The Fulbright-Nehru International Education Administrators Seminar invites about a dozen academics from the United States to tour India for two weeks. By meeting with representatives from 15 universities across 4 cities, we will learn about the higher education system in India and identify potential student exchanges and research collaborations.
When I heard about the IEA Seminars, I was attracted to the possibility to learn more about how to internationalize my home campus. One of the initiatives I led at MGH Institute of Health Professions was to formalize our travel study programs. As policies and procedures came into place, more faculty members embraced the possibility to lead student groups abroad.
Traveling to another country to gain more nuanced understanding of how international collaborations form was the next step for my professional growth. Fulbright offers IEA Seminars to seven countries. India stood out to me as the most promising for creating partnerships. For one, English is the language of instruction there. Also, India has a longstanding tradition of holistic healing, which fits with the health professions offered at the IHP.
Unlike the standard Fulbright award for research, which can last up to a year, the IEA Seminars are designed for academic administrators, who can't take too much time away from their offices. I appreciated the difference when I shared my itinerary with a faculty colleague, who had received a yearlong Fulbright to India a few years ago. She had warned me that the Indian commission that coordinates the award often accommodates grantees in shoddy hotels upon arrival. But, when she saw the slate of five-star hotels they have planned for our group, she told me how lucky I was.
It's never easy to take a two-week hiatus from work, especially this semester when I'm serving as Acting Provost. Still, I've been able to arrange my schedule to minimize disrupting the Institute's work flow. I also expect to have regular Internet access to monitor any unforeseen incidents.
The first leg of the trip takes me from Boston to Newark and from there overnight to Mumbai. Of course, it will be nighttime Saturday by the time I land. Several other Seminar participants will be on the second flight, and I've made plans to meet two of them for dinner in the airport before we board. Skirmishes between India and Pakistan over Kashmir have delayed air traffic the past week, though tensions seem to have returned to their normal simmer.
I'm looking forward to seeing a country I've read about and even taught about when I was a professor of anthropology. I want to broaden my perspective on higher education beyond the few institutions I'm most familiar with. Ideally, I will identify a relationship with an Indian university that will advance our mutual missions.
When I heard about the IEA Seminars, I was attracted to the possibility to learn more about how to internationalize my home campus. One of the initiatives I led at MGH Institute of Health Professions was to formalize our travel study programs. As policies and procedures came into place, more faculty members embraced the possibility to lead student groups abroad.
Traveling to another country to gain more nuanced understanding of how international collaborations form was the next step for my professional growth. Fulbright offers IEA Seminars to seven countries. India stood out to me as the most promising for creating partnerships. For one, English is the language of instruction there. Also, India has a longstanding tradition of holistic healing, which fits with the health professions offered at the IHP.
Unlike the standard Fulbright award for research, which can last up to a year, the IEA Seminars are designed for academic administrators, who can't take too much time away from their offices. I appreciated the difference when I shared my itinerary with a faculty colleague, who had received a yearlong Fulbright to India a few years ago. She had warned me that the Indian commission that coordinates the award often accommodates grantees in shoddy hotels upon arrival. But, when she saw the slate of five-star hotels they have planned for our group, she told me how lucky I was.
It's never easy to take a two-week hiatus from work, especially this semester when I'm serving as Acting Provost. Still, I've been able to arrange my schedule to minimize disrupting the Institute's work flow. I also expect to have regular Internet access to monitor any unforeseen incidents.
The first leg of the trip takes me from Boston to Newark and from there overnight to Mumbai. Of course, it will be nighttime Saturday by the time I land. Several other Seminar participants will be on the second flight, and I've made plans to meet two of them for dinner in the airport before we board. Skirmishes between India and Pakistan over Kashmir have delayed air traffic the past week, though tensions seem to have returned to their normal simmer.
I'm looking forward to seeing a country I've read about and even taught about when I was a professor of anthropology. I want to broaden my perspective on higher education beyond the few institutions I'm most familiar with. Ideally, I will identify a relationship with an Indian university that will advance our mutual missions.
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