Background and Philosophy
In 2011-2012, I was fortunate to participate in Teachers For Global Classrooms, a program of the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs administered by IREX. The goal of this program is to provide a cohort of teachers from across the United States with the opportunity to explore themes and applications for global education in secondary schools through a rigorous online course, Global Education Symposia and a two-week international fellowship.
TGC has provided an invaluable path to collaboration with colleagues from varied academic disciplines in listening, reading, reflecting upon and responding to ideas generated by leading thinkers in the field of global education. It has been a transformative experience, clarifying my thoughts regarding where I would like to direct my professional energies in the years ahead. Moving forward, my message is this: As a community of educators, we need to design pedagogy, curricula and assessment that maximize the potential of globalization and technology to prepare our students to confront, understand and solve complex issues at the local, regional and global scale. We have many pressing domestic and international problems … poverty, human conflict, hunger, access to clean water, disease, pollution, natural disasters, climate change. Let’s move away from subject area isolation and work more closely together to prepare students to be globally competent problem solvers.
The Asia Society, in Educating For Global Competence: Preparing Our Youth to Engage the World describes the globally competent student as able to:
Globally competent students gain knowledge and skills necessary to be effective citizens, employees, and leaders and are able to communicate and collaborate to confront, understand and solve complex issues in their own communities and beyond.
How should educators approach this challenge, regardless of subject area, age group or geographic location? By using 21st century technology tools to engage students in cultivating broader and deeper awareness though interdisciplinary critical inquiry, by facilitating thoughtful face-to-face and virtual interaction with diverse people in diverse places, by striving to elevate the clarity and passion of student communication via multiple media, and by encouraging and guiding students as they translate awareness into action.
Educators cannot create globally competent problem solvers alone. Ideally, families and communities open windows to the world by encouraging curiosity, offering varied experiences, facilitating travel inside and outside the United States and promoting the learning of languages.
A focus on developing global competencies challenges us to build school-community partnerships to construct educational paradigms that fund and facilitate opportunities for students to integrate knowledge from multiple academic disciplines as they build skills in accessing, analyzing, creating and communicating information for a defined purpose. As Fernando Reimers writes in Leading For Global Competency, we need to think about schools as “systems of interdependent actors and processes, in which the most important outcomes, as in a symphony, are in the synergies that result from their interaction and collaboration.”
TGC has provided an invaluable path to collaboration with colleagues from varied academic disciplines in listening, reading, reflecting upon and responding to ideas generated by leading thinkers in the field of global education. It has been a transformative experience, clarifying my thoughts regarding where I would like to direct my professional energies in the years ahead. Moving forward, my message is this: As a community of educators, we need to design pedagogy, curricula and assessment that maximize the potential of globalization and technology to prepare our students to confront, understand and solve complex issues at the local, regional and global scale. We have many pressing domestic and international problems … poverty, human conflict, hunger, access to clean water, disease, pollution, natural disasters, climate change. Let’s move away from subject area isolation and work more closely together to prepare students to be globally competent problem solvers.
The Asia Society, in Educating For Global Competence: Preparing Our Youth to Engage the World describes the globally competent student as able to:
- Investigate the world beyond their immediate environment, framing significant problems and conducting well-crafted and age-appropriate research.
- Recognize perspectives, others’ and their own, articulating and explaining such perspectives thoughtfully and respectfully.
- Communicate ideas effectively with diverse audiences, bridging geographic, linguistic, ideological and cultural barriers.
- Take action to improve conditions, viewing themselves as players in the world and participating reflectively.
Globally competent students gain knowledge and skills necessary to be effective citizens, employees, and leaders and are able to communicate and collaborate to confront, understand and solve complex issues in their own communities and beyond.
How should educators approach this challenge, regardless of subject area, age group or geographic location? By using 21st century technology tools to engage students in cultivating broader and deeper awareness though interdisciplinary critical inquiry, by facilitating thoughtful face-to-face and virtual interaction with diverse people in diverse places, by striving to elevate the clarity and passion of student communication via multiple media, and by encouraging and guiding students as they translate awareness into action.
Educators cannot create globally competent problem solvers alone. Ideally, families and communities open windows to the world by encouraging curiosity, offering varied experiences, facilitating travel inside and outside the United States and promoting the learning of languages.
A focus on developing global competencies challenges us to build school-community partnerships to construct educational paradigms that fund and facilitate opportunities for students to integrate knowledge from multiple academic disciplines as they build skills in accessing, analyzing, creating and communicating information for a defined purpose. As Fernando Reimers writes in Leading For Global Competency, we need to think about schools as “systems of interdependent actors and processes, in which the most important outcomes, as in a symphony, are in the synergies that result from their interaction and collaboration.”
“Now, more than ever, education should prepare students for
global civility and peace. What are we waiting for?”
Leading For Global Competency
Fernando Reimers, Harvard University
global civility and peace. What are we waiting for?”
Leading For Global Competency
Fernando Reimers, Harvard University