Tips and Tales From Around the Globe

Peter Ballagh is Global Experiences' placement director in Dublin, Ireland. Here he lends his expertise on the advantages of start-up internships.

We have had another exciting year at Global Experiences in 2014. I always say that change is constant and again we have seen some changes during the year: new locations, awards, record breaking enrollment, and lots and lots of conferences and campus visits.

Lead by example. Model the results you expect. Just as successful CEOs and leaders of corporations cultivate their missions and strategic plans towards company goals, successful University Presidents also lead by modeling the kinds of bold leadership that inspires students on their campus.

Global Experiences staff (Emily Merson, Melissa Buerkett-Vivian, Alex Paisner, Kevin Pickett and Carri Orrison) were thrilled to attend the NAFSA conference in sunny San Diego and contribute to the internationalization of higher education conversation. To kick start us Tuesday morning, GE hosted a coffee break. If you missed it, please contact Carri to receive your travel mug and tell us where in the world you’d like to go.

We love the Clifton StrengthsFinder Assessment. We’ve mentioned it in a few posts, we provide  it to all of our participants, and we even divided them into the Divergent factions. You know that we love the assessment, but we haven’t told you why we think it’s important for people to be aware of their natural talents.

In January 1998, in the summer before my last semester of my BA degree in Political Science and Science and Technology Studies at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, I did a 3-month internship at the United Nations in Jakarta, Indonesia. It was experience that changed my life in so many ways and set me on a path that has lead me to a place I could never have expected.

Alex Paisner is the Marketing Director for Global Experiences. He has traveled throughout the world, and is an alum of the Global Experiences Dublin Program.