Study Abroad in Thailand!
Academically challenging and intensely experiential, ISDSI courses are expeditions into the cultures and ecology of Thailand. Each course is focused on understanding sustainable development and is designed in collaboration with local communities.
Integrating both the social and natural sciences, on our courses students may work on an organic farm alongside villagers while learning about agroecosystems, backpack on remote forest trails in the mountains with upland people in order to study indigenous forest management or sea kayak to learn about oceans, reefs and fishing communities.
Components of the semester in Thailand include:
- Home stays: An initial 5 week home stay with a Thai family in Chiang Mai. Following this, students will often be in home stays on-course, in the villages where the courses take place. These include Northern Thai, Karen hill tribe, Southern Thai, and other cultures.
- Independent living: After the home stay, students move into apartments and stay there while in Chiang Mai for the seminars and internship portions of their coursework.
- Expedition travel: Most courses contain a significant component of expedition travel, including hiking, backpacking and sea kayaking.
- Field research: Both natural science methods and survey methods from the social sciences are used in ISDSI courses. Students may be doing a field experiment or biodiversity survey one day, and the next interviewing farmers or fishermen about their livelihood the next.
- Language immersion: A core component of the program is intensive Thai language study — using small classrooms with hands on and interactive learning while in Chiang Mai, and required field use of Thai while on the courses. Students come out of the program with a sold working knowledge of Thai.