Education Abroad Network

Education Abroad Network (UMTC EAN)

The University of Minnesota Twin Cities Education Abroad Network includes and serves professional advisers, faculty members, administrators, and others involved with education abroad. Meetings will be organized and convened twice a year by the Learning Abroad Center, but the agenda will be open to issues and topics identified by the entire group and relevant to a majority of participants. Preference will be given to sharing of practices, benchmarking, and updates to foster communication and expanded, multidisciplinary collaboration in regard to study abroad.

EAN Fall Meeting: Awareness of Group Dynamics and Student Behavior on Learning Abroad Programs

Wednesday, October 30, 2019

3-4:30 p.m. 

402 Walter Library, East Bank

To RSVP.

Session Description

Group dynamics and student behavior on learning abroad programs can make or break the experience for the program instructor, the host culture, and sometimes the overall student cohort.  June Nobbe, Assistant Vice Provost for Student Life and Learning Abroad Center staff will share strategies and resources that have been employed to minimize negative effects of student behaviors and dynamics on instructor-led and LAC center-based programs.  Examples include personality clashes, dealing with cliques, inter-group political or identity clashes, and lack of respectful engagement. How can we as a university community be an ally to students as they embark on a program abroad?  

Following presentations, ample time will be reserved for discussing how we can initiate conversations to students to think more about how they will be perceived in a different cultural context, how to navigate a new peer cohort, and ways to encourage students to practice self-awareness in the host culture.

June Nobbe is Assistant Vice Provost for Student Life. She has led multiple Global Seminars to Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, Turkey, Argentina, and  Panama. June has developed a semester-long cultural engagement curriculum for Learning Abroad Center programs in Rome, Florence, Montpellier, and Istanbul.

We hope you can join us!

EAN Advisory Board Members

• Gina Brewington, College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences (gbrewing@umn.edu)

• Scott Daby, Learning Abroad Center (daby0005@umn.edu)

• Kim Hindbjorgen, Learning Abroad Center (khindbjo@umn.edu)  

• Jeanette Howey, College of Liberal Arts, (howey002@umn.edu) 

• Cindy Pavlowski, College of Education and Human Development (pavlo002@umn.edu)

• Chris Schlichting, College of Design (schli019@umn.edu)

• Cathy Schuster, Office of Student Finance (heuer001@umn.edu)

• Ellen Sunshine, College of Education and Human Development (sunsh001@umn.edu) 

• Adriana Taborda, College of Liberal Arts (tabo0017@umn.edu) 

• Christopher Xaphakdy, College of Liberal Arts (xapha001@umn.edu)

Past EAN Meeting Topics and Resources 

Meetings are held twice a year, once in the fall and once in the spring.  For more information about past meetings and resources is available here.  

For more information, contact Kim Hindbjorgen, khindbjo@umn.edu.