Building Bridges to the Future: Global Case Studies of Teaching and Learning in the 21st Century

INTRODUCTION

As the lights dimmed in the Verdi Theater in Trieste, Italy, on a beautiful evening in October 2016, the joyful chatter of the over 600 audience members faded, and all eyes focused on the young man who walked to the center of the stage, dressed in a grey twaub and wearing a white keffieh. For the next two hours, through poetry, dance, and music from different cultures around the world, and with words spoken in Arabic, Spanish, Italian, and English --he and other high school students at UWC (United World College) Adriatic powerfully told the moving story of one of their fellow students, who had made a difficult journey alone, as an unaccompanied minor, from Egypt to Italy.

The performance ended with the young refugee’s acceptance at UWC Adriatic, a two-year residential school located in Duino, Italy, that hosts on its campus, 190 students from 85 countries. In response, the audience --composed of alumni, current students, staff, donors, parents, volunteers, and friends of the UWC network of 17 schools around the world and 155 national committees --rose to their feet. They were applauding not only the students’ performance, but also reaffirming their own commitment to the UWC mission of making education a force to unite people, nations, and cultures for peace and a sustainable future.

Central to the ethos of UWC is the belief that education can bring young people together in their formative years on the basis of their shared humanity and support them in becoming people who can create social change through courageous action, personal example, and selfless leadership. Her Royal Highness Queen Noor of Jordan, President of the UWC movement, stated that UWC does not simply want to produce educated young people. [They] hope to nurture and educate activists and future leaders who can identify and help resolve the challenges within their own societies and contribute to stability, peace, and justice in the wider world. The following case study explores how UWC works to offer a challenging and transformational education to a deliberately diverse group of young people, operating the only global network of pre-university schools whose aims are to make leaders to create a peaceful and sustainable future, selected on their own merit, regardless of their ability to pay.

Jens Waltermann, Executive Director of UWC, in a recent interview, described the profile of the ideal graduate of UWC schools thus: We want them to question the status quo, to question the inequalities they experience, to develop empathy towards other ways of living and seeing the world -- and not to be complacent but to bring about the change they want to see. At UWC, we believe that a self-empowered person… is a person who has the energy to change things and the inclination to use that energy in the right way and for the common good. It’s also somebody who understands and can navigate the complexity of life and who reaches beyond easy answers.

UWC AT A GLANCE

Website

http://www.uwc.org/

Vision and Mission

To make education a force to unite people, nations and cultures for peace and a sustainable future.

Countries in Which There Is a UWC Campus

Armenia, Bosnia Herzegovina, Canada, China (Hong Kong & Changshu), Costa Rica, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Swaziland, Thailand, United Kingdom (Wales), United States.

Grade Level of Students Participating

Most of the schools enroll students only for Grades 11 and 12 (the IB Diploma) and have a total student population of 200-300 students each. However, UWC Waterford Kamhlaba (Swaziland) enrolls students from Grade 6 to 12, while UWC Maastricht (the Netherlands), UWC South East Asia (Singapore), and UWC Thailand enroll students from K1 to Grade 12; UWC Changshu (China) and UWC Atlantic College (UK) also offer a pre-IB year for Grade 10.

Number of Students Participating per Year

Approximately 3750 students per year in the IB diploma years and 9100 students in total are enrolled in the UWC. To date, more than 60,000 young people from over 190 countries have graduated from UWC schools and colleges.

Number of Staff

Varies by school

Number of Volunteers

Thousands, mostly working in one of the 157 national committees to identify and select applicants to the UWC.

Relationship to the Public Education System

UWC is an independent and global network of schools and education projects with schools and colleges in 16 countries, as well as national committees in over 155 countries. Some schools are partially funded by the local or national governments (UWC Red Cross Nordic, for example, is funded primarily by Nordic states, while UWC Maastricht is considered a public school within the Netherlands), but there are schools that do not get any funding from local or national governments.

OVERVIEW OF UWC

Non-Negotiable, Essential Components of UWC

Selection, Scholarships, and Deliberate Diversity:

Finding and selecting promising students and staff to compose deliberately diverse groups at UWC schools and enabling students to attend, regardless of financial need, is a core component of UWC. Over 70% of students attending a UWC in the IB diploma years who are selected by a national committee within their country and culture independent of their ability to pay tuition and receive a full or partial scholarship.

Deliberate diversity is a core tenet of UWC, and for them, diversity is based not only on nationality, but also on socio-economic class, religion, ethnicity, culture, and other factors. Current students at UWC schools represent over 150 different nationalities. The majority (70% in 2015) of UWC students selected attend the school with a full or partial scholarship, ensuring that attendance does not depend on the student’s socio-economic background.

Overview of UWC's Activities

The UWC experience provides an intense experiential education for young people, in and outside the classroom. Most UWC students in the IB Diploma Years are part of residential programs. By providing a context in which students live and learn together in their residential schools, UWCs foster a context in which students and staff learn to know each other and the wider community in which the schools are located. They aim to promote understanding among people of diverse nationalities, cultures, races, religions and socio-economic backgrounds and promote sustainability as a value and practice.

The UWC experience is delivered through the following activities:

•Rigorous academic program designed to foster inquiry, a sense of responsibility, critical thinking, global awareness, and civic engagement

•Extensive community service, involving people from outside the school, that emphasizes mutual giving and learning

•Strong environmental awareness, including wilderness experiences and outdoor