The World is our Campus

PROVO, Utah – Jul 26, 2018 – BYU Marriott’s Global Management Center (GMC) offers up to twelve study abroad options that take place throughout the summer. From Europe to Asia to Africa, students travel abroad to study everything from marketing to experience design to accounting.

This year’s Global Marketing Study Abroad—the only GMC trip that travels all over the globe—took students from the snowy Swiss Alps in Switzerland to the tallest building in the world in United Arab Emirates. They also stopped in London to visit Big Ben and toured new models of BMWs at BMW World in Germany.

“There’s no timeline to the motto ‘enter to learn, go forth to serve,’” says Tanner Wegrowski, a pre-business student who went on the trip this year. “Taking this motto to heart and traveling abroad, while still studying through BYU Marriott, gave me an enhanced perspective of the world.”

In preparation for the trip, students attended a weeklong intensive class and received a term paper assignment to complete after the study abroad. While traveling around the world, students toured a number of companies including BMW in Germany, Google in Milan, and General Mills in Dubai. After trips to each company, students enjoyed visiting some of the most famous tourist attractions around the world.

“I feel fortunate to share these learning experiences with the students,” says Ryan Elder, a BYU Marriott marketing professor who helped lead the trip. “Laughing out loud while riding camels, jumping fully clothed into an Austrian lake, and staring in awe as a lion chased hyenas away from prey created a bond that we plan to maintain throughout life.”

In addition to visiting companies and popular tourist attractions, the group’s world travels offered many cultural experiences. The students were able to visit Dubai during Ramadan, an Islamic celebration that includes a fast from sunrise to sunset. During this time, food is not to be seen in public, and all restaurants are closed.

“This was a great experience for the students to learn about a variety of religions and the importance of understanding different cultures from around the world,” Elder says.

Though some students opt out of study abroad experiences because of the expense, Wegrowski notes that the many benefits make the adventure well worth the cost.

“The same business concepts that would take me weeks and even months to grasp in class have become clear to me in single interactions with the leaders who taught us in their offices around the world,” he says. “Provo is a great place to learn, but it’s only a small portion of BYU’s world campus. You have to go global.”

Here’s a look at some of the places they visited around the world:

The group took a camel-back ride through the desert near Dubai.

Students toured the Neuschwanstein Castle, one of the most photographed buildings in Germany.

The group hopped on a gondola through the Swiss Alps and then rode a train to cities in the mountains.

While in Dubai, students took the world's fastest elevator to the world's highest observation deck in the world's tallest building.

A student reps the Y outside of Hofburg Palace in Vienna, Austria.