Global Engagement Minor
Minor Description
The Minor in Global Engagement (GEM) provides students with an opportunity to integrate their academic studies, co-curricular activities, and experiential learning through a lens of “intercultural competence.” Students acquire theoretical knowledge while applying it to their own existing and emerging global interests. They will hone the skills and attitudes needed to interact effectively and appropriately with others based on informed, mutual respect and an awareness of how positions of power and privilege intersect with aspects of our identities. By cultivating attitudes of reflection, curiosity, and openness, GEM students gain a complex understanding of global problems and learn to work toward positive solutions across difference. The program requirements include the introductory seminar, four courses dealing with at least three world regions, intermediate language proficiency in two or more languages, an off-campus cultural immersion experience, a senior capstone seminar, and a cumulative e-portfolio.
Admission to the Minor
Students may apply to the GEM during spring of their first year. The application consists of a short statement of interest describing how and why the Global Engagement Minor fits into the student’s academic plans, a breakdown of the students’ academic history, and a brief recommendation from a professor at Wesleyan.
Interested students can find the application form and the faculty recommendation form on the Global Engagement Minor page.
Students will be considered part of the GEM group after they have been admitted, have accepted to participate, and have enrolled in the GEM Introductory Seminar offered in the Fall of their sophomore year. Admission of students to the program in the Fall of their sophomore year or later may be possible via petition.
Minor Requirements
During their sophomore through senior years, GEM students will complete a series of structured academic and co-curricular activities including an introductory seminar, global perspective coursework, language studies, off-campus cultural immersion, and a capstone seminar that will enable them to synthesize and reflect on the varied components of intercultural competence.
A key feature of GEM is that all these activities are interrelated, building on one another to support GEM students’ reflecting on and cultivating intercultural competence. The global perspective coursework, language proficiency, and cultural immersion off campus are all subject to reflection and discussion in the two dedicated seminars and via the students’ individual e-portfolios. In addition, we will encourage students to engage in suitable on-campus activities that would enable them to deepen their intercultural learning and global engagement.
Requirement 1: Introductory Seminar
Complete the “Introduction to Global Engagement” seminar (CGST205).
This introductory GEM seminar provides a set of frameworks and activities to help students process their intercultural experiences, and an initial opportunity to collectively reflect on, critically analyze, and brainstorm about how to act on what they have learned. In particular, Introduction to Global Engagement will provide students with the tools to gain insight into their own cultural rules and biases; analyze how their own experiences have shaped these rules, and learn how to recognize and respond to cultural biases. It will also provide students with a framework to articulate a complex understanding of cultural differences and how they are inflected through power, privilege, and oppression. Students will set up and learn to use the e-portfolio software in the introductory seminar and will be able to add to it over their three years in the GEM.
Requirement 2: Global Perspective Coursework
Complete 4 full-credit courses dealing with at least 3 world regions, defined as:
- Global
- East Asia / Pacific
- Europe and Eurasia
- Latin America
- Middle East and North Africa
- South and Central Asia
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- United States and Canada
A wide range of courses from across the curriculum can satisfy the GEM Global Perspective Coursework requirement. One’s “home” region(s) can count; a single region can count for two of the three regions if two courses engage with significantly different aspects of the region (e.g., the experiences of Indigenous peoples and of colonizers); and pan-global courses can also count toward one of the three regions.
Coursework will be tracked within each student’s GEM Certification Form; students will consult with their GEM advisor to ensure that a course will count, which will be tracked by selecting the course through the form’s “override” function.
Requirement 3: Capstone Seminar
Complete the 0.5-credit GEM Capstone Seminar hosted by the Fries Center for Global Studies.
As part of this seminar, GEM students are expected to complete an e-portfolio that will synthesize their experiences from all requirements. The e-portfolio requires students to reflect on their intercultural development, knowledge, and skills gained throughout the GEM program and to interpret intercultural experience from the perspectives of their own and others’ worldviews. GEM seniors will present their e-portfolio to other participants and to the advisors of the program.
Requirement 4: Language Proficiency
Intermediate proficiency in two or more languages, including one’s native language(s). This requirement can be met in several ways:
- Taking language courses through the intermediate level (as defined by the relevant department; often four semesters of college-level coursework)
- Demonstrating intermediate (or greater) proficiency gained outside of Wesleyan; native speakers of languages other than English can simply inform their GEM adviser of their proficiency.
- For multilingual students, taking any subject course taught in English shows sufficient proficiency in English.
Requirement 5: Cultural Immersion Off-Campus
GEM students need to choose an off-campus experience as a focus for reflection with their cohort members and via their e-portfolio. Options for satisfying this requirement include:
- Study abroad for at least one semester
- Internationally focused internship or fellowship abroad or in the U.S.
- Internationally focused service-learning abroad or in the U.S.
- Internationally located research experience
Additional Information
Routine administration of the GEM will be handled by staff from the FCGS and overseen by the GEM Advisory Committee, composed of interested faculty and staff. This advisory committee will meet once per semester to review the status of the program. The core of the initial committee will be the members of the current taskforce.
Each year, faculty or staff of the GEM Advisory Committee will serve as advisors for each entering cohort, and will remain as these students’ advisors throughout their three years in the program. The Associate Director of Intercultural Learning will also provide advising support for all GEM students, as well as take primary responsibility for organizing the Introductory and Capstone Seminars, although these courses will be team-taught with support from both faculty and staff. Please contact fcgs@wesleyan.edu for any questions, comments, or concerns.