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Session 2260

INTERNATIONALIZATION OF THE LAFAYETTE COLLEGE ENGINEERING CURRICULUM

Leonard A. Van Gulick, Michael A. Paolino Lafayette College

Abstract

Three key features serve to internationalize the Lafayette College undergraduate engineering curriculum.

Semester-long study abroad opportunities for students in all Lafayette B.S. engineering degree programs.

A five-year, two-degree program in which B.S. engineering students acquire in-depth knowledge of a foreign language and culture and complete a semester-long capstone experience working abroad as an engineer during their fifth year.

An Interim Session Program, a three-week long foreign study program, usually conducted in January, is also available to Lafayette Engineering Students.

This paper discusses the first two programs in detail. It also presents recent developments, including the use of two-way video conferencing to offer necessary technical courses to Lafayette engineering students studying abroad.

Interim Session courses offer three-weeks of full-time foreign study under the on-site direction of Lafayette faculty members to groups of fifteen to twenty-five students. Several Interim Session courses are available each year. This year’s courses are being taught in Africa, China, Germany and the Czech Republic, and Great Britain. Interim courses are equivalent to three-credit on- campus courses and are usually considered to social science or humanities electives for engineering students.

Study Abroad

Semester-long or year-long study abroad has been long recognized at Lafayette as an invaluable educational experience. Study abroad is considered particularly valuable if it gives the student experience in functioning in a non-English speaking society. In-depth immersion in a foreign culture is always a primary goal of study abroad at Lafayette.

The highly structured, sequential nature of typical U.S. undergraduate engineering curricula tends to discourage students from studying abroad. Foreign institutions only rarely offer the specialized, often institutuion-specific, technical courses, required by U.S. engineering curricula. Students can usually only participate in study abroad if they are prepared to “fall out-of- sequence” and extend the time required to earn their B.S. engineering degree. Those few foreign

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Paolino, M. A., & Van Gulick, L. A. (1997, June), Internationalization Of The Lafayette College Engineering Curriculum Paper presented at 1997 Annual Conference, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 10.18260/1-2--6649