<p>So my son went to the presentation about the Institute for Global Leadership and was very impressed, but also very confused. He said it ended up sounding like an academic cult. (In a good way.) We've looked at the website together and we are both still confused as to what its role in undergrad life is. It looks like they offer one two semester course a year, fund research and internships. It's not clear to me whether that course they offer is in IR, an elective or something else. Anyone know?</p>
<p>I have a question to tack on – is it possible to do the Ex-Col/EPIIC simulation more than once, or do students move on to become leaders for the following year’s simulation?</p>
<p>An academic cult is an excellent way of putting it. Very, very few people have one foot in/one foot out of IGL. The only courses they really offer are the full-year EPIIC symposiums, which are extremelytime-consuming, but most participants seem to really enjoy/benefit from the experience. They also sponsor a BUNCH of programs in active citizenship. They’ll send you to all sorts of crazy places and let you do some really cool stuff for free if you commit to worshiping at the temple of Sherman Teichman (director of the institute). Involved IGL kids commonly graduate having done extremely interesting assignments in two or three countries across the globe (Guatemala, Philippines, Turkey, Cameroon, etc.), and many of them found their own non-profit organizations while still an undergrad. Joining IGL basically means you’ll be overachieving as an extracurricular. The time-intensive nature of their programs, by the way, is what makes them a cult: IGL keeps you so busy that a lot of your friends end up being other IGL kids in your program.</p>
<p>CountingDown - I do believe it’s possible to do EPIIC more than once, but I also don’t think that anyone actually does it. It’s too big a time commitment for too few academic credits to make it practicable. Just to be clear, the students in one year’s EPIIC program do act as leaders within their own year, organizing and leading symposiums and being tasked with all sorts of responsibilities.</p>
<p>Snarf’s assessment is a great account of the EPIIC course, but there are a LOT of IGL programs that don’t demand the same level of time commitment, and it’s important not to confuse EPIIC with the IGL as a whole. </p>
<p>Engineers Without Boarders, BUILD, and Exposure (for instance) are programs the IGL sponsors and helps run that pull students from all over the school who don’t need to sink the same huge time-commitment in order to do really interesting things. Doing EPIIC is a great springboard into the IGL activities and into international travel/research - one that requires an immense time-commitment but offers huge opportunities - but there are other avenues to participation as well.</p>
<p>can anyone who wants to take EPIIC get in?</p>
<p>Yep. </p>
<p>I totally forgot that Engineers Without Borders (I think Engineers Without Boarders would just be engineers who live without tenants) and Exposure were IGL programs. I guess I would say the kids who do the less intense IGL programs aren’t really considered “IGL kids” the same way that the kids who live and breathe active citizenship are. Not that that’s a good or bad thing. Just a group identity thing.</p>
<p>No, that’s not true - you have to apply for EPIIC. It’s a year long course.</p>
<p>Synaptic scholars is also a program under IGL.</p>
<p>You do have to apply for EPIIC - but anyone can apply for EPIIC and they take students from every corner of the university, both in terms of background and academic interests. And you absolutely don’t need to do EPIIC to plug into the dozens of programs that the IGL runs (though, EPIIC certainly acts as great prep for them). </p>
<p>@Snarf - It’s surprising how much the IGL sponsors and does. One of my first learning experiences in admissions was a dunk into all the non-EPIIC IGL work that gets done. Also, I would totally join a chapter of Engineers Without Tenants. :P</p>