Assistant Professor of Cooperative Education Luisa Bieri Rios attended a Global Liberal Arts Alliance Leadership Meeting Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, at Effat University in February. She says, “Effat is an all women’s university doing amazing work to foster and uplift women’s education and equality in Saudia Arabia. I had the privilege to attend the meeting and present, ‘Cooperative Education: An integrative approach to experiential learning’ to the attendees. We had rich conversations around community engagement, global partnerships, and experiential pedagogy in a transnational framework.”

 

The Global Liberal Arts Alliance was formed ten years ago with the goal of advancing liberal arts education around the world and strengthening member institutions through sharing and relationship building. The Alliance is unique in that it provides programming for multiple campus constituencies: administrators, faculty, staff, and students. It is a very active organization, convening several meetings and workshops each year on multiple topics around the world.

 

The theme of the 2020 meeting was Liberal Arts in Practice. Through a series of panel presentations, Liaisons shared best-practices from their campuses on undergraduate research, faculty-led study away, community-engaged service learning, internships, first year experience, academic and career advising, and student mental health.

 

Luisa adds, “With our Cooperative Education program turning 100 next year, Antioch has much to contribute to the ongoing dialogue in Higher Education and the Liberal Arts about the critical importance of integrating immersive experiential learning into an undergraduate education. Co-op continues to be a unique, holistic model whereby students earn 36-48 credits of their 180 credit degree—with 12 of these credits able to count towards their major—through engaged fieldwork, professional development, job training or undergraduate research.”