Lee University Named on Great Values Website
Cleveland, TN—Lee University was recently named on the list, “30 Affordable Colleges with the Best Study Abroad Programs 2017-2018.” The list was released by greatvaluecolleges.net.
“More and more, businesses and organizations are realizing the need to hire college graduates with international experience,” the article stated. “Congress is working to help colleges make study abroad opportunities more easily accessible through the Senator Paul Simon Study Abroad Program Act of 2017, which was reviewed and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions early March.”
The article went to say that as the number of companies that target globally competent business men and women continues to grow, so does the percentage of students studying abroad. According to the Institute of International Education’s (IIE) 2016 Open Doors Report on International Educational Exchange, released in November, the number of students receiving academic credit for study abroad is rising each year.
The article reported the methodology for the list came as they sourced information from the National Center for Education Statistics’ College Navigator Database, U.S. News & World Report, Wikipedia, the individual schools’ websites and other college resource websites. The ranking was developed by starting with a list of 100 colleges and universities collected from various rankings and sources, including U.S. News & World Report’s 2015 list of schools with the highest percentage of students studying abroad. The list was narrowed down to the 50 cheapest colleges, and then ranked the top 30 using a point system that included tuition affordability, percentage of students studying abroad, program types available, scholarships, awards, and length.
Founded in 1918, Lee University is a private liberal arts university historically affiliated with the Church of God with over 5,300 students, a 106-acre campus and 52 majors. Lee’s Global Perspectives program sends more than 90 percent of the school’s students are in study abroad programs. Lee’s curriculum calls for a cross-cultural engagement of all students, and it offers options for fulfilling this requirements like a semester study abroad in the U.K., over 30 faculty-led trips across the world during the winter, spring and summer breaks, student-designed independent experiences and collaborative study abroad opportunities. These trips can be no less than seven days in length, not including travel, and up to a full semester. Institutional scholarships are applicable toward one study abroad program per student, and institutionally-funded aid may only be applied to programs directly sponsored by Lee. These Global Perspectives trips include destinations like Australia, Egypt, Israel, Honduras, Cuba and more. The Global Perspectives office hosts an annual World’s Fair, during which students can discover details about all of Lee’s travel programs and information to help them find the option best-suited for them.
