How does a community college instructor begin to tackle a lack of global awareness exhibited by her students? She spends an afternoon at Stanford with leading faculty and experts, as well as other community college faculty, to discuss issues of importance to the global community.

The Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE) and Stanford Global Studies are offering exciting professional development opportunities to help community college instructors internationalize courses by incorporating recent area studies research and materials. The Education Partnership for Internationalizing Curriculum (EPIC) is funded by the National Resource Center Program of the U.S. Department of Education under Title VI.

Held on Friday, March 6, 2015 at Stanford, the first EPIC community college workshop focused on Global Food Security. Twenty community college instructors attended from 16 community colleges, with disciplines ranging from English composition to math, economics, nutrition, sociology, anthropology, biology and political science. EPIC and SPICE organizers chose food security as the topic of their first workshop because it combined interdisciplinary appeal with international content.

At the half-day workshop featuring lectures by Walter Falcon, an agricultural economist at Stanford, participants learned how every individual’s access to an adequate supply of high-quality food—that is, the individual’s food security is affected by very complex processes of production, distribution, and consumption. And how, despite decades of progress in agricultural technology, economic development, and poverty relief, food security continues to elude hundreds of millions of people around the world. 

Some topics covered and highlights from Dr. Falcon’s lectures include:

• Two world problems: the need to double food output this century without destroying the environment; and providing economic access to the billion plus people who are food insecure, not because there is a general lack of food, but because they are poor.
• Supply and demand issues: the importance of the green revolution’s significant impact on the supply of grains.
• The GMO debate: there are legitimate controversies and important arguments along with irrational extremes, and there is an important discussion to be had in the middle.
• The importance of development strategies in poor countries to reach the poorest half.
• Imports and exports: an international orientation on the part of a nation-state is generally good; often the worst thing is to close an economy, particularly in a badly governed nation.
• Redistributive land reform: it is not done usually in an evolutionary way, but usually revolutionary and the results are varied.
• The second half of his Dr. Falcon’s presentation was an in depth analysis of Indonesia, the world’s 4th most populous country, and the focus of his work for 30 years. Some of the insights from his experience include:
• Good advice often starts with the word “Don’t.” It’s easy to write a catalogue of the things that would be nice. In a good year you can do two or three things. Policy advice turns out to be finding a sequence of good things that should be done to improve various aspects of food systems.
• There are good folks in bad governments and there are bad folks in good governments. You can sometimes do good things even within corrupt governments.
• Most of what food policy is about is adjudicating the tension between producers, who want high prices, and consumers, who want low prices. It involves improving storage and roads and keeping consumer prices down while still benefiting producers.

The final part of the workshop, led by SPICE Curriculum Writer Jonas Edman, discussed how instructors can incorporate more international content into their curriculum. All attendees were given online access to a copy of the curriculum unit developed by SPICE, Feeding the Poorest Billion: Food Security in the 21st Century, and a copy of the book, The Evolving Sphere of Food Security, edited by Rosamond Naylor. 

Through group activities, participants then collaboratively explored pedagogical practices for incorporating the material into their particular courses. Some of the ideas shared included:

• A creative fictional short story writing assignment demonstrating the connection between agriculture and health
• “Make a Meal” food security card game incorporating math and nutrition
• Having students share about the cities and countries they come from followed by a multicultural potluck for community building in the classroom
• Having students survey their families

As the workshop concluded, an English instructor with 40 years’ experience expressed her concern about students’ lack of global awareness, even basic geography, and Edman answered that this is the reason we have Title VI funding.

The next EPIC workshop for community college instructors, to be held on Friday, May 8, will be focused on Global Health. More information on this and other Global Studies community engagement activities is available at https://sgs.stanford.edu/programs-centers/community-engagement.

Standing upright, then slowly clasping both hands and drawing them up to shoulder height, Kevin Won next kneeled on the floor. Bending forward, he bowed his head toward his silent audience.

Won’s demonstration of the Sebae, a traditional bow performed for elders during South Korea’s lunar new year, may have seemed out of place during a warm, sunny day on Stanford’s campus. But the intricate display was in perfect context during a cross-cultural conference for secondary school teachers from the United States to learn about Korean society, as well as providing a forum to directly engage with Korean teachers and students.

Despite Korea’s growing relevance worldwide, there has been little development of Korean studies below university-level, leaving a vacuum for misunderstanding, including stereotypes, to form at an early age. The conference – now in its third year – aims to shift this reality.

For three days in late July, twenty-four teachers from across America participated in a variety of activities and seminars intended to give them new perspectives and teaching strategies.

Gary Mukai, director of SPICE, welcomes participants.

The conference was co-organized by the Korean Studies Program (KSP) at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) and the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE), both in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. The two groups work together to convert research on Asia into material that is suitable for younger students.

“Our mission is to make Stanford scholarship accessible to all,” said SPICE director Gary Mukai, who has been with SPICE for over 26 years. SPICE and Shorenstein APARC, under the direction of Gi-Wook Shin, a professor of sociology, have coordinated curriculum development for key projects on Korean history and perceptions of wartime history in Northeast Asia. 

A cadre of scholars and practitioners from Stanford and other universities and organizations offered talking points and actionable ideas for instruction. Among them was David Straub, the associate director of KSP, who lived in Korea for eight years as a senior U.S. diplomat. 

