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Universities commonly mention global components in their mission statements. Many governments endorse the concept of global preparedness for its industry and people, and support student and faculty mobility. Yet not all students have the resources or motivation to study abroad, though still value an international experience. This 3-year study, based in the United States and Finland, explores the use of the Internet to connect university students in equivalent classes across international borders, completing collaborative assignments requiring student-student virtual dialog and cross-cultural reflection. After 10 repetitions of virtual exchanges between U.S. and European undergraduate students, quantitative and qualitative results indicate that virtual exchanges, like actual student exchanges, can provide learning opportunities for global awareness. Students, regardless of prior international experience, recommend virtual exchanges. No single pedagogy achieves 100% success and improvements are underway. This paper identifies virtual exchange goals, describes pedagogical activities, presents results, identifies areas for improvement and offers research suggestions. The approach can apply to any discipline at any level. Faculty hesitant about either technology or interference with course structure may be motivated to try this easy-to-use, cost-effective pedagogy to broaden global perspectives that can be scaled up, down, or custom-tailored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work describes the international collaborative learning experience among students from different institutions in the Americas through a multinational global design project. The case study presented here refers to the conceptual design and prototype fabrication of a portable folding bicycle as an economical and environmentally friendly transportation solution. The paper presents the technological, geographical and cultural challenges of this collaborative initiative, as well as the strategies, methodologies, planning, logistics, and specific tools for communication via Internet used to carry out the project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This concluding article presents the main themes that emerged from this volume within a multidimensional, multidisciplinary integrative framework conceptualizing the consequences of the trauma of terrorism and informing optimal prevention and intervention methods. It reviews short- and long-term findings of the effects of terrorism on adults, children, families, communities, and societies and makes numerous research recommendations, Viewing terrorism as psychological warfare against the community, it advances community-based, culturally congruent interventions, with a public mental health approach, in an ongoing, integrated network of services promoting community and individual resilience, specialized training, international collaboration, and continued dialogue concerning the role of the media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is an accepted opinion [among some people] that the Academy constitutes the central point, to which all discoveries and inventions from the entire world converge as soon as they are made. These discoveries will take the trouble to come to us to verify their authenticity and it is only after being supplied with a passport, signed by us, that they can decently circulate in the republic of science. The title of associé étranger is reserved for those scientists who, from all countries except France and in all the sciences which the Academy studies, have reached the first rank. By this happy association the Academy is in a way universal, and the history of all the great discoveries, with which the sciences have been enriched since its foundation, belongs to its own history. I bequeathe to the Academy of Sciences the sum of 20,000f., the interest from which will be given every two years as the Delalande-Guérineau prize to the French explorer or scientist, who has rendered the greatest service to France or to science. Internationalism and nationalism A certain universalism emerged in the eighteenth century from the ideas of the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment helped to spread the idea of man learning from nature. The natural world was thought of as providing models for law and politics, as for other human concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Out[side] of the pale of the Institute and those who aspire to its honours, there is infinitely little. I demand as an amendment to Article 1 of the regulations [of the Institute] that the meetings of every Class should be held in public. The public will derive great advantages for their education. Also, if members of the Institute are placed under the public gaze, they will not fall asleep in their academic chairs. For two years an idea had been absorbing all my research and a hope had been consuming me. I had finally captured the idea and I thought that fortune was smiling. In those days young men knew only one dream, a king of glory, whose temple was the Academy of Sciences, guardian of truth … I remember how I trembled when I dared to speak to one of [the Academicians] in the courtyard of the Institute. On the fringe of official science All groups make distinctions between members of that group and non-members. Such distinctions apply to nationalities, to races, to schools and to learned societies. If the learned society in question was one of ancient lineage with government sponsorship and the very highest standards of membership, one should not be surprised if the distinction between members and non-members was almost an absolute one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]