SMU “Swiss Kids” build a special bond during their first semester at SMU as study abroad students at Franklin.
For the past several years, 30 students come to study abroad at Franklin for the first semester of their degree programs at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. These students have the opportunity to experience Franklin’s cross-cultural environment, to travel as part of the Academic Travel program and to learn to be comfortable in an international context.
The students at SMU use various monikers for the students who participated in the Franklin study abroad, referring to them as “Swiss Kids” or “Swiss People.” The students that participate in this program develop relationships that continue once they move on to their studies at SMU.
Anabel Hall, an SMU student who extended her attendance to a year at Franklin said, “Swiss people have the most special bond that can never be broken. When walking on campus and you see a fellow Swiss person you smile and wave. It’s a connection that no one else has.”
Franklin is proud to give these students an eye-opening introduction to learning to live and work in an international setting. As Taylor Rudell said in his article for the SMU Daily Campus, “The students who attend this program come back to SMU full of memories and knowledge.”