Mentor Advice
Question
Why is it important to study abroad?
25 Replies from Mentors
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Brenda CoxManager for International and Advanced ProcurementBMW Manufacturing Co.As companies become more global, language skills are highly desirable, and now required in more positions as compared to ten or even five years ago. However, today, for a company or an individual to be effective and successful, a combination of skills is required.
One may have an excellent knowledge base in engineering or technology, perhaps even a Ph.D. and maybe bilingual. But if that individual has not developed good skills in communicating, interacting and people resource management, they have already limited their opportunities and chance of success…
The ability to work with a wide variety of personalities, cultures and values is imperative to carry out our responsibilities. -
Angelina JolieActress and Goodwill AmbassadorUN Refugee Agency UNHCRI started traveling about seven years ago with film. I would go to places like Cambodia… I was very nervous to call the U.N. agency at the time… So first I went to Washington [to the UNHCR office] and I sat with everybody there and said… "If you could just help me, I'll pay my way." I spent the next year and a half going to, first, two camps in Africa, and then Pakistan and Cambodia… and had the opportunity to have this great education… I was transformed in such an amazing way.
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Jenny MingFormer PresidentOld NavyStudy Abroad is a great way to gain perspective and experience that will shape the rest of your life - personally and professionally.
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Peter OlfsSenior DirectorSiemens AG (Munich, Germany)Global knowledge and global experience [are the] key factors for a better world... For students: you need to have an idea about the world; you want to learn about other cultures – language is the vehicle; you want to learn how to learn about cultures and values. With this you will be able to listen to hidden signals; with this you will have better judgment; with this you will be the better boss – even at home.
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Alfred J. VerrecchiaChairman of the BoardHasbro, IncGood communication skills is a critical success factor in today’s global economy… [You] must have ability to collaborate and communicate with a large network of providers, inventors, manufacturers and peers Worldwide.
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Andrew YoungFormer ChairmanGoodWorks InternationalWe are interdependent and dependent on one another. We have got to find a way to make this whole planet work… It is a wonderful world. We have the resources to solve almost any problem. In America, if we can conceive it and believe it, we can achieve it. Yet, we are never totally self-sufficient. This world was not our creation. We are just a part of it. We have to approach things humbly, and we have to always be open for new things. My grandmother used to say all the time, ‘The world will make a way out of no way.
(taken from White, William, Young shares wit, wisdom with Auburn audience,Opelika Auburn News, January 27, 2006) -
Fareed ZakariaFormer EditorNewsweekThe most important thing that schools can do is to make people aware that understanding the world is very much part of the requirement of being an educated person. There should be some shame attached to not being more aware of the world, not having some mastery of foreign language.