by Christine Hearn
Illustration by Kevin Ghiclione

Students, faculty and staff are on the move.

Nello Angerilli has a not-so-modest goal: he'd like to see every student have some international experience before getting a degree.

As executive director of SFU International, Angerilli believes that international experience changes students and faculty, and through them the university as a whole. "The view of the world is different for those who move around," he says. "They gain the perspective that Vancouver is not the centre of the universe."

SFU has had a long involvement in international activities with a major increase over the past 10 years. The university is committed to enhanced internationalization, and Angerilli, who has spent years managing university projects in Indonesia, believes it is difficult these days to deliver a high quality of education without some international experience. Current activity includes alumni events; student, faculty, and staff mobility programs; international student recruitment; international delivery of curricula; development projects; and contract education.

  Faculty Exchange

For English professor Paul Budra the experience hit on New Year's Day 2002. He and his younger son, Max, were standing outside a closed castle in a desolate, bizarre, brown landscape in Connemara, Ireland.

"Max said he felt like we were in the Middle Ages and that's when it really clicked that I was in Ireland and would be teaching in an Irish university for the next six months," recalls Budra, who had exchanged jobs, cars, and houses with an Irish faculty member. Home for Budra, his wife, and two sons was not a medieval walled town, but a sprawling, walled suburb outside Galway, the fastest growing city in Europe.

He found the Irish university teaching system very different. In the lecture course, Budra taught one hour a week but otherwise had no contact with the students; in the smaller seminars the entire grade was based on the final essay.

Budra says teaching abroad has given him a new appreciation for SFU. "The system there is set up for the convenience of the professors; it's really a very cushy life," he explains. "At SFU we're more student-oriented and as a result I think our students get a much better education."

Other recent faculty exchanges include psychology professor Marilyn Bowman, who is in Hong Kong, and two Chinese scholars who were at SFU over the summer, one from East China Normal University in Shanghai and one from Jilin University in Changchun.

  Field Schools

Two years ago archaeology chair David Burley found himself and his field school students in the middle of a coup in Fiji. "We were watching a parade when they took over the parliament buildings," he says. "We were right there when they burned Suva [the capital]; in fact the building next door to where we were staying was burned down. So we moved to a dig on the island of Ovalau, but things got hot there too so we had to airlift the students out." Fortunately this year's field school with its 19 archaeology students (there were also 10 linguistics students in Fiji this summer) was a calmer experience.

Despite the adventures, the students find it an exceptional experience. "I've never had a single student complain that it wasn't totally positive," explains Burley. "For most of them it is their first time outside North America; for some, it is their first time outside Vancouver."

The students attend classes at the University of the South Pacific for the first part of the semester; then the archaeology students spend three weeks in the field, usually at Sigatoka Sand Dunes National Park on the Coral Coast, working in coordination with the National Trust of Fiji and the Fiji Museum.

"I think the students get a whole range of benefits," says Burley. "It's one thing to study something, but it's quite another to be in an actual research project surrounded by Fijians and Fijian culture. It's a very valuable experience."

About 100 students per year attend field schools in countries including China, Cuba, Greece, the Czech Republic, Ghana, Indonesia, and Latin America. SFU developed its first field school in Latin America 27 years ago. Field schools continue to provide a unique opportunity for group study opportunities in non-traditional overseas environments.

  Development Activities

Environmental scientist Leah Bendell-Young believes universities such as SFU have a moral responsibility to be leaders in world affairs. "I feel that as a university we have an important role to play in outreach," she says. "We should be taking many more risks in getting involved in issues of global concern, and reaching international students is the best way of doing that."

Bendell-Young has been involved for several years with a Canadian International Development Agency project at Manado, North Sulawesi, in Indonesia. The project allows select graduate students at Manado Universitas Sam Ratulangi to get a master's degree through the two universities.

"My thought is that we have to try to expand outside our insular university," says Bendell-Young. "It's the whole idea of giving back Ð we have the benefits and opportunities to pursue so much and we make such a tremendous impression on these students. It's important that we further educate where it can really have an effect."

Four of Bendell-Young's Indonesian students have already challenged accepted practices by exposing a major environmental hazard in North Sulawesi's Minhasa Peninsula. They found that illegal gold mining has seriously raised the mercury levels of fish in the area. "I had them take this on as a project," says Bendell-Young. "We then published an article pointing out the hazards of illegal gold mining."

