VCU Globe returns to campus

By Amelia Heymann

Virginia Commonwealth University's Global Education Office is charting a new course for VCU Globe, a program it touts as a passport to global leadership, learning and career skills.

Originally launched in 2013, Globe served as a living-learning program focused on world engagement. Domestic and international students lived in the West Grace North residence hall and shared classes, volunteer opportunities and cultural engagement activities geared toward Globe participants. The program ended in 2022.

"The previous iteration of VCU Globe was such an incredibly successful living-learning program that had enormous outcomes for the participants," said Stephanie Tignor, who leads the program and is the GEO's executive director of global learning. When the global learning department was formed in 2022 by combining education abroad and global student engagement operations in GEO, she said, leaders wanted to bring back the "magic of VCU Globe."

The program's new iteration is more flexible and, notably, more accessible to students.

Without the previous rigid timeline and dorm residency requirement, students now have more freedom to choose the lectures, volunteer opportunities and other engagement activities they participate in - which allows them to tailor the VCU Globe experience to their needs and curate their own global learning journey.

"We brought it back in a different iteration that would allow even more students to join and have multiple entry points for joining, because with the previous VCU Globe, you really did need six semesters in order to participate," said Jill E. Blondin, Ph.D., vice provost for global initiatives in the GEO. "And in this situation, it's open to all students, even graduate students, which is much different."

Tignor noted that the GEO's core outcomes for student learning - observing and relating to cultures; developing global self-awareness; and articulating and integrating global knowledge - are fully embodied in Globe.

In the new program, students can earn three levels of digital microcredential certificates by accumulating points across three core requirements, which are now more flexible in execution.

Engage in major global experiences: These include study abroad, intercultural training, globally focused internships and more.

Learn from globally focused academic opportunities: Options include enrolling in a foreign language course and achieving the student Global Zone Training badge.

VCU Globe Speaker Series

"Students also could be engaging in a virtual exchange, which could look like participating in the virtual global learning academy, which we offer today through the English Language Program," Tignor said.

Participate in interpersonal cultural experiences: These range from attending a Global Cafe or career prep workshop to participating in peer leadership or a lecture in the VCU Globe Speaker Series.

"By putting all of the programming we offer into these three categories, we're trying to help students to experience a breadth of global learning opportunities because there are so many ways that students can engage with global learning," Tignor said.

And she emphasized how more students can join the new iteration of VCU Globe, as the earlier live-in requirement limited participation to those who lived on campus. Still, there will be an optional freshman living-learning community that students can join to enhance their Globe experience.