By Judith Roberts
Students at Louisiana Tech are being offered three study abroad programs in Europe this summer.
The offerings include a study abroad in Berlin, Madrid and Rome.
Tech professors Joe Koskie, Joel Stake and Kristi Stake will take students to Rome, and Kristi Stake said this will be her first study abroad trip with students.
“Originally Dr. Bryan Zygmont, former associate dean of Liberal Arts, was planning this trip,” she said. He had planned other trips for study abroad, including one last summer to Paris. My husband, Dr. Joel Stake, and I had talked to him about joining the Italy trip and offering a course, as well. When Dr. Zygmont left the university last summer, the trip fell on our lap. Dr. Stake had taken students to St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands and Beijing, China at a previous institute, so he knew how to plan a trip that would be interesting and educational for students.”
Stake said Rome is the birthplace of significant history in the fields of biology and communication, which her husband and she teach, respectively.
“I teach communication studies, and the Roman Forum is where the Latin style of public speaking was originated, which is still taught today in the United States and some European countries,” she said. “Italy is the home to the world’s oldest surviving anatomical theatre, the Palazzo Bo, and home to so many important scientists that lead the biological field into the modern era.”
The classes that will be offered in the Rome study abroad are Science and Society with Koskie and Joel Stake and Professional Communication with Kristi Stake.
“The science course is focused on helping students discover the context in which modern science and medicine emerged from medieval thinking as well as helping students explore the contributions of Italian scholars, patron families, religious institutions and universities to that modern understanding,” she said. “We will explore the transition from thinking about an integral cosmos to a mechanistic view of the natural world while visiting places like Museo di Storia della Medicina, e Palazzo Bo, Galleria dell’Accademia, and the Galileo Science Museum. But, of course, we will also have cultural visits to the Pantheon, the Sistine Chapel, and St Peter’s Basilica, too, while we are there.”
Stake said traveling helps students become more well-rounded in their entire educational experience.
“When you travel to another country, your ideas of what the world is like are so radically altered that it causes you to rethink a lot of what your natural biases are and start to think outside of the box of ‘normal life’ that you had before,” she said. “I really think, aside from the actual content that you learn, the real lessons are in teaching you to push your boundaries of what is and can be. Students come away from a trip to another culture with the understanding that it is OK to do things in a different way or to think about a problem from another angle, and that opens them up to learning and engaging differently with the world around them. And I think it ultimately makes them a better student and a better employee.”
Associate professor Damon Caldwell in the School of Design is taking students to Berlin in 2023.
“I have done a trip to Berlin three other times over the past 12 years,” Caldwell said. “In 2010 and 2012 I did Berlin along with a history professor. In 2017 the School of Design did the trip with myself and Associate Professor Nicole Duet (studio art) as faculty instructors.”
Caldwell said the Berlin trip will allow students to learn the culture of Germany, generally expanding their sensibilities of cultures and people.
“I initially proposed Berlin back when because I had worked there for a few years back in the ‘90s so I knew some aspects and had some contacts,” he said. “Also, Germany holds a significant place in modern architecture, through the importance of the Bauhaus school before WW2.”
Caldwell said he, as a student, never went on a study abroad trip, but once he did cross the ocean, it was life changing.
“When I finally travelled to Europe after grad school, my world was changed,” he said. “Study abroad is so beneficial, expanding the ways one sees the world, the openness to foods, people, crowds, different ways of living, city life, etc. Any student who goes will find it a transformational experience.”
For more information about the Rome trip, email jstake@latech.edu. For information about the Madrid trip, email arcase@latech.edu. For information about the Berlin trip, email caldwell@latech.edu.
