WHITNEY CURTIS | news editor
New goal will ensure 70-80% of future students will study outside the country during college.
APU now has over 4,000 undergraduate students, but only about 10% of each graduating class travel overseas to live and study abroad. APU leadership aims to change that through the goal of intentional internationalization.
Internationalization will create another kind of education for students—one in which the majority of students will be expected to learn not only in the classroom, but also in other countries as well.
“As it relates to us as a university, [internationalization] is the concept that our students have the responsibility and opportunity to learn from the world,” Executive Director of International Programs Matt Browning said.
Browning and his colleagues are designing more opportunities for students to interact with the world around them by cooperating with new study abroad organizations, initiating different mission trips, and admitting diverse and international students.
“When I talk to Matt Browning, his vision for our students and school is really exciting to me,” senior psychology major Ryan Lane said. “We are trying to create students who not only go out, but also create a mindset of world vision and understand God’s passion for the whole world and God’s calling to us to reach out to the world.”
Satellite campuses, like the one recently opened in South Africa, are planned for other parts of the world as well.
“We are looking at the academic structure and the location of where we might begin other campuses in the near future,” Browning said.
Browning says that a key component to a college level education is for the student to break away from ethnocentric thinking and actively pursue a wider knowledge of other cultures and global issues.
“My bottom line dream is that students in the APU community would really understand the world and its people the way God does,” Browning said.
Although students are interested about the coming study abroad opportunities, some have voiced concerns about the program’s affect on their studies and school activities.
“I think [the idea of every student studying abroad] would be so awesome,” freshman finance major Adam Bailey said. “The only problem is all of the athletic students—half the time they have practice and games year-round. And hard majors like nursing would have to offer classes that would help them complete their major.”
Browning addressed this common problem when he said the staff is working hard to create study abroad options for students with demanding majors, such as nursing, which will fulfill their necessary classes and credit hours.
“A lot of science students aren’t really encouraged to study abroad and we need to see the world and what is outside of APU,” junior applied health major Simone Borghei said. “I think it is important to know the people that we are helping—especially for those of us interested in the mission field.”
Some are also wondering if 70-80% of students are expected to study abroad during their college years, how they will afford it.
“The commitment we’ve made to students is that it costs you no more to study in a place like South Africa than it does to study here, including the price of airfare,” Browning said.
Browning said that various APU offices such as the International Center, the Study Abroad Office, the Institute for Outreach Ministries, and the International Programs Office are working together to create study abroad options that are effective and easy for students to participate.
“I so desperately want the students of this campus to be marked by the world and to make a mark in the world for the advancement of the kingdom,” Browning said. “I pray that students would be ruined for the ordinary after having lived around the world somewhere and seen what needs to be done.”
The bottom line: APU may have, at most, 10% of the student body participating in study abroad programs now, but that will soon change as Browning expects a majority of future students will practice intentional internationalization. 
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