July/August 2009
Around the Quads
University Opens Global Centers
The University has expanded its global reach with the opening in March of two Columbia Global Centers, created to bring faculty and students together with their international counterparts to work on projects around the world. The research centers, in Beijing, China, and Amman, Jordan, are the first of what could be as many as six centers in world capitals.
“When social challenges are global in their consequences, the intellectual firepower of the world’s great universities must be global in its reach,” said Kenneth Prewitt, v.p of Columbia Global Centers and the Carnegie Professor of Public Affairs. “Columbia’s network of Global Centers will bring together some of the world’s finest scholars to address some of the world’s most pressing problems.”
Members of the University’s undergraduate, graduate and professional schools, as well as independent affiliates, will have opportunities to travel to the centers to address global challenges on local soil.
One project already underway is the China 2049 program, which pairs China’s top economic planning agency with the Brookings Institution and Columbia’s Earth Institute to create policies that protect China’s environment while creating long-term economic growth and development. Also, Teachers College faculty have been involved in education in Jordan, offering a course in teaching English to non-native speakers and advising the country’s ministry of education.
“It is essential to a great university that our students and faculty know and understand more about our world, and we are committed to providing new opportunities to deepen our engagement with scholars, ideas and challenges across the globe,” said President Lee C. Bollinger, who launched both centers.