Penn’s School of Nursing offers students the opportunity to learn under renowned scholars in their field, work with state-of-the-art simulation equipment, and gain clinical experience at world-class hospitals throughout Greater Philadelphia. Yet, despite its title as the world’s leading nursing school, the University only offers one semester abroad program for Nursing students.
Passport, the web platform for Penn students to research, apply for, and manage study abroad programs, lists 119 options for students interested in studying on a semester abroad, excluding Global Research and Internship Programs and Penn Global Seminars. Of those 119 programs, only one is available as credit for students in the School of Nursing.
The one option for Nursing students accounts for 0.84% of the total semester abroad programs at Penn, yet undergraduate Nursing students comprise about 3.85% of the full-time undergraduate student population. Shouldn’t access to semester abroad programs roughly reflect student representation? Is it really that challenging for the School of Nursing to expand from one program to four or five semester abroad programs simply to approach parity?
For those who choose to study abroad at Penn’s only option for Nursing students, the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, the experience is undeniably invaluable. Nursing senior Tara Lee spoke about her time abroad, explaining “I only have good things to say, honestly.” But while UQ is undoubtedly an incredible choice, the issue is that it is the only one. Despite her great experience, Lee still commented, “It would be nice to just have more than one option.”
Other Nursing students shared similar perspectives. Nursing sophmore Michael Parella, who is preparing to go abroad to UQ this fall, admitted that while he’s excited, he “probably would have gone somewhere else if I had the option.”
More significantly, the program is only offered in the fall, which creates social and academic tradeoffs. Given that many students choose to study abroad during the spring term, Parella added that Nursing students planning to attend the program “leave mid-July and return mid-November, so you’re left with this really weird year where you just don’t see your friends for an entire year, which is kind of unfortunate.”
While over 2,500 students at Penn travel abroad for academic purposes each year, only a fraction are Nursing students. Given the limited options, it’s no surprise that during the Fall 2023 and 2024 semesters only four and six Nursing students studied abroad respectively.
Furthermore, the Nursing School previously offered two other semester abroad options in Israel and at Oxford Brookes University in England. While these partner institutions are still inexplicably advertised on Penn Nursing's study abroad website, they are no longer available for Nursing students to attend.
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Perhaps the lack of Nursing semester abroad programs reflects a broader trend of Nursing neglect at Penn, and many Nursing students agree. “The School of Nursing is very overlooked in general,” Parella said. He added that the lack of abroad options for Nursing students is “kind of ridiculous compared to the College, where everyone goes abroad.”
In a similar vein, Lee commented on Nursing neglect, saying “I feel like it’s kind of a common thing with the University … that other schools get a little bit more than Nursing.”
Ultimately, the issue is grounded not in semester abroad programs, but in how Penn chooses to prioritize its students. A school that claims to promote health in every part of the world cannot continue to limit the experiences that make global understanding possible. Having access to multiple semester abroad locations would allow Nursing students to build cultural competence while engaging with a wider range of nursing and health care practices, patient populations, and global perspectives. Expanding study abroad options is a necessary step toward aligning Penn Nursing’s opportunities with its ambitions and ensuring that Nursing is treated as an equal part of the University it represents.
JOSHUA DAUGHERTY is a Nursing sophomore from Farmington, Conn. His email address is joshuacd@nursing.upenn.edu.
