Off-Campus Studies Programs
76% of Carleton students participate in off-campus study program during their years at Carleton. To meet the needs of individual students, Carleton offers and supports a wide variety of off-campus study programs: Carleton seminars, winter break programs, and spring break programs in the United States and abroad, led by Carleton faculty; Carleton co-sponsored programs, and other non-Carleton programs. In addition, the Carleton Global Engagement programs are open to both Carleton and non-Carleton students.
Students expecting credit for participation in an off-campus program, whether in the United States or abroad, during the academic year or the summer, must check with the Off-Campus Studies Office, Leighton 119, for procedures, required forms, applications, and deadlines.
Carleton Off-Campus Study Programs
Carleton offers a changing selection of seminars, winter break, and spring break programs every year. These programs offer a related group of courses designed and led by Carleton faculty for Carleton students, using the resources of a site other than the Northfield campus. Students are selected by application two to three terms preceding the actual program. Students pay the Carleton comprehensive fee, which covers room, board, tuition, plus excursions and social events at the program site. Transportation to the site, books, and personal expenses are the responsibility of each student. Financial aid applies to these programs.
In addition to the Carleton seminars and break programs, students can choose a Carleton Global Engagement program. These programs enroll students from institutions nationwide.
- Carleton summer seminar participants must take a required leave of absence during the following winter term.
- Cancellation Policy: Carleton College shall have the right, at its option and without liability, to make cancellations, changes, or substitutions in cases of emergency or changed conditions or in the interest of the program.
Other Programs for Off-Campus Study
Students can also select from a variety of co-sponsored programs and over 80 additional non-Carleton programs. Students who plan to participate in a co-sponsored or non-Carleton program must complete the online OCS Application for Approval prior to participation. Students participating in these programs pay a $500 administrative fee. The fee will be charged to the student’s Carleton account after the Off-Campus Studies Office has approved the application. Students who are approved for off-campus study by the College may earn up to 54 credits (one year’s worth) to be applied to their Carleton degree. Financial aid applies to one non-Carleton off-campus study program approved by the College.
Students are encouraged to learn more about off-campus study opportunities and information about specific programs by visiting the Off-Campus Studies office in Leighton 119 and by visiting its website: go.carleton.edu/ocs.
Carleton Programs 2018-19
Economics and European Studies in Cambridge, summer term
Faculty Director: Paul Petzschmann
Founded in 1983, the Carleton Economics Seminar has been located at the University of Cambridge for over 30 years. Starting in Brussels, the program familiarizes students with the institutions of the European Union. It was the experience of the world wars that made possible the creation of institutions of European governance. The memory of the Great War will be at the center of a subsequent excursion to the battlefields of Flanders, immortalized in countless poems and other works of trench literature. While memory of the conflict has done much to unite European elites around the idea of shared governance, it also continues to divide historians and Europeans generally. The seminar will continue to explore these divisions on location in Cambridge and London while studying Britain’s long and fractious relationship with Europe. Students will also read the works of some of the most famous political economists who made Britain their home in the 19th and 20th centuries. Their discussions of Capitalism and its crises will be supplemented with visits to sites of the Industrial Revolution in Manchester and the British Midlands.
Cross-Cultural Psychology in Prague, Fall term
Faculty Director: Ken Abrams
Students will live and study in Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic and one of Europe’s most beautiful cities. Since the Velvet Revolution in 1989, which brought an end to 44 years of communism, Prague has been at the forefront of the sweeping social, cultural, and economic transformations of Central Europe. To help experience the culture and history of the region firsthand, students will participate in discussions, cultural events, and walking tours, as well as excursions to historic sites and towns both within and outside the Czech Republic.
Cross-Cultural Psychology Courses
Spanish Studies in Madrid, fall term
Faculty Director: Humberto Huergo
This advanced Spanish language program is based at the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM), one of Spain’s top academic institutions. Courses include Urban Studies, Political Sciences, and Art History, as well as an intense grammar review. All 20 credits count towards the Spanish major or minor. In addition to their coursework, students are allowed to audit a course of their choice.
