Dive Brief:
- Dickinson College President Margee Ensign recently told Education Dive experiences from her time serving as the former president of the American University of Nigeria gave her unique insights into "community and civic engagement," finding unique ways to reach out to and retain female students and working with a remarkably diverse body of students. Ensign worked at AUN at the same time the nation was confronted challenges with the Boko Haram and learned how to effectively welcome and incorporate thousands of refugees to the campus.
- Similarly, Pareena Lawrence, president of Hollins University, told Education Dive she drew upon her experience as a student at the University of Delhi, where she didn't have much of a choice in her education pathway, to better emphasize as a leader the value of U.S. higher ed. "The choices students have ... to study and pursue the field that they want ... and explore what you're passionate about" is something she emphasizes to students as a leader. At the same time, she's brought the Indian system's respect "for the value of education and intellectualism," to her approach to supporting her faculty and reminding them they serve an important role.
- Leaders at the 2018 American Council on Education conference echoed similar sentiments on how international perspectives can enrich the leadership practices at home, where during a panel session institution presidents from Columbia, Canada, and the United States exchanged their best strategies for helping underserved populations succeed. One of the panelists, Paul LeBlanc, president of the Southern New Hampshire University, mentioned that the U.S. is "appallingly behind" in appropriately addressing the needs of indigenous student populations and can learn from Canada, "which takes the lead on this."
Dive Insight:
Institution leaders within the American higher education system can learn a great deal from their counterparts abroad, especially as issues like serving low-income students or increasingly diverse populations are universal challenges. Lawrence has mentioned, for example, that she understands in particular the importance of making international students feel welcome on campus not only because they are valued, but also because it's critical to institutional success in an evolving industry-wide business model.
"Are we ready for a student body that is primarily students of color," she asked in a recent visit to Education Dive's offices, noting, "that is going to come soon. So if we are not cognizant of it right now, our schools and universities will not be ready in the next 10 years to welcome this large incoming class of students of color. Businesses — same thing, these students are going to be your customers," she said. "If you don't understand them, you don't understand their needs, you don't respect them, you don't welcome them, guess what's going to happen to your bottom-line? I want it to be a moral argument first, but really ignore the moral argument the economic argument is right there."
Ensign told Education Dive that during her time working in Nigeria — particularly with refugees and women — that she gained invaluable experience in developing effective community engagement tactics, which has been helpful to her work with diverse students in the United States. In addition, Ensign says that in the process of bringing an American style of education to a country as big as Nigeria that had been embedded in the British system, she really had to think through some of the key, positive attributes of the U.S. higher education system, which would be helpful in her move to Dickinson.
Facing high illiteracy and unemployment rates, Ensign said, "the core mission of the institution was to be a development university, to make sure we had the knowledge and skills and confidence to solve the big problems of that country," said Ensign. "To address this, I had introduced problem based learning from the U.S. and we had an American based faculty member teaching online to our faculty, that was the link between working in the community and solving problems and providing deep learning in the classroom."
"One of my big takeaways is that American colleges and universities should be much more involved in their communities, because it’s not only the right thing to do, but it really helps students understand and build the capacity to solve problems and learn they have the ability to take on some of the very big issues we are facing in America right now."