Learning to love fondue, discovering the best types of beer and making friends with locals are just some of the cultural information often overlooked when students are considering studying abroad.
Glimpse Abroad, a Web site and magazine founded by Nick Fitzhugh '02, offers firsthand accounts of studying abroad.
The idea for Glimpse came to Fitzhugh during the year he spent traveling through Europe before matriculating at Brown.
His experiences "opened my eyes (to the fact) that I didn't really know anything about these western European countries, and what I did know was through news and headlines," he said.
After high school, Fitzhugh wrote creative non-fiction about his experiences in Europe that was published in the Providence Journal. "It was very accessible and sardonic - it made people feel like they were right there next to me," he said. The experience inspired him to collect similar accounts from others.
While alums hold many of the Glimpse's senior leadership positions, the company has also taken on several Brown students as interns. "Brown students tend to be the best because they have a really great knowledge of writing and grammar," Fitzhugh said. Kerala Goodkin '02, editor-in-chief of Glimpse, said that there have also been interns from other state colleges.
Hilary Costa '06, an editorial intern since the summer, learned about the company through an e-mail from the English Department. She said she thinks submitted articles have a broad appeal for many students.
"Since the articles are all personal experience-based and not at all academic or overtly political, they reach a wider audience. ... They balance creative non-fiction and information with an educational spin," Costa said.
Herald columnist Andrew Marantz '06.5 also interned at Glimpse this summer. "It's nice to put it in perspective and see where people are coming from," he said.
The idea evolved during Fitzhugh's time at Brown. He worked on an independent study with Professor Emeritus of Engineering Barrett Hazeltine and recruited about seven other students to work on developing plans for a potential business.
"I found a lot of support and interest from a lot of people at Brown, but for the most part we did it independently," Fitzhugh said, adding that these students never wanted to form a student group because they didn't want to be tied to Brown indefinitely.
Fitzhugh said the students quickly developed a board of trustees who provided general guidance and served as a sounding board for ideas. A board of advisors, which meets informally throughout the year, was also formed during this time. It includes Hazeltine; Visiting Professor of English Tracy Breton; Adjunct Associate Professor of Anthropology Patricia Symonds; Senior Lecturer in English Elizabeth Taylor; Associate Professor of Comparative Literature Meera Viswanathan; and John Eng-Wong, former director of the Foreign Student, Faculty and Staff office.
The first step was to develop an editorial philosophy and a business plan. "That's where (the Office of International Programs) and OIP at other schools came into play. ... We had to find ways to serve them and their students so that they would want to pay for what we do," Fitzhugh said.
Over time, the purpose of the group evolved from just publishing a magazine to operating as a non-profit foundation. The organization hopes its work will improve Americans' understanding and appreciation of other cultures.
"Americans have the farthest to go in understanding (the world) and the cultures in it," Fitzhugh said. "We think we don't need to (understand), but that's not true, and it's shown in the antagonism extremist groups feel toward us."
Glimpse mainly works through colleges to distribute its magazine, though it also has arrangements with bookstores across the country and a syndication deal. The company offers three levels of membership for colleges that provide bulk discount subscription rates as well as services that allow students to connect with each other and share experiences. One of these is a blog that students can use free of charge for six months.
Brown is the only institutional subscriber in Rhode Island, though Goodkin said the company works with other colleges in soliciting submissions. There are about 60 member institutions and 800 schools that work with the company, she said, though Brown has had the largest number of submissions from any one school.