The United States and Korea have a very close relationship, but lack equal dialogue, explained Straub. America is still “number one” for Koreans, as such, Koreans know more about the United States than Americans know about Korea. This imbalance can lead to misunderstanding. Straub took the teachers through the recent history of U.S.-Korea relations, which is often narrowed to the context of the Korean War. 

Two teachers work together on a curriculum exercise comparing political cartoons.

Since 1945, South Korea overcame extreme poverty and effectively established a democratic society, a transition that was uncommonly quick and relatively smooth, and one that now supports a global powerhouse of trade and culture.

Throughout the conference, SPICE staff demonstrated ways for educators to bring Korea, and greater Northeast Asia, into their classrooms. They gave the teachers a chance to practice student lessons. In one exercise, the teachers deciphered sets of political cartoons and compared news headlines from Japan, China and Korea, using material from SPICE instructional materials. 

Each activity was carefully prepared to guide teachers to examine their own preconceptions. Greater cultural awareness can come when both teachers and students are “more critical consumers of information,” said Rylan Sekiguchi, a SPICE curriculum specialist, in his presentation.

While curriculum is important, establishing rapport seemed an essential part of the conference. A key component to a successful cross-cultural workshop is creating a community, “and looking around the room, I think we’ve done that here,” said Mukai, in an address to participants at a reception.

Also in attendance was a delegation of 11 Korean teachers and students from Hana Academy Seoul, a private high school in Korea with a unique structure and curriculum. The school’s name comes from the Hana Financial Group, which established the school in 2010, and is also the supporter of the Stanford conference. The Korean students gave presentations that covered a wide range of topics, including an analysis of teenage life and the public education system in Korea.

(Left to right): Students Nayoon Kim, Kevin Won, Seung-hyun Kim and Sarah Chey presented on Korean culture and society.

Six students from Hana Academy Seoul performed Samulnori, one of Korea’s most popular genres of music. The musical group, known as Da-Seu-Reum, showcased their talents while wearing traditional, brightly colored outfits. Afterward, the students became the teachers – when they invited the American teachers to come up and play the instruments. 

Three students were also honored for their research and participation in the Sejong Korean Scholars Program (SKSP), a distance-learning opportunity for 25 high school students across the United States to engage in an intensive study of Korea for a semester. SKSP is dually led by SPICE and Shorenstein APARC, and sponsored by the Korea Foundation.

“I feel very honored to attend, and have learned a lot about U.S.-Korea relations,” said Won, who is from Korea and attends The Taft School in Connecticut. “But mostly, I am just glad my presentation went well.” 

Won, a relative newcomer to public speaking, explained Korean holidays and how to perform a traditional bow. After demonstrating the correct posture and sequence to the audience, he asked for, and easily received, teacher participation. 

Kelly McKee, a teacher from Illinois, tries playing the Buk, a drum used in Samulnori, with direction from a Hana Academy Seoul student.

“From the impeccably credentialed presenters to the wonderful pacing of the presentations, I thoroughly enjoyed my three days here,” said Eladio “Lalo” Martin, a humanities teacher at Cesar Chavez Middle School in Watsonville.

“This conference, by far, is the best I’ve ever attended,” he added. Martin has been teaching for more than 18 years, and says he looks forward to returning to Stanford.

“The speakers have been fantastic,” said Kelly McKee, a social studies teacher. “They’ve shared in-depth expertise on topics like Korea’s special economic zones and North Korea – areas you can’t find in professional development workshops elsewhere.”

McKee, who works at Lake Forest High School in Illinois and is a leader of a student exchange program to Shanghai, says she plans to supplement her Korea unit with what she has learned. As the availability of Asian studies curriculum continues to grow, she says the future certainly looks bright.

On July 30, 2014, three anxious but very poised high school students from the Sejong Korean Scholars Program (SKSP)—an online course on Korea sponsored by the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE) and the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center—took the stage to present their final papers to an audience of 25 American and Korean high school teachers and several university professors at a three-day conference on Korea at Stanford University. 

The students—Alex Boylston, a recent graduate of Riverwood International Charter School in Atlanta, GA; Anne Kim, a rising senior at Richard Montgomery High School in Rockville, MD; and Elaine Lee, a rising senior at Los Altos High School in Los Altos, CA—were selected from a class of 26 students, based on the excellence of their academic work and final course papers. 

When asked how he came to choose his topic on Koreans in Japan’s yakuza, Alex Boylston thoughtfully replied that he had thought “outside the box” because he didn’t want his instructor “to have to read 20 essays on the Korean War.” Taking a different tack, Anne Kim turned her personal interest in historical Korean dramas (“sageuk”) into the topic for her final paper, “Let’s Talk Drama: Sageuk as a Reflector and Perpetrator of Societal Change in South Korea.” Closing out the presentations, Elaine Lee stepped up to the podium and discussed the challenges South Korea faces as a global economic power, leaving no doubt she will achieve her goal of participating in the future of U.S.–South Korean relations. All three were honored with an award for excellence, following their presentations.

The SKSP accepts 20-25 exceptional high school students from throughout the United States for each course offering. The course provides students with a broad overview of Korean history and culture as well as U.S.–Korean relations and an opportunity to learn from and interact with top scholars and experts in Korean studies. The SKSP is now accepting applications for its spring 2015 term; www.sejongscholars.org.