Connecticut College has announced a partnership with Ashesi University College that will allow students and faculty from both institutions to explore opportunities for increased global learning and understanding. The partnership was formalized with a Memorandum of Understanding signed by Connecticut College President Katherine Bergeron and Ashesi President Patrick Awuah, during the former's first visit to campus.
“Our institutions share a common goal of developing students into ethical leaders with a vision for a better world,” said Bergeron. “This agreement will create a new kind of opportunity for students and faculty with vastly different experience to work together and share perspectives in order to address the complex problems of our global society."
The partnership promotes collaboration between the two institutions in international education and in academic research. Together, the colleges will consider the development of cooperative programs, including: an exchange of undergraduate students, faculty exchanges, development of joint research and teaching activities, and other mutually beneficial collaborative activities.
Of particular interest to both institutions is the development of integrated programmes on campus that would allow students from both schools to take courses together, taught by Connecticut College faculty. Conn students would benefit from joint classes and the campus immersion experience, and Ashesi students would have access to a broader range of class offerings as well as classmates. Other options under consideration include globally networked learning that brings distant faculty and students from different backgrounds to collaborate through the use of online communication tools.
The official partnership between Connecticut College and Ashesi grew out of exploratory exchanges during the 2015-16 academic year. Two delegations from Connecticut College visited Ashesi, in October and March. In May, Connecticut College welcomed an Ashesi arts and sciences professor and two student representatives to New London.
“The Ashesi partnership will be an important model as we continue to enhance our students’ global perspectives and help them develop into creative, adaptive and resourceful thinkers,” said Amy Dooling, associate dean of global initiatives, director of the Global Commons and professor of Chinese, who was a member of the initial delegation to Ghana. “With our shared commitment to a transformative liberal arts education, together, Ashesi and Connecticut College will develop the next generation of leaders.”
Connecticut College is a highly selective private liberal arts college, located on a 750-acre arboretum campus overlooking Long Island Sound in the seaport city of New London, Connecticut. Its new Connections curriculum integrates everything its 1,900 students do — classes, majors, study abroad, residential hall life, extracurricular and a guaranteed funded internship — and shows them how to put the world together in new ways.