Spanish Studies in Madrid courses
Global Engagement Program: Buddhist Studies in Bodh Gaya, India, fall semester
Faculty Director: Arthur McKeown
Through comparative study, the program examines each of the three major Buddhist traditions and their historical development: Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana. Students live in a Burmese Vihar, or monastery, where our highly qualified team of faculty and on-site staff provide an engaging and supportive environment. In addition, the program includes group travel to Varanasi and New Delhi, as well as a month-long Independent Study Project at the end of the semester that includes the opportunity to travel to a Buddhist community in India or neighboring countries.
Buddhist Studies in Bodh Gava course
Global Engagement Program: Women's and Gender Studies in Europe, fall semester
Faculty Director: Iveta Jusová
Since 1984, the Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe (WGSE) program has offered students a unique opportunity to explore feminist and queer theory in practice across Western and East Central Europe. Interaction with academics, politicians, activists, and homestay hosts in Utrecht, Berlin, Prague and Krakow encourages comparative approaches to independent research projects.
Women's & Gender Studies in Europe courses
Conservation, Geology and Natural History in Tasmania, Winter Break
Faculty Directors: Mary Savina and Nancy Braker
Tasmania is an outstanding natural laboratory for studying the geology, natural history and biogeography inherited from the Gondwana supercontinent, the history of biology and geology, and issues of modern land use and conservation. This program deals with the intersections of these issues.
Public Health in Practice: Washington DC and the Twin Cities, Winter Break
Faculty Drector: Debby Walser-Kuntz
The field of public health touches everyone and is by nature interdisciplinary, with important contributions made by epidemiologists, sociologists, physicians, economists, statisticians, scientists, and nutritionists, among many others. Through both coursework and the two-week field experience, students will explore the social-ecological model of public health. Participation in a local, collaborative, community-based project coupled with study in Minneapolis/St. Paul and Washington, D.C. allows a comparison of public health efforts at the local, state, and national level.
Sustainable Energy Principles and Practice in India, Winter Break
Faculty Director: Arjendu Pattanayak
Understand the future of energy for the world. During the fall, we will get an understanding of the basic scientific principles, as well as some of the social issues. We will design a solar installation (possibly a wind turbine as well) for a location near Auroville, a short distance from Chennai, on the southeast coast of India. During winter break, we will travel to Auroville for hands-on work, refining our design, and then installing the sustainable energy system. We will also visit Delhi and other field locations to provide cultural and policy context. We will learn how the local and geographical context matters, as well as the differences between the energy challenges for industrialized and developing countries.
Sustainable Energy Program courses
Society, History, and Popular Culture in Senegal, Winter Break
Faculty Director:Cherif Keita
Unlike most countries in Africa, where political transition is often achieved through military coups, in Senegal, a vocal youth movement called Y EN A MARRE [FED UP], uses the power of Hip Hop, within the framework of a solid and dynamic civil society, to protect democratic transition. Senegal owes this exemplary approach to democracy to a number of factors that will be examined during the field trip: Senegal’s long apprenticeship of the “Republican” model inherited from the French Revolution and the humanistic leadership fostered by its first President, the poet and philosopher Leopold Sédar Senghor, who eloquently celebrated the rich traditions of his people (the oral epics and songs of different ethnic groups, a harmonious coexistence between traditional spirituality and imported religions) while promoting modern party politics and creative expressions. This process culminated in the establishment of a multiparty political system in 1980 and a free and vibrant expressive culture (written and oral literature, world-renowned cinema, traditional and modern music, plastic arts, and more).
India: Globalization and Local Responses, Winter Term
Faculty Director: Meera Sehgal
India is a place of immense contrasts and diversities, being home to a wide array of languages, cultures, religions, and communities. Amid this diversity, the impact of globalization on the country’s 1.3 billion people is a topic of intense debate. This OCS program will explore the responses of several distinct communities to the pressures and opportunities generated in India’s globalizing economy. With a focus on the intersections of tourism, politics, development, sustainability, and gender relations, we will see how individuals and groups navigate social structures and institutions as they work to make a decent living. Questions that will frame our enquiries include: What is globalization and how does it impact different regions and groups of India? What are the major paradigms of economic and social development currently dominant in India? How do these play out on the local level? What roles do the government and NGOs play in Indian communities today? What are the forces of modernity and tradition in India and how do they affect different strata of society?
