When Ross Lewin takes the helm as the associate vice president for international affairs this summer, he knows his initiatives will have to extend far beyond the borders of the campus.
Lewin, the executive director of the Office of Global Programs at the University of Connecticut, said he plans to expand upon this university’s international relationships by crafting innovative ways to connect across the globe. But before this university begins its outreach abroad, Lewin said he hopes to take advantage of its proximity to the nation’s capital by forging relationships with the State Department and other federal institutions.
“The main goal really is to more deeply network,” he said. “The university already has over 300 partnerships, and it’s about making sure that those partnerships run deep and that they’re not passive agreements – that they have teeth to them.”
Lewin said one of his biggest priorities after he assumes the position at the end of July will be ensuring this university’s partnerships with international institutions are available to students in all departments.
University President Wallace Loh said these types of alliances are crucial to both furthering the university’s aims and better preparing students for life after college.
“Our job is to prepare our students to be global citizens and to forge alliances that will keep our state and nation at the forefront of technological and intellectual development,” Loh said in a press release. “I am confident Ross Lewin’s experience and wealth of ideas will advance our global networking and prominence.”
These partnerships won’t just enrich students’ educational experiences, Lewin said, but provide students with the tools they need to solve world problems.
“One of my passions is global citizenship,” Lewin said. “The way I understand global citizenship is in line with the mission of the university. It really means taking responsibility for problems across the globe and working toward their solutions.”
Although plans are far from being set in stone, Lewin said he plans to explore setting up an international summer school so students from other nations could come together to study various issues, such as national security.
While the university already sends many students abroad each year, making it a “global hub of expertise” would further strengthen ties, he said. Lewin added using technological advances to create global classrooms where students from different nations could interact with one another is another means of facilitating these links.
Interim Associate Vice President for International Programs Jon Wilkenfeld said one of the major goals of the department is expanding study abroad opportunities for all students.
“The University of Maryland is already one of the major players in the United States in terms of study abroad,” Wilkenfeld said. “We want to increase that quite a bit, and one of the things we have done is increase the amount of scholarship money that will be available for students who could not otherwise go abroad.”
Lewin said he also hopes to increase the number of international students, as well as ramp up opportunities for faculty and staff to take part in global experiences.
“I think we need to work on developing faculty and staff exchanges,” he said. “The way to internationalize the university is to internationalize the whole culture. We also need to focus our energy on affording faculty and non-academic staff opportunities internationally.”
These sorts of initiatives will significantly improve the university’s ability to provide its students with a global education, Loh said.
“We have a lot of international activities on this campus, but there’s a need for better integration and focus,” he said. “We are doing 40 different things and … if you focus, you can have more of an impact.”
“There’s an amazing amount of international activity that’s already taking place,” Lewin said. “We just need to build on what we already have.”
kirkwood@umdbk.com
