Aseel, an English major studying at the Al-Qasemi Academic College of Education in Israel, is walking away from her virtual exchange experience feeling more connected to the world. PATHWAYS Institute for Negotiation Education’s Game Changers in Education allowed her and fellow participants to humanize people they previously felt disconnected from, leaving them with a deeper understanding of how crucial it is to interact with peers from different backgrounds.
All video clips featured in this story are captioned in English and Arabic, and include transcripts.
For Aseel, participating in PATHWAYS Institute for Negotiation Education’s Game Changers in Education has shifted the way she thinks about her place in the world. As part of this virtual exchange, she developed key negotiation skills on how to best communicate with two sides who might have differing perspectives and agendas.
Listen to Aseel describe the program in her own words:
She is now able to look beyond her own bubble, looking further out into the world and exploring the ways in which people from diverse backgrounds and experiences think about different issues.
Learn more about the skills she gained:
Using the skills developed during her exchange, she now regularly represents her university as a student speaker and engages with representatives from other countries. In these settings, she advocates for social justice initiatives and pushes for equitable programming in her university.
Hear how she uses negotiation skills in her daily life:
As someone who hopes to become an educator in the future, she speaks to all those who have a passion for education on the importance of developing these types of negotiation skills. She says, “[Educators] are changing a full-on generation; we are teaching [and] shaping the society…we do need these skills to talk to our students in a different way… because we do have the traditional way of saying, ‘don’t do this’ and ‘you mustn’t do that,’ but [we need to] go about it in the way that Game Changers has done.”
Listen to Aseel’s message to future educators.
If you are interested in bringing this program to your institution, complete this form.
Game Changers in Education is implemented by PATHWAYS Institute for Negotiation Education and is supported by the J. Christopher Stevens Virtual Exchange Initiative (JCSVEI). JCSVEI is a U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs program administered by the Aspen Institute.
