Owli partners with University of Maryland on semester development challenges such as capstone, Global Classroom initiative, Summer internships and Semester Abroad to prepare MIDCM students with practical, translatable knowledge and capabilities that are required to enter and contribute constructively to the international development profession. To achieve this, students are (1) introduced to practical realities of international development work, including challenges associated with exposures to new settings, cultures, and issues; (2) trained in hard skills necessary to design, plan, implement, and evaluate development projects effectively and ethically; (3) instructed in rigorous methodologies of empirical research and analysis with theoretical and applied relevance; and (4) exposed to strategies of entrepreneurship and innovation.

OWLI UMD PROGRAMS

Capstone program

Students learn through an intensive, dynamic project-based and design-oriented experience. They spend the bulk of classroom hours “workshopping” in their project teams, conceiving, refining, and articulating novel, viable solutions to key contemporary problems in international development. For purposes of the projects, a list of concrete, real-world problems are “seeded” by a network of the instructor’s contacts in the international development sector. The key deliverable of each project team is a professional brief that the students present for feedback in a final symposium before an audience of international development practitioners

STUDY ABROAD

designed to equip fellows with the knowledge, skills and mindsets necessary for them to become exceptional leaders to drive change in the schools and communities where they will be placed. Once in the communities, fellows continue to receive individual and team coaching and support from their dedicated leadership coach to grow in their role as community change-makers and as leaders

SEMESTER PROGRAM

SUMMER INTERNSHIPS

Students can sign up for a range of in-country opportunities over the US summer. We have two 4-week study abroad programs (based in Kenya ), and an 8-week outcome-based internship in Samburu, Kenya.

FACULTY JOINT RESEARCH

The goal is to create an interactive, open-access, online toolkit that activists and professionals in communities around the world can use to design social impact projects, where interventions will be evidence-based and each stage of the design process will be infused with the imperatives of ethical, inclusive, participatory development.

CUSTOM GROUP OPPORTUNITIES

These programs are fully customizable and are designed collaboratively to meet desired student learning outcomes. They typically include virtual exchanges (which are delivered entirely online), in-country programs (such as traditional faculty-led options, which are delivered in-person and involve travel), or a hybrid format (combining virtual and inperson program delivery).