Intercultural communication class travels to Washington, D.C., over winter break

WASHINGTON — Students in SPAN 297I/IT 297I/PORT 297I Multilingual and Intercultural Communication initially thought they’d be traveling abroad as part of the new embedded course. However, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, plans changed.

Lauren Halberstadt, assistant teaching professor of Spanish and the course instructor, decided to pivot and look for domestic opportunities that would still provide her students with chances to engage with their coursework outside of the classroom in an enriching and immersive way. At the start of Penn State’s winter break in December 2021, nine Penn State students traveled to Washington, D.C., to extend their learning beyond the classroom.

The course, which was taught for the first time last semester, focuses on linguistic strategies for succeeding in multilingual situations, as well as intercultural communication practices for navigating new environments.

In addition to developing and teaching the course, Halberstadt serves as the director of engaged scholarship for the Department of Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese in the College of the Liberal Arts. She created the course to include alumni engagement and applicable skill-building that students could apply to their professional lives after graduation.

Halberstadt’s goal for the course was for her students to take what they learn and use that to become global citizens.

“The hope for this course specifically is to teach students how they can use their multicultural and language skillsets to enhance their professional aspirations,” she said. “And on a greater scale, I hope to help build students who enrich the lives of others, approach diverse environments with an open mind, and understand how to create and foster inclusivity and equity.”

Claire Lewis, a second-year student majoring in photojournalism and minoring in global and international studies from Northampton, Pennsylvania, explained what the class was like for her and how much she enjoyed her studies.

“As a global and international studies minor, I needed a class with the cultural background, and I found the class description super interesting,” Lewis said. “The class in general I really loved. The content was super cool. It was a small and intimate class, and my professor was very open and always drove conversation.

“She [Halberstadt] would always point out our accomplishments, so it felt like a little family, which was nice from the get-go.”

Lewis also appreciated the diverse backgrounds of her classmates.

“We had people from Pennsylvania and New Jersey, but we also had people from Seattle, New York City, Puerto Rico and Poland,” she said. “It was just so cool to have a class which was multicultural, and to have that many different backgrounds was very insightful.”

“One goal of the Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese engaged scholarship program is to create an environment for diverse students,” said Giuli Dussias, professor of Spanish, linguistics and psychology. “This group of students represented three countries, four states, five languages, four academic levels, and many different majors.”

Lewis was one of the students who embarked on a three-day trip to the district in December. The students visited Planet Word, an immersive language experience that is the world’s first voice-activated museum, and took a private tour of the National Gallery of Art.

At the National Museum of American History, the students saw an exhibit on empowering women called “Girlhood.”

"It was especially cool being a whole group of women doing that,” Lewis said.

Students also networked and connected with two Penn State alumni. They had dinner with Julia Streisfeld Kennedy, a 2013 Italian alumna. Kennedy is the director of scholarships, grants and youth engagement at the National Italian American Foundation. They also met with Gary McMillen, a 2012 Spanish and accounting alumnus. McMillen is an audit and assurance senior manager at Deloitte.

Lewis could tell how much effort Halberstadt put into making the trip special for the students.

“Lauren (Halberstadt) found all of the exhibits herself, and you could tell it was very detailed and planned out,” Lewis said. “Despite not being able to go on our original trip to Europe, she wanted to give us a cool experience.”

Lewis explained that although hesitant to go on the trip due to it being the end of finals week, she was really glad she took advantage of the opportunity.

“It was really fun,” Lewis said. “I knew the majority of people on my trip from my class, but there were a few girls on the trip who were engaged student coordinators that I didn’t know and became super close with them during and after the trip.”

“It was a really cool experience, and I’m really glad I did it,” Lewis said.

Halberstadt and Dussias hope to plan more embedded courses in the future to allow students to extend their learning beyond the classroom.

“There is no questioning the value of traveling in person with students again and especially to connect the with young, engaged alumni. As our engaged scholarship programs grow, I look forward to including our diverse student body in immersive programming here and abroad,” Halberstadt said.