IDOCS 05/06-3
At the May 4, 2006 faculty meeting, IDOCS will move that the CIEE Senegal program be moved from pilot status to full status.
Administered by the Council on International Education Exchange, the program in Dakar, Senegal program offers students the opportunity to live and study in a French-speaking West African country. The goals of the program are to introduce students to Senegalese society, provide them with a cultural immersion experience, and to help them develop and /or acquire foreign language skills in French and Wolof. These are accomplished through coursework, internships and living with a host family. The CIEE Study Center in Dakar is operated in conjunction with three host institutions: Suffolk University-Dakar Campus, the Boabab Center and the Université Chikh Anta Diop (UCAD). Students may enroll for a full year, semester 1 or Semester 2. The focus of study is the humanities and social sciences. Students take five courses per semester; all are required to take three courses that constitute the CIEE core curriculum: Contemporary Senegalese Society and Culture (taught in English), French Language, and Wolof Language.
Rationale
IDOCS granted this program pilot status in 2002. Since then, seven St. Olaf students have participated in the program. (Five have applied for Spring 2007.). Student feedback on the program has been uniformly positive, and program adviser Wendy Allen has described it as “academically rigorous and culturally rich.” Upon her request, IDOCS recommends that the faculty approve the moving of the CIEE Senegal-Dakar from pilot to full status.
