Globalizing Women's Education

Photo: American University in Cairo

Globalizing Women's Education for the Twenty-first Century

The pressure to globalize education is on, and for good reason. Authors, pundits, and polltakers have decried “globalization” as one of the most overused buzzwords of this “global century.” But if the word is overused, its validity is also increasingly apparent. Globalization is nothing new--having long been evident in trade routes, political partnerships, and climate patterns--but improved communications and transportation technologies have rendered its effects more transparent. Students, faculty, and administrators alike must prepare themselves for principled action with the global community on terms that are ever more encompassing.

When it comes to women’s education, globalization is no less expansive. To consider women’s education in a global context means to entertain ambitious possibilities. It means aspiring to educate girls and women to recognize that all women’s lives are interconnected. It means extending education to women in all geographical, economic, and political locations, and improving the quality of life for everyone, male and female, as a result. It means creating new partnerships, new exchanges, and new conversations--forming alliances with neighbors whose proximity is novel only in that we are now more equipped to recognize it.

This issue’s contributors illustrate the many ways that women in higher education are moving forward to form alliances with their global peers to improve educational opportunities for their students and for girls and women across nations. It is clichéd but appropriate to say that these women are “teaching without borders,” with results that border on the extraordinary. Susan E. Lennon and the Women’s College Coalition are embracing the challenge to educate women for leadership in the face of global inequity, and Nina Rabin faces a similar challenge at the borderlands of the United States. Helen Sobehart has formed a partnership with academic administrators to improve the availability of research on women, and Kimberlee Staking has collaborated with international colleagues to improve students’ learning opportunities. As Gladys Brown illustrates, these collaborations depend on an abiding willingness to listen and learn from global peers like Aisha Bilkhair, who describes the unique challenges facing women in the United Arab Emirates.

Our contributors’ words challenge each of us to consider the possibilities--and responsibility--of placing women’s education in a global context. As Susan Lennon reminds us, “The challenges we face are indeed daunting.” But our authors attest that facing them is well worth the effort.