Studio Art in the South Pacific, Winter Term
Faculty Director: Fred Hagstrom
The goal of this program is to bring together studio art practice with the challenges and advantages of off-campus study – drawing from nature in a new environment, studying social issues in context, and producing narrative work in response to travel. Students will work both to improve their drawing skills and to see drawing as a unique way to understand the world. The work of the entire term, including both drawing and printmaking projects, will form a visual journal in which the students will record the experiences of travel abroad. Students will examine social and environmental issues, learn about indigenous and post-colonial art and artists, visit with artists, and interact with many people along the way.
Visions of California: Searching for the Golden State, Winter Term
Faculty Director: Michael Kowalewski
The “Visions of California” Seminar was first offered as a Carleton off-campus program in 1995. An intensive, “total immersion” experience, the seminar is a broad-ranging exploration of California literature, art, cinema, history, and environment. An experiment in putting education “in place,” the seminar features multiple fieldtrips to literary and historical sites. It also features an array of guest speakers – writers, artists, historians, actors, geologists, winemakers, architects, surfers, movie-makers – sharing their knowledge of and passion for the complex life and history of the Golden State. “Visions of California” is a unique venture in American education, and has been written about in the Washington Post, the Chronicle of Higher Education, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Sacramento Bee.
Vision of California Program courses
Contemporary Cinema in Europe, Winter Term
Faculty Director: Laska Jimsen
This seminar will engage Europe as a creative laboratory for cinema. We will explore diverse mediums in moving image arts including video, photochemical film, and installation. Through a combination of coursework and visits to film festivals, artist-run spaces, studios, galleries, and museums, students will expand their understanding of contemporary cinema. Students will develop technical and conceptual skills, and practice both collaborative and independent approaches to cinema production. Specialized workshops will introduce students to new tools for their own creative projects.
Cinema in Europe program courses
Creative Writing: Theater and Literature in London, Spring Term
Faculty Director: Greg Hewett
London is a global center for the literary arts and theater, as well as for music and the visual arts. Using London itself as a text, along with literature, theater, art, architecture and cultural history, students will combine reading, classroom discussion, group excursions in and outside the city, and individual exploration to write about London both creatively and critically.
French and Francophone Studies in Paris, Spring Term
Faculty Director: Cathy Yandell
A location with a particularly rich cultural history, Paris is today a diverse and dynamic city influenced by many distinct traditions. The program will explore key aspects of the historical, cultural, and artistic foundations of Paris, through both study and experiential learning in the city. The role of France’s colonial legacy in contemporary Paris will also be explored, culminating in a trip to Morocco, one of the most significant sources of French immigration.
Pilgrimage and Sacred Space in Japan, Spring Term
Faculty Director: Asuka Sango
Explore pilgrimage and sacred sites in and near Kyoto where there are thousands of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples—some more than thousand years old, like the city itself. The program offers a rare opportunity to study Japanese religions on the ground as lived by local people, and as experienced by domestic and global tourists including students themselves.
Sacred Space in Japan program courses
History, Religion and Urban Change in Medieval Italy, Spring term
Faculty Directors: Victoria Morse and William North
Centered in Rome, a city with one of the richest historical pasts in Europe, this program will provide students with diverse opportunities to explore these broader questions through the close examination of texts, images, sites, and landscapes produced during Late Antiquity, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and beyond. A central purpose of the courses in the program is to have students experience and explore the city and environs in depth and to learn how to integrate this experiential knowledge with academic sources of insight and information. Each course will therefore have a significant number of site visits inside and outside Rome as well as assignments that require independent exploration.
Carleton Global Engagement Program: Language and Culture in Global Russia, spring semester
Faculty Director: Diane Nemec Ignashev
Over the course of a semester, students immerse themselves in a country striving to redefine and reestablish itself culturally and economically. Students leave with a new perspective not only of Russia, but also of themselves and their “Americanness.” The program is based in Moscow, with program trips to St. Petersburg and the Lake Baikal region, on the border with Mongolia.
