Sewanee Around the Globe

Molo! Sewanee students may be greeting each other in isiXhosa beginning Fall 2025, when the newest iteration of one of our Mellon grant programs, South Africa: Cape to Campus, will begin. Sewanee, Rhodes, and Centre students will travel to Gqeberha (formerly Port Elizabeth), South Africa, where they will take four courses at Nelson Mandela University. They will also take one course with the program's faculty leader, Dr. Johann Van Niekerk. Originally from South Africa, Van Niekerk is an associate professor of music at Centre College and serves as the chair of the music program and director of the choral and voice programs. He will be teaching a course, Keeping it Real: Intercultural Borrowing in Africa and the African Diaspora, which “will investigate the interplay between contemporary U.S. pop culture, pop culture in other Black populations in the Western Hemisphere, and pop culture in countries from across the African continent.”

Life—even college life!—is made up of more than just classes. In NMU residence halls, students will have a private bedroom and bathroom with shared common space, living with South Africans as well as other international students. Students may opt into service learning or an internship. They will have excursions to Robben Island (which housed a penal colony and a leper colony and where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned), Addo Elephant National Park (home to not only elephants but secretarybirds, lions, zebras, and everyone’s favorite, the dung beetle!), and Cape Town. The city itself is on the coast, home to beaches (good for surfing, swimming, and watching for dolphins and whales), museums, nature walks, and more.

Gqeberha is known as the “Friendly City,” making it a good match for those who’ve grown accustomed to Sewanee’s passing hello - or should we now say the passing Molo!

Students still interested in joining a Sewanee Away program this fall may still apply to our Centre and Rhodes consortium programs by Saturday, Feb. 15. Those programs include Ecuador: Global Environmental Challenges, Study & Intern in NYC, and a new program in South Africa. This year’s Ecuador program will be led by our very own Dr. Deborah McGrath.

Victoria Ryan, C’26, (pictured above) just returned from our NYC program where she was a theatrical production intern at Abrons Arts Center on the Lower East Side. “I think this program is very well-suited for many different kinds of people. No matter your realm of interest, New York probably has an internship for you," says Ryan. "The opportunity to get to make professional connections is what I'd say makes this program truly special. You get to start your career and live in such an exciting place at the same time!"

Saturday, Feb. 15, is the first deadline for students hoping to study away in the Spring 2026 term. For more deadlines click here for the semester program deadlines and here for summer programs. Feel free to also email us at global@sewaneee.edu with any questions.

The Office of Global Citizenship had the pleasure of catching up with recent graduate Alma Foley, C’23. She is currently stationed in Banteay Meanchey, Cambodia, with the Peace Corps and is a part of the K-15 Cohort. Alma is more than willing to connect with students who are interested in applying to the Peace Corps. She has greatly enjoyed connecting with her current students and exploring the beauty of Cambodia. She recently had the opportunity to join a Khmer wedding (pictured below). She feels her Sewanee experience set her up with resilience, creativity and focus, and these skills have served her well while in Cambodia. Students interested in the Peace Corps can reach Alma at almagabriellefoley@gmail.com.

Spend six weeks studying and traveling in and around Georgia and Latvia with Associate Professor of Russian Mark Preslar and Associate Professor of French & French Studies Donald Rung. Students will explore the intersection of various cultures, empires, and trade blocks in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus ranging from the medieval period to the present. Classes will be held primarily in Riga, Latvia, and in Tbilisi, Georgia, two former Soviet republics known for the natural beauty of their surroundings and the many traces of the past still visible in them. The program will include side visits to Tallinn, Estonia, the Black Sea, Kakhetia, and potentially, Yerevan, Armenia. Students will take a six-plus-week intensive Russian language course, and INGS 326, a course on the imperial and economic influences, from the East and West, that swept through these two former Soviet republics before, during, and after the Soviet period.

Spend three weeks immersed in German language and culture with Associate Professor of German Richard Apgar! Summer in Berlin combines language study at the DiD German language institute in Berlin, where students are placed in classes with other international students, with excursions every afternoon led by a Sewanee faculty member to historical sites, museums, and Berlin’s unique neighborhoods.

Sewanee's Domain and the Southern Appalachians host a fantastic variety of geological sites, but by exploring the West, students can experience landscapes and geologic features absent in our particular neighborhood and round out their education as geo- and environmental scientists. In Geology of the Western United States, we will visit landscapes bounded by active tectonics and shaped by desert processes. We will investigate emergent coastlines and volcanoes, young mountains and old growth forests. The sites we visit will be contextualized with readings and discussion of scientific literature and current issues, and works of cultural importance. Students will collect and analyze field data in some locations. Intended to be for more than just geology majors, Western Geology can open new perspectives on the physical environment of the United States to any students interested in earth or environmental science. Are you ready to hit the trail with Assistant Professor of Geology Max Dahlquist this summer for an unforgettable educational experience?

Learn more about all summer study away programs on our website.

We are thrilled to spotlight Sher Shah Mir, C’26, a student from Lahore, Pakistan. As an economics major, Sher is not only committed to his academic journey but also to creating a meaningful influence both on and off-campus.

This Easter semester, Sher will take a significant step in his professional training by beginning an opportunity with BCG BrightHouse in Atlanta, serving as a strategy intern. This opportunity is part of his membership in the Carey Fellows Business Honors Program.

Sher has previously served as the president of the Organization for Cross Cultural Understanding (OCCU), where he has helped foster an inclusive environment for students from diverse backgrounds to thrive at Sewanee. Beyond his former role with OCCU, Sher is active in numerous campus initiatives, always striving to contribute in meaningful ways to the campus community.

OPT Applications open from Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025, to Thursday, July 10, 2025.

Homecoming 2024 found Sewanee’s reunion-goers reliving their foggy days on the Mountain at the Office of Global Citizenship. We were thrilled to introduce some of our current international and recent study away students and to get to visit with an array of grads from those who studied abroad to those who were international students—and at least one who checked both boxes! We hope you’ll stop by and see us for Homecoming ’25 for an afternoon of good company, interesting stories, and a tea ceremony, courtesy of OGC member Marcus Murphy.

On Reading Day this past semester, Marcus Murphy, our associate director, hosted a “Tea and Zen” session in the Office of Global Citizenship in collaboration with the Asian Studies Club and the Chinese Residential Learning Community. Attendees sipped on 普洱/pu’er and 乌龙/oolong tea that Marcus recently brought back from his travels in Taiwan and Japan with students during the summer of 2024.