The University of South Carolina, in conjunction with the Education Abroad Office, is honored to host the Forum on Education Abroad Standards of Good Practice Workshop for the second year in a row on February 2nd, 2018.
According to the Forum on Education Abroad’s website, “The Forum’s institutional members include U.S. colleges and universities, overseas institutions, consortia, agencies, provider organizations and foundations. The Forum focuses on developing and implementing standards of good practice, encouraging and supporting research initiatives, and offering educational programs and resources to its members. Its mission is to help to improve education abroad programs to benefit the students that participate in them. It is achieving this goal by establishing standards of good practice and quality assurance programs, improving education abroad curricula, and promoting data collection and outcomes assessment, all to advocate for high quality education abroad programs.”
Throughout the year, the Forum invites institutions of higher learning throughout the U.S. to host workshops surrounding their Standards of Good Practice. These workshops are complimentary to the national conference held each year in March, and are conducted with the hope that staff who are unable to travel to the national location will still be able to attend a regional workshop, such as the one at USC.
The two sessions that attendees can choose from at the USC workshop are titled Student Learning, Development and Academic Framework and Program Resources, Policies and Procedures. According to the event website, “Student Learning, Development and Academic Framework” focuses on student learning, development and the academic framework for education abroad and will help to identify resource and design programming to assist in this effort. Through simulations involving specific examples, participants will address critical issues often introduced by colleagues in higher education who are unfamiliar with the importance of tying these two areas together in education abroad. Additionally, “Program Resources, Policies and Procedures” focuses on Policies and Procedures and the Organizational and Program Resources. Through discussion and analysis of specific case studies participants will explore how these two Standards can assist an organization in attaining more effective use of resources through the proper implementation of policies. Each session qualifies as a Forum Certification Workshop and will be facilitated by Kristen Mallory, Director of Off-Campus Study at Claremont McKenna College.
The deadline for attendees to register for the workshops is January 19th, 2018. Anyone who is interested in attending should contact the Education Abroad Office at 803-777-7557.