Welcome to St. Olaf's 2017 Global Semester!




Greetings!  Welcome to the blog for St. Olaf College's 2017 Global Semester.  We are glad that you are here!

Students will be posting regularly to this blog about their daily reflections and experiences. Students will also be posting pictures on our Facebook page (St. Olaf Global Semester 2017), so be sure to follow that as well!

To get us started, here is a brief overview of the Global Semester.  My name is Jason Ripley, and my wife and I (along with our two boys) are leading the 2017 program. We begin on August 31, when we fly to Rome, Italy for a week of learning and adventure. Our next week will be spent in Israel and Palestine. After that we fly to Egypt, where we will be taking a course in Egyptian history at the American University of Cairo and touring various historical sites on the weekends (Pyramids!) From there we head to India for a course on the religions of India. We start in Hyderabad, where we will be based at the Henry Martyn Institute for almost 3 weeks, followed by a week in Chennai and surroundings areas. We then travel to Aurangabad to explore the Buddhist caves at Ellora and Ajanta, followed by a visit to Delhi and the Taj Mahal in Agra. Our next adventure is in Thailand, where students will spend their fall break, and then we head to Hong Kong for a week. Our final month is spent in Beijing, China, where we will take a course in the Political Economy of China.  My course, Christology in Global Dialogue, will weave throughout these locations and explore how Christian theology is enriched and enlivened by global communities of faith engaged in inter-religious dialogue.  We will wrap things up and return home on December 22!


St. Olaf's Global Semester is celebrating its first 50 years, and we are well-positioned for the next 50 thanks to the generosity of the Board of Regents chair Larry Stranghoener and his wife Lynn, whose donation (with earnings matched annually by St. Olaf’s Strategic Initiative Match program) has endowed the program for future generations of Oles.  Students are now able to participate in Global Semester at no additional cost, and we are grateful for this transformative gift that is opening the world to us.  Fram Fram! 

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