Experiential learning is a definitive element of our educational approach. Through internships, cross-disciplinary courses, research and other hands-on learning opportunities—at DU and around the globe—we ensure students have the opportunity to receive the practical experience they need to thrive.
Our degree directors are focused on creating educational experiences that address real-world challenges. The School is home to a number of research centers, institutes and initiatives that allow students to gain valuable research and internship experience. We also encourage our students to study abroad and learn a foreign language to widen their cultural perspective and articulate solutions with regional stakeholders.
Our office of career and professional development is a unique resource dedicated to helping Korbel students identify employment opportunities in their area of interest or expertise. Actively mapping a student’s career early on aids in pinpointing and developing skills that their ideal employers specifically seek. Furthermore, many of our staff, faculty and visiting professors are actively engaged in the field and offer career-focused guidance to current students and alumni.
CENEX, or the Crisis Engagement and Negotiation Exercise, is a major crisis management exercise executed by a volunteer student organization based out of the Korbel School. During CENEX, participants assume the roles of leaders of states, IOs, NGOs, and other non-state actors and their advisors in an international crisis scenario. Held over a Friday night and all day Saturday, the exercise focuses on a highly realistic scenario set in the near future. CENEX exposes students to the potential constraints and opportunities facing policy makers in an information limited, fast paced environment. As representatives of various national and international teams, participants are asked to make critical decisions in the interest of their respective countries as they attempt to resolve the crisis. The goal of the exercise is twofold; to encourage students to think about the complexity of managing international crises, in particular managing the flow of information in and out of their teams during negotiations, and to get students to ‘think outside the box’ while problem solving in an interactive and time-constrained environment.
During Spring quarter, Korbel School faculty and students pursuing the humanitarian assistance certificate along with other students partner with the International Disaster Psychology program at the Graduate School of Professional Psychology to offer students from both programs an opportunity to engage in a two-day international humanitarian crisis simulation. Simulations are an essential component of training in international humanitarian work and disaster psychology and may provide students with a competitive edge in the job market.
The specific focus of the simulation is on assessing and addressing the needs of a population newly displaced by conflict. The simulation is meant to serve as a tool in the process of preparing students for work in the humanitarian sector by giving them a taste of on-the-ground realities and allowing them to experience how they function in such environments. Students also receive training on engaging with the media and on the use of new technologies.
The Humanitarian Assistance Applied Research Group (HAARG) provides students with supervised opportunities to be involved in needs assessment, program evaluation and other forms of applied research with humanitarian organizations.
By being linked to humanitarian agencies through HAARG, students have opportunities to apply knowledge gained from their classes in a real-world context. This gives them a competitive advantage in searching for international internships and in the post-graduation job market. This is especially true for monitoring and evaluation positions within humanitarian organizations. Humanitarian agencies benefit from having qualified research assistants supporting needs that cannot always be fulfilled internally due to staffing and other resource and capacity challenges.
The Army War College’s International Strategic Crisis Negotiation Exercise (ISCNE) is designed to engage and educate participants in the process of crisis negotiations over a two-day period. The intent of this exercise is to gain experience in negotiations at the international strategic level, with participants coming away with a greater understanding of the complexity of the problem sets and the effort that goes into the pursuit of a resolution to a regional crisis that has broad-ranging implications.
We believe hands-on experience is critical to a student's education. In fact, most of our programs integrate an internship into the required curriculum. Career coaches help students identify potential internship opportunities that utilize their academic skills and interests and help them navigate the application process. Thanks to the generous support of several donors, we award partial to full funding to make valuable out-of-area experiences possible. Award amounts depend on a variety of factors, including length and location of the internship as well as the cost of living.
Whether made by man or by nature, a disaster leaves distraught and displaced people in its wake. Addressing the needs of survivors is the work of highly skilled aid workers and mental health professionals. To ensure that the next generation of those workers is prepared for effective service in the fog of calamity, the University of Denver sponsors an annual international humanitarian crisis simulation exercise.
Korbel School Students Hone Diplomacy Skills in ISCNE Program Exercise
This year marked the 8th anniversary of the International Strategic Crisis Negotiation Exercise (ISCNE), an experimental negotiation program organized by staff from the U.S. Army War College (USAWC) in partnership with faculty from the Korbel School.
ISCNE is a derivative of an exercise that the USAWC originally conducted with their international fellows between 1998 and 2014. The aim of the ISCNE program is to provide experiential learning opportunities to students studying international relations and public policy. As an outreach program of the USAWC, the program is a valuable tool to bridge the gap between civilians and the military.
To keep up with the latest with the ISCNE program, follow the U.S. Army War College’s Twitter account @ISCNE_USAWC.
