Research shows that the impact of international experiences is highly increased by training students’ intercultural skills and Crossing Borders Education is dedicated to supporting educators with powerful tools to unlock the incredible learning potentials of study abroad. Our three feature films, 40+ short videos, online toolkits and facilitator manuals are created to empower students before, during and after their time away and can be easily adapted to specific program needs.
These intercultural resources cover key learning areas that are increasingly important for undergraduate curricula and enhance skills such as critical thinking, cross-cultural openness, social awareness, welcoming diverse perspectives, intercultural empathy, enhanced civic engagement, and other.
The Crossing Borders Education toolkits are vital resources to ensure global competency, international awareness and the fundamental necessity of acceptance.Lauren Norville, Assistant Director, Office of International Services, Teachers College, Columbia University
Supporting study abroad objectives:
Our intercultural resources are carefully crafted to support study abroad coordinators in following efforts:
- To spark students’ interest to increase their intercultural skills on study abroad programs.
- To create intercultural orientations and training sessions.
- To communicate the powerful impact of international education to administrators, faculty and staff.
- To create cross-subject, cross-cultural campus events that bring students of diverse ethnic, cultural and socio-economic backgrounds together.
Resources that engage students:
The following resources show how we meet the objectives above with tools that engage students personally, emotionally and intellectually.
1. Short Videos:
Short videos such as Why explore Diversity? below, our film trailers and creative resources such as our Quote Cards help students to get a glimpse of the potential life changing impact of intercultural experiences.
2. Educational Resources:
Short activities such as On Stereotypes provide students with the opportunity to grow intercultural awareness prior to traveling abroad. Programs like the Study Abroad Toolkit, which we developed with the SIT Graduate Institute, provide the practical tools to create intercultural orientations and training sessions. Our pages like Campus Internationalization Resources can inspire, challenge and support your administration to include intercultural events and sessions into curricular on campus and in doing so naturally increase student interest for study abroad.
3. Intercultural Films:
Our engaging, character driven, emotional documentaries Crossing Borders, The Dialogue and American Textures can support you to host powerful screening discussion events that can reach the campus community, connect diverse student groups and interlink diverse subject areas.
Program sponsors need not be expert practitioners in intercultural learning, rather, the CBE tools provide the necessary framework and resources to implement a thorough, reflective learning experience.Bethany Keller, Multicultural Center and International Student Affairs, Webster University, MO
Short Term Travel Programs:
In addition to our engaging films, toolkits and creative resources, we are organising unique cross-cultural short term programs to Morocco. At a time of increased islamophobia, it creates a truly profound impact for students of diverse ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds to travel together in North Africa on our Morocco Exchange. Since 2004, we have organised well over 650 successful and safe immersion programs for more than 10,000 US college students and we would be delighted to custom tailor one for your institution.
After this program I feel that in order to truly understand any culture one must experience it first hand.Katie Kollar, Student, New York University
