International Week

I-Week 2021 is September 20-24

Building Global Community at Home and Abroad

After a year of challenge and innovation, we find ourselves in awe of the resilience of people and the world around us. We have learned new approaches to daily life and crafted innovative ways to engage with others. The ongoing global health crisis has dramatically changed our interactions and left many feeling isolated. For others, the new virtual nature of engaging has opened new avenues for people to access services and people in ways they were never able to connect with before. As we reconnect with the world and communities around us, we can take what we've learned and bring them into the new communities that we re-build around the globe, and we strive to make these renewed communities more inclusive, empathetic, equitable, and diverse.  Read more

After a year of challenge and innovation, we find ourselves in awe of the resilience of people and the world around us. We have learned new approaches to daily life and crafted innovative ways to engage with others. The ongoing global health crisis has dramatically changed our interactions and left many feeling isolated. For others, the new virtual nature of engaging has opened new avenues for people to access services and people in ways they were never able to connect with before. As we reconnect with the world and communities around us, we take what we've learned and bring them into the new communities that we re-build around the globe, and we strive to make these renewed communities more inclusive, empathetic, equitable, and diverse.  

While local culture shapes varying beliefs, values, languages and customs, the globalization of societies requires us to work and live together. We acknowledge our universal interconnectedness: we must be more aware of who we are, our differences and similarities, and how we relate to each other. There is power within our global community to bring voices together to effect change. In doing so, we must examine our relationship with our shared humanity and how that relates to our individual, personal growth. In today's global community, it is imperative to cooperate globally in promoting peace, justice, security, spirituality, protection of the environment, human health, agriculture, use of resources, and many other global topics. 

By intentionally re-building our connections, we have the opportunity to focus on the commonalities that make us human and celebrate the uniqueness of each individual. To be a member of the global community means to look at our responsibilities to ourselves and others and to consider how we can ensure cooperation and collaboration in our interconnected world. In the words of Abraham Lincoln, “We can succeed only by concert. It is not ‘can any of us imagine better?’ but, ‘can we all do better?’ [...] As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew.” 

• The Harrisonburg community is one of the most diverse areas in this region: one of 33 Church World Service Refugee Resettlement sites (and one of the sites with the highest rate of refugee resettlement per capita) and one of the most diverse school systems in Virginia (56 languages represented and with more than half of students have a language other than English spoken at home). 
• More JMU students participate in study abroad than most of our peers (#1 for total number of students studying abroad on short-term programs) with 1,380+ students studying in 55+ different countries each year.
• Our international student body has been increasing steadily over the past 5 years and continues to grow. Right now at JMU we have international students representing 75 countries.