunities and to tap into connections through faculty interests, and alumni and parent contacts. Recently an alumnus who had done a great deal of work in Ireland made it possible for an undergraduate, with background in Irish history, to apply for a specially funded opportunity to work with the Women's Research Council in Dublin for a summer. The fellowship involves working closely with the members of the council, which deals with a wide range of issues affecting women in Ireland, from grassroots organizations to the highest government and policy levels. The grant may become a model for other international opportunities, based on strong connections between alumni and organizations, the faculty and the curriculum, that can assure the finest quality of experiential education.
Over the past year the Brown Office of International Programs has made a substantial contribution to the UTRA/Odyssey Program to enable students to have such international experiences with faculty abroad. The continuing collaboration with OIP could lead to other opportunities. Among them may be specific positions linked to a semester-abroad program. For example, the UTRA/Odyssey Program is currently discussing an excellent experience one student had following a semester in the Brown program in Madagascar. The student worked in a health clinic which was integrated with alternative medical healing practices using local plant substances; the focus on indigenous healing was designed to lead the Malagasy to understand the importance of their plants and forests and thereby to support a conservation movement. The possibility that a student might be able to spend a summer following his or her semester of study in Madagascar working in medical anthropology, plant science or environmental sciences with sponsorship of one of our faculty in those fields opens the horizons for yet another kind of international experience.
Brown has discovered many alumni in different parts of the world who are interested in offering international internships to students. The Career Development Office among others has been active in identifying such possible placement. Internships and international UTRAs go hand in hand as complementary experiences, the one focused on experiential, hands-on learning, the other on a combination of research and cultural experience carried out in collaboration with a sponsoring faculty expert and mentor. Incorporating such opportunities into the Brown education will further the internationalization of the Brown curriculum and the preparation of undergraduates for life in our interdependent global future.
Karen T. Romer is associate dean for academic affairs.