It can be daunting for faculty members in a strange country: "I was in Indonesia by myself when the politics of the time added to the feelings of isolation. I didn't have a translator so I felt very isolated, but the people bent over backwards to help me and keep me informed."

The university has extensive development activities in many parts of the world. The Eastern Indonesia project strengthens science teaching at Indonesian universities; the Centre for Distance Education has undertaken project design and delivery work in the Caribbean, Africa, South America, Asia, and the South Pacific; and continuing studies writing and publishing program has developed technical communication materials for engineers and others who work for S.A. International in Tamil Nadu State in India.

In 10 years international exchange options have grown from two to more than 80 and now involve more than 30 countries, with new opportunities increasing every year.

International Co-op and Exchange

With 12 years of after-school Cantonese lessons, communications student Brenda Tang was a natural to go to China on a co-op program to teach English. But Tang wasn't allowed to tell her students that she spoke Cantonese until her last day. "They freaked totally," she laughs. "They said, ÔSo you knew what we were talking about all along!' And I did."

Tang was in Guangzhou, southern China, at the American Language, Technology, and Education Center, teaching basic conversational English, an experience she'd recommend to other co-op students. "I'd say it was one of the best times ever," she says. "I got to work and travel at the same time and it was a tremendous opportunity." Tang says in addition to the fun, she learned from experiencing a different culture and meeting new people, and she gained teaching and leadership skills as well. She says that she is still in touch with a number of her former students via email.

The eight months in China were challenging. Even though she spoke the language Tang says it was hard to adjust at first. Tang felt she was really in China one day when she sat down and ate so-called street meat. "It was prepared on a barbecue beside a dump in the middle of nowhere and it was pretty dirty," she recalls. "But I thought, Oh well, I'm here, might as well eat it."

SFU is making international co-op placements an increasing priority. Last year 100 co-op students went to other countries. During the summer 14 students were in Japan working with companies including Sony and Sanyo. Other co-op students over the years have worked in 25 countries, including Australia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yugoslavia and for companies and agencies as diverse as Hong Kong banks and the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology.

In addition to co-op placements, students have the opportunity for a wide range of exchange experiences. Student exchanges stretch from Adelaide to Albuquerque, from Oslo to Osaka. In 10 years international exchange options have grown from two to more than 80 and now involve more than 30 countries, with new opportunities increasing every year. In May university president Michael Stevenson signed a student exchange agreement with Hong Kong University that provides for exchanges of students in all fields. A memorandum of understanding was also signed with Malaysia's Sunway College for future arrangements for Malaysian students to attend SFU.

  Alumni

The university has lasting influence with overseas alumni Ð many of whom return to their home countries after studying here. SFU records show more than 5,500 alumni are living in 113 countries outside Canada. Alumni representation can be found in the U.K., Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, Japan, Singapore, Korea, and Western Europe.

In his spring trip to Asia, president Stevenson hosted alumni events in Hong Kong, which has 1,200 alumni; Singapore, which has 500 alumni; Malaysia, which has 250 alumni; and Vietnam, which has 20 alumni. The events were well attended and well received. International alumni are SFU's best ambassadors for raising the university's profile internationally and have been most effective in recruiting students from their home countries.

  Institutional Agreements

The president also signed a number of institutional agreements, including a memorandum of understanding with Hong Kong Baptist University for the joint delivery of an SFU degree in business and communication. It will be delivered entirely in Hong Kong and about 50 students a year will participate.

The university has been invited to participate in the delivery of a master's degree program in Vietnam. Faculties of education from around the world submitted proposals and SFU was one of only two accepted. While in Vietnam the president visited Hue University of Education in Hanoi and the University of Natural Sciences in Ho Chi Minh City. And in Malaysia he met with a group seeking the university's assistance in developing a new university chartered by the Malaysian government. There is also a possibility of twinning programs with several Malaysian colleges.

The agreements and exchanges are all part of the increasing global opportunities that executive director Angerilli and his team want to provide. Randall Martin, director of international cooperation and mobility, explains that in Europe approximately 300,000 students move around annually, that the goal in Europe is to move 10 percent of faculty and 10 percent of students each year.

"We're a long way from that here," Martin says. "But it's certainly something to aim for as we develop an academic response to the forces of globalization." aq

Find more information on SFU 's international activities online.

© 2002 aq magazine