By Rick Vacek | October 6, 2025
The Hobson Wildenthal Honors College’s commitment to international research experiences can be summed up in three simple sentences totaling only 11 words.
The world is your classroom.
Go and explore it.
Just go.
“It’s the golden intersection,” said Dr. Donal Skinner, Dean of the Honors College. “I am super passionate about students having research experiences, and I am super passionate about students having international experiences.
“From the research side, it’s phenomenal – students are getting a deeply enriched research experience. But there are all these other opportunities.”
The “other opportunities” for Honors College students on stays in four European countries this summer included:
The links at the bottom of this story contain all those details and much more about trips that are central to the educational mission of The University of Texas at Dallas. Skinner has made it his mission to proclaim to the world his goal.
“I want this to become the No. 1 destination in the United States for meaningful, high impact undergrad research experiences,” he said. “Every student is getting something different. Every student’s experience is unique.
“This is about creating opportunities for these amazing students and then encouraging them to seize those opportunities so that future students will look to them.”
At the golden intersection, the light is always green.
Honors College students who study abroad are in a UT Dallas cohort but otherwise are on their own. For some, the flight overseas is their first bit of education.
“Getting there was a cultural shock,” said Sophia Vargas, who traveled to Paris for her stay at The Sorbonne. “I’ve been to other countries before. I’ve been to Asia. I’ve been to Latin America.
“When you go with your family, you have people you can rely on, people you can talk to. But when you go by yourself, it’s completely different.”
The challenges don’t subside when the plane lands. Tyler Crivella had been outside the U.S. on a cruise and had spent a week in Spain, but those were his only international experiences until he headed to Germany and had to find the right train from the airport to his destination, Marburg.
Just another part of the adventure.
“I thought it was kind of fun,” he said. “It’s like, ‘I need to get to a city two hours away by the end of the night. Figure it out.’”
Then there’s the little matter of learning how to live in a different culture, possibly with a different language. Crivella didn’t know German but found a simple solution to navigating Marburg, where English isn’t spoken often compared to the larger German cities.
“Google Translate is my best friend,” he said.
Instead of an app, Vargas had to use the approved approach to communicate with Parisians, famous for their disdain of English.
If she tried to speak French, which she attempted to learn, they would hear her accent and automatically switch to English. At least she had tried, in their view. But if she went up to them and immediately spoke English, their reaction was less than friendly.
The solution:
“What you have to do is go up to them and ask if they speak English in French – ‘Parlez-vous anglais?’ Then it’s a smoother transition into them helping you with whatever it is,” she said.
Even Scotland presents a language barrier. Nihal Anand’s family visited him during his time at the University of Glasgow, and they were flabbergasted to watch him carry on a conversation with a Scotsman whose brogue was as thick as the lush countryside.
“How do you know what he’s saying?” they asked.
Research is the linchpin of international education, but the exploration outside the lab reveals so much more about the student’s ability to adapt and grow.
“The research is the familiar part. I know what I’m doing, I know what I’m working on. We all do,” Crivella said. “Everything else – crazy and new.”
Those crazy experiences can create a new sense of self-assuredness. Overcoming a fear of the unknown invigorates and inspires.
“It makes you feel more independent,” Vargas said. “It makes you feel like you can go anywhere in life, anywhere in the world and you’ll be OK. Now the world is my oyster.”
Ah yes, the food. No matter where they go, students talk about the food.
“There’s good and bad with it,” Crivella said. “I went to a cafeteria where you get a main meal with three sides. Every day, at least two of those four items would have potatoes in them, without fail. Every single day.
“At first I thought, ‘You know, I like mashed potatoes.’ After a week I said, ‘French fries are nice, but I’m good. I need something else.’”
With adaptation comes discovery.
“It’s especially for somebody who enjoys traveling, trying new experiences, meeting new people, eating new food – people who are spontaneous and enjoy expanding their horizons,” said Katrina Lee, another member of the Marburg cohort.
“I like that we were tossed into a new country with less direction and more freedom to do our own thing. But even if you prefer more security in terms of having familiar people and familiar things, this is also good for those types of people because you have your cohort.”
Lee liked the freedom so much, she would like to live abroad someday.
Most students, of course, will stay closer to home after they graduate. But they still can apply the skills they picked up overseas.
Claire Wang, for example, learned how to cook during her trip to Aarhus, Denmark, and proved it by bringing her homemade cheesecake to Skinner.
“One of the things I say in terms of Honors is that we want to educate the whole person,” he said. “There are the courses you take – critical, foundational knowledge. But there’s everything else that happens while you’re a student. You’re getting access to experiences that help you grow in a way that cannot happen in a classroom.”
The international education experiences might come at an inconvenient time. Crivella had two jobs lined up for the summer before the trip to Marburg changed his plans. “I was flung into it, but it was super fun,” he said.
The message is simple.
Just go.
“If not now, then when?” said Hannah Choi, part of the Scotland cohort. “You’re out there meeting people your age who are there for the same reason as you. There’s never another time in your life when you could have that experience.”
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Related content:
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In Students’ View, Scotland Is Worthy of High Praise