Study abroad for advisers

A dozen advisers and administrators traveled to India to gain insight into the university experience of students in India and to network with colleagues at Christ (Deemed to Be) University, one of UC’s 12 global strategic partners. Their goal was to kickstart specific projects to better the experiences of international students at UC.

International education and a global campus are vital components of the Next Lives Here promise of real-world learning for all University of Cincinnati students, regardless of their background or program of study. UC’s core institutional partnerships worldwide help sustain experiential learning programs and support the universities’ global educational and research goals.

Two previous “Study Abroad for Advisers” programs—to Spain and France in 2018 and to the University of Zagreb in Croatia in 2019—were designed to offer UC advising staff the experience of joining a faculty-led study abroad program. With that firsthand glimpse and a chance to exchange best practices, the advisers are now better able to support UC students who want to study abroad.

Ryan Meyer, associate director of UC International Programs (Study Abroad) described the origin of the advisers’ program.

“It actually came out of a presentation session at a conference. Somebody said, wouldn't this be a cool thing?” he said. “It kind of snowballed from there.

“The focus in those first two trips was the study abroad experience and getting advisers to be well versed in what study abroad looked like. They really had that unique experience of seeing it from the student’s lens.”  

After the COVID travel shutdown forced the cancelation of the third Study Abroad for Advisers trip to Colombia in March 2020, Meyer and UC’s advising leadership decided to shift the program’s focus. This year’s trip was for advisers who work with international students here at UC.

“After that long pause, it was kind of a natural time to think: How do we reimagine this?” Meyer said. “We've done study abroad for a couple of years, why don't we look at this other population who is also on a study abroad, here in the U.S.?”

Last year, nearly one in 10 students at the University of Cincinnati was international. Students come to UC from more than 120 countries around the globe, but more than half come from India, which made Christ an ideal host for the program.

Participants for the 2024 trip were chosen on the basis of proposals they submitted for projects to improve their own or their unit’s service to international students.

“If one out of every 10 students that an adviser meets with is international, the [UC advisers] should know the kinds of things that they're going to be experiencing with these students,” said the 2024 group’s co-leader Lorri Blanton, assistant director for student programming for UC International. She and her staff provide social and academic support for international students.

“We wanted for them to come back and identify gaps in how we support our international student population,” said co-leader Leah Frierson, director of University Advising Leadership. Her goal is to make it easier for students to navigate sometimes siloed college and campus services at UC.

After almost 24 hours of travel, an experience that in itself stirred empathy for international students who arrive at UC, the advisers plunged into a full schedule of meetings and programs at Christ’s Bangalore and Delhi campuses.

They had the chance to meet with their counterparts who manage student affairs and provide counseling and other support services. They also had opportunities to speak to students and faculty. All of those encounters gave them insight into the different expectations and experiences students have in India.   

Examples are continuing parental involvement in students’ daily lives, mandatory class attendance and required engagement in university events.

“Our expectation [in the U.S.] is that you have a high level of independence as you're navigating your collegiate career. When those two expectations come into conflict, it's frustrating for both sides,” said Blanton, who daily meets students trying to navigate those differences.

“Being able to try to share that cultural difference is important. It's a good reminder for our staff who work with students every day,” she said.

“It's just a culture bump, I think, where expectations don't meet.”

Beyond the differences they observed on the trip, the advisors found a lot of common ground.

Suzette Combs is director of the Gen-1 program and 1mpact House that serve first-generation college students at UC. She recognized many commonalities between the first-generation college students she serves and international students on UC’s campus.

That includes the strong familiar—and familial—community ties that both groups bring as “capital” they can draw on in their university lives. But both groups lack some of the other advantages that students with different backgrounds may have: the social, academic, linguistic and professional capital needed to succeed and to move on to careers or graduate programs.  

“There's a lot of overlap, with not understanding the culture or the vocabulary, not having support from your family right at your fingertips, all of those kinds of things.”

She learned that universities in India are directly involved in arranging post-graduation job placements for their students, which is not typical at U.S. universities. She plans to collaborate with UC International on career-focused programming like the existing Ready, Set, Graduate program the office runs to increase students’ career capital. She’ll also work on professional development opportunities for staff and student mentors, including cultural awareness and competency training.

Combs said that the potential for collaboration with UC colleagues is another clear benefit for the advisers who made the trip.

“The trip confirmed that overlap and reinvigorated me to really ask who my allies are and who else [at UC] is doing this kind of work.,” she said. She and Blanton are now working on other joint projects.

Sarah Jernigan, a senior academic adviser in the Carl. H. Lindner College of Business, agreed that closer collaboration benefits everyone.

“Especially with UC being such a large organization, it's helpful to know people. I have a ton of students that minor in other colleges, and I hate not being able to do a 'warm referral' [for information about those colleges]. Now I feel like I can, and that's really helpful,” she said.

Jernigan did her doctoral dissertation on mental health for international students in higher education. She had the opportunity to meet with staff who provide counseling and psychological services at Christ and found that there is still a stigma attached to discussing mental health problems outside of the family.

She is hoping to develop an affinity group within UC’s Counseling & Psychological Services specifically for international students. She believes that group therapy or listening sessions will make those support services much more accessible for those who find it difficult to seek out individual help.

“For them, it's really difficult because they're having to struggle with,’ Oh, that's something I need to take to my family unit, not a stranger,’” she said.

“Sometimes Indian students come to advising appointments, and they want their friends to come. And we're like, ‘What? No, we can't do that.’ But that's normal, because of how they function in India,” she said.

In addition to her advising caseload, Jernigan supervises student PACE (Professionalism, Academics, Character, and Engagement) leaders in Lindner. She presented about that program at Christ and is now also working on a collaboration with one of the leaders of the student peer mentorship program there.

The adviser group also had opportunities while in India to visit local schools, meet with guidance counselors and recruiters and admissions staff, see student volunteer projects and enjoy some cultural immersion experiences.

The experiences led them to a greater understanding of why students choose study in the U.S. and at UC and what challenges and opportunities they face here.

Now back at UC, they are working on more professional development opportunities for the advising community and more support services for students. Their projects include a student advocate certificate program; new ways to embrace collectivist strategies for advising and teaching; the development of more centralized website resources; additional job placement resources and career prep; streamlined registration procedures; and even something as basic as more vegetarian options in campus dining.

“I think this is a very unique partnership and privilege that advisers and student-facing staff have,” said Frierson. “This is not an opportunity everywhere.”

“I would love to see an expansion of this. … Advising is one branch of a bigger tree and, if we could find a way to expand, to hit the holistic part, I think that would be really helpful,” she said, citing admissions and financial aid services as examples of the larger student affairs network.

Adds Jernigan, “I think this is a great way to show value to the advising community. … It's unique in that way, getting to travel among fellow staff."

Combs said, “We're investing in our people, and that's never a bad investment. … It's an investment in the people who work here, and it allows them a moment to pause and breathe and meet other people and learn new things away from home.”

Meyer, who has since based his doctoral dissertation on the long-term benefits of the original programs for advising staff and the students they serve at UC, said the program is still unique of its kind in U.S. higher education.

“I think our leadership is creative, and they allow for creativity. And that's taking the seed of an idea from conversations and then actually turning it into something that happens. That's unique. In general, there's always been a positive energy around these international activities and collaboration at the University of Cincinnati.”

Featured image, top: UC’s Julie Steimle, Lorri Blanton, Suzette Combs and Mega Tobin in Bangalore | Photo provided