Business School Faculty Members Lead International Trips

Created in 2005, the Global Citizenship Project (GCP) is a truly unique, Shenandoah University-funded international travel and educational experience offered annually during spring break. Five groups are selected to travel to five destinations. The groups are limited in size to maintain intimacy of experience (10 to 12 participants) and composed to represent the diversity of Shenandoah, resulting in the unexpected benefit of cross-disciplinary networking.

Applicants submit an original one-page essay describing their personal and/or professional interest in GCP and how they envision sharing their experiences with others at Shenandoah the following year. Applicants must sign on without prior knowledge of the destination to which they might travel.

Essays are reviewed anonymously by a selection committee of previous GCP travelers.

The intention of GCP is to give the selected participants the opportunity to experience another culture while focusing on a universal theme, such as global citizenship (2005), power (2006), time (2008) or sustainability (2010). GCP has traveled to locations on six continents, including Costa Rica, Peru, Mali, India, Taiwan, Oman, Denmark, Romania, Australia, Vietnam, Morocco and Burma. Participants share their international experiences with the rest of the community in unique ways upon their return.

This year, three of the five GCP trips – to China, Rwanda and Uruguay – were led by business school faculty members Assistant Professor of Accounting and Finance Wenbin Tang, Ph.D.; Associate Professor of Sport Management Joey Gawrysiak, Ph.D.; and Assistant Professor of Management Montressa Washington, Ph.D., respectively. Business school students and staff  participating in the trips included Isaac Schrantz ’21 (Iceland), Myles Hairston ’14 and Cameron Sickler ’17 (Rwanda),  Nyrissa Osborn ’20 (Spain) and Sydney Arnette ’19 (Uruguay).