Study Abroad Shifts in Troubled Economic Times

To cut travel abroad, or not. And if so, how? And how to "spin" it if you do? Elizabeth Redden surveys the state of this issue from conversations at the Forum on Education Abroad's fifth conference:

A conference session here on being proactive in economically reactive times attracted a (proactive or reactive?) crowd. 'The size of this audience, given the number of people here, shows that misery does love company, Stevan Trooboff, president and CEO of the Council on International Educational Exchange, said. . . . But one of the take-aways from the session was that misery isn't widely, or at the very least, equally shared in the field at this point. Fortunes seem to vary. In fact, many institutions are expecting increasing or at least flat study abroad enrollments in the near future—with the exception perhaps of some small private colleges that are hurting and are (proactively) attempting to keep their numbers down. . . . 'There's clearly an attempt by many of the private colleges already to limit or to restrict the numbers of students eligible to go on study abroad, and this is being done in a number of ways,' said Adrian Beaulieu, dean of international studies at Providence College, who, like his co-presenters Friday, had prepared for his talk by surveying colleges similar to his own (in this case New England private colleges).

Strengthening Study Abroad: Recommendations for Effective Institutional Management for Presidents, Senior Administrators, and Study Abroad Professiona

The press release for this report from the National Association for Study Abroad (NASFA), which is endorsed by several presidents' organizations, states: "'As study abroad continues to grow, and as demand for study abroad expands, it is the responsibility of institutional leadership to undertake a deliberate and proactive approach to developing and supporting this important component of the education of today's college students�. Attention, involvement, and commitment at the highest levels of an institution's leadership are vital to the success and growth of study abroad.' The report urges campus leaders to confront a set of 'specific challenges that virtually all institutions face,' setting out fourteen criteria for the institutional management of study abroad in four major categories: institutional commitment; infrastructure; resources; and clarity and accountability."