Thoughts on Global Eduation

According to The American Forum for Global Education, global education is "the fostering the ability to think creatively, analytically, and systematically about issues in a global context." Educators need to help students prepare for a world where issues have global implications and dimensions. Some questions that educators may ask are:

1. Knowledge: What do your students know about global issues, and how well do they know it?
2. Skills: How are your students going to learn about global issues?
3. Participation: How can students make a difference in resolving global issues?

Global eduation is much more than distance learning, study abroad opportunities, exchange programs, or international campuses. "It is also a curriculum that ensures that all of our students will be able to succeed in a world marked by interdependence, diversity and rapid change. A global education is one that provides knowledge and understanding of culture, language, geography and global perspectives. Most importantly, a global education is one that enables all students, both domestic and international, to understand the world through the eyes of others and teaches them how their actions can affect, and be affected by people throughout the world." (http://view.fdu.edu/default.aspx?id=255) Global education provides cross-cultural opportunities for its students. Students are presented with perspectives different than their own. They are taught skills that will help them become employable and successful in a global workplace and that will help them "meet the complex challenges of living in a global society." http://www.gem-ngo.org/ Global eduation does not limit instruction to issues specific to one's native homeland, but rather expands instruction to include topics and issues with global significance.

Traditional instructional delivery methods may not be sufficient and new media technologies must be used to meet the demands of global education, i.e. students in the same classroom from different parts of the world, with different world views, from different cultural and political backgrounds, with different belief/value systems, etc.

Global education, as a distinct construct from globalization, does what higher education has traditionally aimed to do: extend students' awareness of the world in which they live by opening them to the diverse heritage of human thought, action, and creativity. Global education places particular emphasis on the changes in communication and relationships among people throughout the world, highlighting such issues as human conflict, economic systems, human rights and social justice, human commonality and diversity, literatures and cultures, and the impact of the technological revolution. While it continues to depend on the traditional branches of specialist knowledge, global education seeks to weaken the boundaries between disciplines and encourages emphasis on what interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary studies can bring to the understanding and solution of human problems.” Farleigh Dickinson University's Global Learning Newsletter in an article entitled "What Is the Meaning of Global Education?" by Michael Sperling.