American University’s School of International Service (SIS) is proud to be among the top international affairs schools in the world, training the next generation of service-minded leaders. Since our founding in 1957, SIS has been a place where students come to discover their passions in the realm of international affairs.

And while we’ve always provided room for exploration, this fall, we are offering students even more flexibility with updates to our undergraduate curriculum that further enhance student discovery.

These curriculum enhancements, spearheaded by SIS faculty members, respond to the realities of our ever-changing world while seeking to meet the concrete academic interests of our students.

“SIS has reviewed the curriculum of the International Studies BA, assessing its strengths and pinpointing practical challenges students have faced navigating it,” said Robert Adcock, SIS associate dean of undergraduate education. “We reaffirmed our commitment to providing a single, schoolwide experience of interdisciplinary discovery and skill development while reforming our thematic and regional requirements to give students greater choice in how they balance breadth and depth in developing their substantive interests.”

Reimagined Thematic Areas

Our immersive undergraduate curriculum has long provided students with the opportunity to tailor their pathways and find where their passions lie. Our reimagined curriculum maintains this flexibility but reshapes the requirement for students to take courses across areas, allowing for broader academic discovery and more freedom of choice with elective courses.

Where students used to be required to choose both a primary and secondary thematic area of study, under this reimagined curriculum, students will have the flexibility and freedom to choose whether they want to pursue breadth across multiple areas or depth in one area of study.

Students beginning SIS this fall will, as they proceed through the degree, take three 200-level survey courses and three 300-level or higher elective courses, in either one thematic area or across several.

Students will choose from survey and elective courses organized within six thematic areas:

• Peace, Conflict, and Human Security
• Global Justice and Human Rights
• Foreign Policy and Global Security
• Environment, Development, and Health
• Global Economy
• Global and Comparative Governance

These reimagined thematic areas build on the strengths of SIS’s interdisciplinary curriculum while encouraging student inquiry across multiple areas of study.

“These changes to the undergraduate curriculum are the result of a coordinated effort to hit a sweet spot—an alignment of the strengths of the school with the passions and needs of our students, preparing them to meet present and future challenges facing the world,” said SIS professor Robert Kelley. “We’re always tinkering with the right balance of breadth and depth of subject matter for our students, and we’re hopeful that the changes will deliver the right mixture to the Class of 2030 and beyond.” 

Additional Flexibility in Regional Studies

Our revamped regional studies requirement gives students new flexibility to explore more than one region of the world during their time here at SIS and in study abroad.

Previously, students were required to pick one of six regional areas to study and take three classes in that region. Now, they will have the option to concentrate all three courses in one region or combine courses from different regions.

More than 80 percent of SIS students study abroad during their time in the program, often fulfilling much of the regional studies requirement while there. The new flexibility allows students to better adapt their approach to fulfilling this requirement with the courses available to them in study abroad.

“Our aim with this change is to continue our longstanding commitment to the value of regional studies while also enabling the pursuit of interests and experiences cutting across traditionally defined regions,” said Adcock. “Overall, these curriculum revisions allow students to discover what international service means for them in the 21st century.”