Hope College | Paul G. Fried International Center

Official Domestic Programs

THE PHILADELPHIA CENTER

The Philadelphia Center provides opportunities for professional exploration, intellectual development and personal growth in the heart of America's fifth-largest city. Our accredited program features field placements, seminars and independent living. Students select an internship from more than 800 placement opportunities and then design a Learning Plan that provides the structure for integrating work experience with educational, social and professional development objectives. Students earn 16 credits: eight from the internship and four for each course. Class topics currently offered include finance, social justice, architecture, psychotherapy, religion, Africanist perspective and senior seminar. Each fall and spring semester, 75-100 students with any major from liberal arts schools across the country participate in the program.

Contact: Isolde Anderson , Linda Koetje, Tom Smith, Pam Koch, William Pannapacker

WASHINGTON HONORS SEMESTER PROGRAM

The Washington Honors Semester Program enables superior students from all disciplines to study in Washington, D.C. and to apply knowledge of their area as it relates to government and politics. Select junior and senior students will take a seminar on American government and politics, participate in group interviews with congressmen and legislative staff, executives, lobbyists, political party officials and journalists, intern for two six-week periods in Congress, the executive branch or with political interest groups and prepare extensive research papers upon their semester's work.

Contact: Jack Holmes

Other Approved Domestic Programs

Situated in a bilingual, multicultural region composed of the three states of Texas, New Mexico, and Chihuahua, the Border Studies Program explores the many ways in which nations, cultures and languages interact to construct what is known as border culture. Ciudad Juárez, with nearly two million inhabitants, and El Paso, with approximately 800,00 inhabitants, together form the largest bi-national metropolitan area in the world.

THE CHICAGO SEMESTER

The Chicago Semester draws students from Hope College and nine other Christian colleges in the Midwest. The program offers students a distinct opportunity to live, learn and work in America’s third largest city, while studying issues of urban life on a fully accredited program. The staff of the Chicago Semester combines advanced academic training and professional experience with years of living and working in the city. They provide support and guidance as students explore the possibilities and issues within an urban working world. Up to 16 hours of academic credit can be earned through the program, which includes a four day/week supervised internship and two seminars. The seminars currently offered complete the senior seminar, urban sociology, the 4-credit fine arts requirement and a second religion requirement as needed. Students representing nearly all college majors choose internships that fit their vocational or career goals. They select an internship from several options developed by the staff, interviewing at each before making a decision. Areas for internships include, but are not limited to, graphic design, theater, accounting, finance, business, human resources, advertising, public relations, marketing, event planning, health sciences, communications, social work, social services, student teaching, law, sports management and media.

In October 2002, the Chicago Semester received the Program of the Year award from the National Society for Experiential Education (NSEE).

The Newberry Library Program in the Humanities enables students and faculty to tap the extraordinarily rich resources of the Newberry Library in a semester-length fall seminar, several month-long seminars in winter, spring independent study at any time after December and occasional internships. The Newberry Library, founded in 1887, is a privately endowed research library located in Chicago's Gold Coast neighborhood. Over one million volumes and six million manuscripts comprise its strong general collection of Western history and the humanities from the Middle Ages to the early twentieth century. Special collections concentrate on linguistics, the American Indian, Chicago history and culture, the Renaissance, the history of cartography and printing and the history and theory of music. The Humanities program is jointly sponsored by the Great Lakes Colleges Association, Inc. (GLCA) and the Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM). Recent seminar topics have included Herman Melville, American Dissent from 1870 to Present, The Concept of Revolution, Cultural Ideals and Realities in History and Literature and Play and Society in Literature and History.

Contact: William Pannapacker

This program is designed to provide students seriously interested in the performing, visual and communication arts with a unique opportunity to be a part of the world of established professional artists in New York City. Students spend a semester as an apprentice to a producing artist or with an organization in the arts, supplemented with academic study. Resident staff members assist students in finding both apprenticeships and housing.

At the New York Center for Art and Media Studies (NYCAMS), the city

will be your classroom. NYCAMS is located within walking distance from some of the most prestigious galleries and museums in the world; these extraordinary cultural resources will be an integral aspect of your learning experience. In addition, internships with internationally renowned artists, galleries, and institutions will provide you with unique opportunities to experience and engage professionally with the arts.

The Great Lakes Colleges Association, Inc. (GLCA) sponsors this program which allows qualified majors in natural sciences, social sciences, mathematics or computer science to spend one semester at one of the world's major research centers, Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. The students spend 40 hours per week in research as assistants to Oak Ridge scientists, take one senior level course and participate in an interdisciplinary seminar. The courses and the seminar are led by GLCA faculty. Each student receives sixteen credits under Interdisciplinary Studies for participation in this program which provides an opportunity to work with outstanding scientists and sophisticated equipment on important energy-related research.

Students in this semester-long program live in the Cascade Mountains of Oregon. While studying one cluster of themes at a time in an intensive discussion format, students learn how to pursue important questions reflectively and in depth. They live in community with other students and faculty members who act as mentors, seeking common goals: scholarly excellence, maturity in their Christian faith and a direct encounter with nature.