Work in progress - integrating international competence into baccalaureate degrees

Globalization is a fact of life. As such, U.S. universities have made concerted efforts to infuse international components into their educational programs. Despite these efforts, one-tenth of U.S. undergraduates participate in an international academic experience and only one-tenth of those are majors in the physical sciences, computer sciences, mathematics, and engineering. The problem is that U.S. universities have yet to combine all of the critical components of a meaningful international education into coherent, cost-effective programs that prepare large numbers of students to apply their disciplinary knowledge in a global context. To address this problem, Georgia Tech is developing a program that integrates international competence into disciplinary curricula, especially the highly sequenced curricula in technical fields, and that can be delivered on a large scale without undue burden to the students or institution.