Think global. Study local. Higher education now covers the world, addressing massive challenges: sustainability, new energy solutions, digital media, information technology, international trade, medical breakthroughs and much more. Major corporations are moving onto campus, too, pulling students into new research and ventures.
Here are some CliffsNotes on how regional colleges are jumping in to prepare students for the most promising careers of the next decade.
Ni-how, China: Thick with the BRICs
Brazil, Russia, India and China, often called the BRIC nations, are the world’s biggest emerging markets. They’re stepping up to first-world trade status, followed closely by the Middle East and Africa. Local colleges offer immersion in the culture and business sectors of those nations.
But first, it helps to learn the language. The University of Pittsburgh offers courses in the world’s major languages — and even a dozen that are less-commonly taught, like Swahili and Vietnamese. Pitt’s International Business Center in the Katz School of Business, which launched a Global Management program in 2008, includes language studies as well as business topics. The center bolsters course work with 10-week summer internships in business centers. Preceded by two-week orientations on the business cultures of their destinations, the work assignments include varied levels of language training. This summer, 46 students took advantage of the for-credit experience.
“The program’s been running for three years, beginning in Sao Paolo, Prague and Beijing,” says J.P. Matychak, director of career services for Katz. “We’ve added Madrid, Milan, Berlin and Paris — and we’re investigating India, South Korea and Japan.”
Carnegie Mellon University offered its first section of elementary Chinese in 1992. Today, the Department of Modern Languages offers more than 20 each semester, as well as Mandarin for business managers within the Tepper School of Business. This year, 99 students will major or minor in Chinese studies.
There’s a new demand on the horizon for individuals who can teach Chinese at the pre-college level, too. St. Vincent College recently became one of three colleges in the state to offer a certification program for elementary, middle- and high-school teachers. Students pursuing teacher certification must study abroad one semester or complete an immersion experience. The college arranges such opportunities through cooperative arrangements with Beijing Normal University, Fu Jen University or Wuhan University.
Mad Men: Marketing, Communications and Design
CMU’s School of Design offers undergraduate degrees in communication and industrial design. Dan Boyarski, the design school’s director of alumni relations, says more companies are hiring design professionals because they have a systematic way of creatively resolving problems; meanwhile, companies like Facebook, Twitter and Apple have been seeking these graduates because they’re also users of their products and services. These tech giants are looking for new hires who can think of different ways to extend product lines or build new businesses, enhance the visual impact of their interfaces and improve the user experience.
In the North Hills, La Roche College’s minor in Web design reaches outside the classroom, enabling students to create sites for real-life clients; students have interned in departments at Allegheny General Hospital and Pitt, among other businesses.
Read more at Pittsburgh Magazine.
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