NYIT Honored for Excellence in International Education

NYIT is among a select group of universities to receive the prestigious 2016 Senator Paul Simon Award for Comprehensive Internationalization from NAFSA: Association of International Educators. In bestowing this honor, NAFSA reaffirms NYIT's longstanding commitment to providing a globally integrated learning environment that fosters collaboration among students and faculty members across its campuses worldwide. The award also recognizes NYIT's excellence in promoting study abroad programs, cross-cultural exchange, and strategic partnerships on the international stage.

"For nearly 20 years, NYIT has been linking strategically with partners in regions that require career-oriented education to develop national economies and knowledge-based capital," says NYIT President Edward Guiliano, Ph.D. Following a unique "one university" model, all NYIT campuses—in New York, Canada, China, and the United Arab Emirates—share a common curriculum and issue the same diploma. He adds, "Part of what attracts faculty and students to NYIT is that we are a global university."

NYIT Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Rahmat Shoureshi, Ph.D., notes, "Global competence is appreciating different perspectives and knowing how to interact professionally and personally with people from diverse cultures and backgrounds. Our faculty assess this skill as a learning outcome in all undergraduate and most graduate programs."

Increasingly, NYIT students go beyond the classroom and learn in more meaningful, immediate contexts—such as by providing medical aid in Ghana, presenting research at conferences in China, and building water purification systems in Costa Rica and Nicaragua.

In addition to a range of short- and long-term study abroad options, NYIT encourages international students to come to New York, and Division of Student Affairs staff members have smoothed complex processes for new arrivals. "We try to think of everything through an international lens," says Guiliano.

Named for the late Senator Paul Simon of Illinois, NAFSA's Simon Awards acknowledge outstanding and innovative achievements in campus internationalization, which includes international perspectives in the curriculum, an engaged leadership, and international outreach and partnerships. Additional 2016 Simon Award winners include College of William & Mary, University of Massachusetts Boston, and University of Tampa.

NAFSA Executive Director and CEO Marlene M. Johnson says, "This year's winners exemplify a diversity of unique and shared approaches available to higher education institutions. The 2016 Simon Award institutions prepare our students for success in the thoroughly interconnected environment in which global learning is becoming a prerequisite to success, both in the classroom and beyond."