Carleton Co-Sponsored Programs 2018-19
For specialized areas of study, Carleton has partnered with other colleges to develop off-campus study programs. For each of these programs, Carleton representatives participate in the management, Carleton faculty often serve as instructors and directors, and Carleton students participate along with others from the member colleges and universities.
Associated Kyoto Program (AKP), in Kyoto, Japan, fall and spring semester, academic year
Students with background in Japanese live with Kyoto families and enroll at Doshisha University in intensive language classes plus two courses each term conducted by visiting professors from AKP member colleges or Doshisha faculty.
Higher Education Consortium for Urban Affairs (HECUA), fall and spring semester
These 15-week programs provide the opportunity to learn from local and international faculty who integrate theory with real-life urban issues. Home stays, internships, community immersion activities, and field research are used throughout the programs, which are open to all majors.
- Art for Social Change: Intersections of Art, Identity, and Advocacy, in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, spring semester only
- Community Internships in Latin America (CILA), in Quito, Ecuador, fall and spring semester
- Democracy and Social Change in Northern Ireland, fall and spring semester
- Environmental Sustainability: Ecology, Policy, and Social Transformation, in Minnesota, fall semester only
- Inequality in America: Policy, Community, and the Politics of Empowerment, in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, fall and spring semester
- Globalization, National Identity, and the Politics of Belonging, in Oslo, Norway, fall semester only
- New Zealand Culture and the Environment: A Shared Future, fall semester only
- Sustainable Agriculture, Food, and Justice in Italy, fall semester only
Inter-Collegiate Sri Lanka Program (ISLE), fall semester only
This 15-week program enrolls 15-20 students from seven consortium colleges to study the culture, history, religion, political structure of Sri Lanka. In-depth studies include Buddhist thought and practice, conversational Sinhala, and an independent research project. Students live with host families in Kandy.
Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM)
The ACM programs in the United States and abroad have a resident director for each program recruited from the member colleges. Courses are conducted by the ACM director and by staff at the program site.
- ACM Amsterdam: Sciences Global Health, Interdisciplinary Studies at VU Amsterdam, fall semester, adviser: Debby Walser-Kuntz
- ACM Botswana: Development in Southern Africa, Tanzania: Ecology & Human Origins, spring semester, adviser: Thabiti Willis
- ACM Brazil: Culture, Community, and Language at PUC-Rio, fall semester, spring semester, adviser: Helena Kaufman
- ACM Chicago Programs: fall semester, spring semester, spring trimester, advisers: Arts: David Lefkowitz, Entrepreneurship: Nathan Grawe, Social Justice: Rich Keiser
- ACM Costa Rica: Community Engagement in Public Health, Education, and the Environment, fall semester, adviser: José Cerna Bazán
- ACM Costa Rica: Field Research in the Environment, Social Sciences, and Humanities, spring semester, spring quarter/trimester, adviser: Mark McKone
- ACM Florence, Italy: Arts, Humanities, and Culture, fall semester, winter quarter/trimester, adviser: Ross Elfline
- ACM India: Culture, Traditions, and Globalization, fall semester, adviser: Kristin Bloomer
- ACM India: Social Entrepreneurship and Development, winter quarter/trimester, spring semester, adviser: Kristin Bloomer
- ACM Japan Study, academic year, fall semester, fall semester with cultural practicum, spring semester, adviser: Noboru Tomonari
- ACM Jordan: Middle Eastern and Arabic Studies, fall semester, adviser: Yaron Klein
- ACM London and Florence: Arts in Context, spring semester; winter quarter/trimester, adviser: Susan Jaret McKinstry
- ACM Newberry Seminar: Research in the Humanities, fall semester, adviser: Victoria Morse, Kristi Wermager
- ACM Oak Ridge Science Semester, Oak Ridge, National Laboratory, Tennessee, fall semester, adviser: Will Hollingsworth
- ACM Shanghai: Perspectives on Contemporary China, fall semester, adviser: Mark Hansell