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The purpose of this paper is to develop relevant questions for research by gaining an initial understanding of how the field of study abroad education is organizing itself within institutions of higher education. The context is the growing numbers of students, demands, and expectations made on study abroad programs.

The survey was carried out by analyzing publicly available data and information, as it would be available to students, of all the accredited institutions of higher education within the six states of New England.

The findings confirm that albeit for Community Colleges, the vast majority of institutions offer study abroad programs. However, this survey also reveals the important role providers are playing in offering generic programs to students from multiple institutions.

The findings call for further investigation into institutional strategies concerning the choice of programs, particularly those involving providers who potentially imply losing tuition and control over educational outcomes. Limitations are discussed suggesting the need to widen the geographical area studied as well as analyzing in more detail the Community College offerings that are not easily accessible with the methodology that has been used in this paper. The findings also raise some questions and future avenues of research particularly in the area of examining the integration of generic study abroad programs within particular institutional and programmatic objectives. It is also suggested that further research is needed to better evaluate if/how study abroad programs are designed to capitalize on the employability advantage they offer to participating students when they enter the job market.

The number of US students participating in study abroad programs is expected to continue to grow and it seems these programs will become part of mainstream offerings in most institutions. Similar trends are observed in Europe between member states. Besides giving a broad overview of the current offerings, this pilot study principally reveals several important avenues for future research that should help institutions in their choices of programs and the orientation they give to study abroad.

Certain administrative structures and processes need to be in place on the home campus to provide high quality study abroad experiences for students. They provide the support needed to make study abroad programs successful and effective. To this end, they need to be based on criteria that ensure the best possible quality in these arrangements as they relate to stated program outcomes.

The object of this brief paper is to discuss the balance between business content and language proficiency in study abroad programs related to business. When blending these three activities, the challenge is to balance each appropriately. If the study abroad experience contains little or no business content, students lose out on the opportunity to learn elements of international business. If the study abroad experience contains little or no language content, students miss out on the cultural integration that is essential for international interactions. And if “study abroad” becomes too loose (i.e. party on the beach) or too rigid (i.e. no different than taking classes back home), students miss the essence of studying in a foreign location. Of course, there are excellent business study abroad programs that are conducted in English (e.g. see Keillor & Emore for the roundtable discussion regarding English language programs). The focus of this paper is the role of foreign language instruction and student proficiency in foreign language, as it relates to business study abroad programs.

During the past decade there has been a growing consensus that study abroad experiences are valuable not only for students majoring in the language of the country in which they intend to study, but that they also provide vital experiences for students enrolled in business programs. This is a change from the early 1980s when it was rare to find a business program offering study abroad experiences for its students. The increasingly global nature of commerce and the need for business professionals to effectively interact with people in a work force growing more diverse are strong arguments for students to study abroad. In addition to exposing students to different cultures and peoples, the study abroad experience challenges students to function in unknown environments and situations, teaches students about themselves, and forces them to look critically at their own resources and values. It is the ultimate “Problem-Based Learning” experience (PBL).

Throughout the early 1980s, schools of business struggled with ways to internationalize their faculty, students and curriculum. In the face of an increasingly global economy, it was necessary for schools to meet this challenge. Various strategies were employed: infusion of global topics into the classes, creation of International Business departments, the implementation of the CIBER program (Center for International Business Education and Research) and faculty exchanges. Although the Kelley School of Business tried all of these, our most successful efforts to internationalize students has been by facilitating overseas experiences through organized study abroad programs.

From a traditional institutional perspective, the ultimate customer of the university is the student and perhaps his/her parents. From the perspective of a business school, however, the ultimate customer is the employer. Thus, a school’s goal, in particular a CIBER school, should be to develop and provide international programs that deliver expertise and experience to meet the needs of firms, not students. The students are the products, and the study abroad program is the means by which this product is developed and improved. Faculty are key players in the development and quality control of the student product.

This critical analysis explores issues linked to the development of sustainable study abroad programs in emerging nations, and the challenge of developing true partnerships between universities in the North and South. To this end the analysis: (1) develops a framework for analyzing the opportunities, challenges, and dilemmas of expanding study abroad programs in emerging nations; (2) asks how study abroad programs might be redesigned to become more beneficial to host institutions and communities, while providing more responsive and transformative learning experiences for students; and (3) examines the challenges facing universities from the North and South who wish to create collaborative partnerships linked to grants, research, and publications.

This paper summarizes the findings of the empirical papers in this volume and outlines future research directions for global leadership in general. We summarize the state of global leadership development in universities and recommend design criteria for these efforts. Given the popularity of study abroad as an integral component in many global leadership programs, we highlight common challenges for study abroad programs and the importance of taking an organization development approach. We conclude with future directions for global leadership development research in university settings, most of which emerged from the featured papers on this topic in this volume of Advances in Global Leadership. It is our hope that this chapter serves as a primer for both university program directors and researchers.

A study of community college students enrolled in a for-credit study abroad program in Costa Rica sought to identify the experiences that influence intercultural competency growth during study abroad trips and to learn how the experiences influence the development of global leadership competencies. The results led to a modified global leadership development expertise model for understanding the process of global leadership development in student populations. The study revealed a key link between antecedent characteristics of participants and their transformational ability during the study. The study also revealed that there are types of transformational experiences that, when experienced sequentially, can maximize transformational potential and the development of intercultural competencies.

This study aims to identify how objective indicators of destination country risk differentiate business study abroad programs from those in other academic disciplines.

The authors trained a neural network model on six years of student-initiated inquiries about study abroad programs at a large US university. The model classified business versus nonbusiness study abroad programs using objective measures of destination country risk as the primary inputs.

The model correctly classifies business and nonbusiness study abroad programs with over 70% accuracy. Business programs were found to be 20% less likely to include destinations where the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommend nonroutine vaccinations and favor countries with higher Global Peace Index scores.

These results underscore the need to consider destination country risk in the design and administration of study abroad programs. An understanding of student preferences for lower risk destinations can contribute to improved planning, execution and student experiences in these programs.

Better planning and management of study abroad programs based on understanding of destination country risk can lead to enhanced student safety and experiences.

This study offers a unique perspective on understanding study abroad programs by focusing on objective measures of destination country risk rather than risk perceptions. It also is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the first to use a neural network to classify study abroad programs as business versus nonbusiness using objective measures of country-specify risk indicators.