Introduction

I jump to my feet and proudly applaud the Georgetown graduates, their faces a mix of elation and anticipation as they open the door to the next chapter and take their steps forward into an exciting future. As parents and professors beam, the last students move their tassels from right to left, signifying the years of hard work and accomplishment that brought them to this moment. A chorus of laughter and cheering erupts from the mass of capped and gowned graduates as they file out of the commencement hall into the grand library atrium where friends, family, and community members anxiously await them. Above, rows of flags from all over the world hang high from the walls and ceiling, the bright sunlight from the skylight windows highlighting the vibrant colors. The nine key values that drive the spirit of Georgetown, like “People for Others” and “Community in Diversity,” are prominently displayed throughout the building, reminders for each generation of the ties that bind them to both the future and the past.

I mingle and congratulate, moving through the room of familiar faces. The smile firmly planted on my face since morning is still there as I walk outside into the summer weather. It’s a balmy 110 degrees and actually cooler than the day before—a nice surprise for the early days of May. Another commencement is complete, another chapter written in Georgetown’s history.

As you might have guessed, this is not the Georgetown you probably know, positioned on the hill above the Potomac River, a stone building of spires and steeples nestled amongst cherry blossoms in the spring. That Georgetown campus in Washington D.C. is more than two hundred years old, home to the Jesuit university renowned for its research, service, and education. The campus of this commencement story is also Georgetown, and it’s equally as beautiful. The faculty and students hold close the same values and benefit from the same prestigious education—it’s the location and experience that differ.

Georgetown’s global branch campus in Qatar, 6,900 miles from the United States, is situated in the desert oasis of Doha in Education City, an initiative by the Qatar Foundation to bring the world’s top universities together on one campus. In addition to Georgetown’s main campus in D.C., Georgetown University in Qatar is the second home of the Walsh School of Foreign Service. Since 2009, graduates of our program have shown that what started as an experimental theory to enrich the educational experience has, in fact, resulted in a world-renowned opportunity for students, faculty, and communities to bring cultures together and embrace our new global world.

Inspiration from Innovation

In the summer of 2012, I was a sociology professor on the main campus at Georgetown, preparing to move from Washington, D.C. to Doha, Qatar for the semester to teach Women in Development at Georgetown’s global branch campus. Just three years prior as a faculty senator on the main campus, I had listened to Carol Lancaster, the late dean of the School of Foreign Service, speak to the Faculty Senate about the recent graduation of the first class of Georgetown students to attend the Doha campus.

In its founding years, the program proved successful, she was happy to report. They had a small group of students, attentive faculty, and a focused mission to extend the benefits of a Georgetown education to an international locale. They offered students from around the world an enriching, first-rate education with courses, programs, and opportunities unlike anywhere else—including Georgetown’s main campus.

I expected to bring back a completely different perspective after that summer semester in Doha—except I didn’t return to the main campus for long. Instead, I returned to Doha and was offered the role of assistant dean for Academic Affairs at the Georgetown campus in Qatar, a position in which I’ve had the honor and privilege of serving for the past several years.

The Global Experience

People tried preparing me for Qatar’s climate by telling me that it feels like Arizona in the summer but hotter. Despite having an average temperature of 75 degrees, May through July brings temperatures that top 110 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade. You know it’s exceptionally hot when even the bus stops are air conditioned.

Qatar, a peninsular Arab country, was a whole new world to me of sea, sand, and sun. I loved it.

The campus was impressive, with its technology-infused classrooms and state-of-the-art student facilities. The students were engaged and curious, with smaller class sizes that allowed for more focused and intense discussion. Every day was an opportunity to learn—for the students and me. Students brought unique cultural perspectives with them to class, representing the views of not only American and Qatari students but of students from fifty different countries and all corners of the world.

After that summer, I better understood Dean Lancaster’s excitement about Georgetown’s global branch campus. It isn’t just the amazing facilities and technology or the passionate students and seminar style of the classes. The entire concept of a global branch campus makes the program unique.

Students accepted into a prestigious American global branch campus spend four years of undergraduate education in another country, learning a specific course of study, selecting from a variety of disciplines, and receiving the same level of education they would from the university’s main campus. It’s important to note that this is not study abroad but rather a complete, degree-conferring U.S. higher education undergraduate program. If study abroad is the movie trailer, the U.S. global branch campus experience—just like the mainland campus experience—is the entire movie.

For U.S. branch campuses going global, each university brings a different school and distinct program to locations throughout the world. There is an exciting breadth of diverse programs and disciplines, from undergraduate to masters programs in the arts and humanities, communications, business, international relations, political science, marketing, fashion design, graphic design, cinematic music production, medicine, engineering, and foreign service.

In Qatar, Georgetown offers its renowned Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service degree program, or BSFS, a branch campus of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service in Washington, D.C. Students pursuing the BSFS degree apply directly to the Georgetown University program in Qatar and complete their studies in Doha. With the options of majoring in international politics, international economics, international history, or culture and politics, students also have two additional unique opportunities:

1. During their four-year undergraduate program, students may spend their junior semester or an entire year abroad at either the Georgetown main campus or partnering institutions in more than fifty countries throughout the world.
2. During their four-year undergraduate program at the Georgetown branch campus in Qatar, students may enroll and cross-register in a variety of courses across multiple disciplines, all taught by world-class faculty at one of the other five U.S. universities in the Qatari neighborhood known as Education City.

The degrees conferred with Georgetown University in Qatar are identical, whether on the main campus or the branch campus. Upon graduation, the names of students who attend the Doha campus appear alongside the names of the main campus students in the graduation book. All are listed with the School of Foreign Service, with no separate distinction for their program’s location. The highest honors, like valedictorian and summa cum laude, are granted to those who earn the title—whether in Doha or Washington, D.C.

One might argue that if it’s the same education with the same distinctions, why bother with a global experience? The answer to this question lies within the program’s community.

A Global University Community

Georgetown has always been considered the leading university in international affairs, so being a pioneer in the launching of a global branch campus was not a stretch for the institution.

Edmund A. Walsh founded the School of Foreign Service in 1919, becoming its first dean. According to Georgetown’s Walsh School of Foreign Service website, he established the school because of U.S. involvement in World War I, saying, “Having entered on the stage of world politics and world commerce, we assumed worldwide obligations. Our viewpoint can never be the same again.” For many U.S. diplomats, Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service provides ideal training for the State Department.

The atrium at Georgetown University Qatar, Hall of Flags | Photo courtesy of Georgetown University Qatar

The School of Foreign Service remains, “dedicated to educating students on global issues and preparing them for lines of service in the international arena.”1 When Georgetown University in Qatar was founded in 2005, the responsibility of diplomacy that had become the legacy...