Every day at 8:00am, Rhonda Hinkle is sitting in her office with a smile on her face, ready to help her international students.
Hinkle, Marian University’s Global engagement’s executive director, has helped transform the international community at Marian. Her duty is to ensure all the international students are prepared to travel to Marian, making sure they arrive safely and help them settle down. She helps her international students at any stage of their lives. She is quite friendly to her students, making them comfortable enough to confide in her.
Hinkle is an original Hoosier, who grew up in a small county Washington, in southern Indiana. Hinkle grew up around Amish people, which she considered as the only diversity she had in her childhood. She
was fascinated by them and by the exchange students at her high school. She believed there was a world beyond white Amish people and that is what gave her the itch to know more. She went to the university of Evansville, an hour away from southern Indiana. Her school was known for their global engagement, and she got to experience different cultures as their residence halls were filled with so many international students.
“I studied abroad the first semester which was really eye opening for me,” said Hinkle.
As a first-generation student, she had never been out of the country till her study abroad trip in her first semester of college.
“I knew that I wanted to help other students to have this more open world view of these global experiences. It really was life changing for me,” Hinkle said.
Hinkle went on to work in international education and she has been working in it for 26 years. Throughout her years of working, she set out to get a second master’s degree at Butler University in education. She just completed her doctorate at Marian University in Organizational leadership. This is her eighth academic year at Marian University.
Hinkle now works at the global engagement office at Marian. Its mission is to serve study abroad students and international students. It builds global partnerships from Marian university to any Universities around the world. Marian’s mission is to have a transformative education to prepare leaders of service to the world.
The office recently wrapped up a project that started last fall, it was also part of Hinkle’s doctoral work. They were partnered with the First Year Seminar to help prepare them for study abroad, what it means, what it pertains to them, what to expect, just to make sure that it makes sense to them.
Starting Nov. 18-22, Hinkle and her team have a new project called International Education Cultural Week. They chose this to be more inclusive. During that week they will be trying to make sure they have programming on campus, cultural awareness, study abroad awareness, international student awareness, immigration information, they will be exhibiting this to ensure all students are properly educated and factually informed with these issues.
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Hinkle, working with these students enriches her life, she loves to be that person in whom they can confide. She loves learning about different cultures. She is happy to help navigate them through academic, cultural, immigration life here in the United States. She is honored to learn more about them because it helps her be a better person.
“Rhonda has been instrumental in the creation of the Global Engagement Office in 2021 and am so lucky to call her a friend and colleague! It is rare to find someone whose passion and experience perfectly matches their job title, but Rhonda is an example of this. Said Laura Avtgis, Study Abroad Coordinator. She loves working with international students and fostering cross-cultural discussions with all members of the Marian community; her excitement for global learning is truly contagious.
Hinkle said she would like to see more financial assistance for incoming Marian students. Most grants, scholarships and loans are only specific to U.S. citizens or residents. However, most of her students are not eligible for that which makes it a lot harder for them to find enough financial support. She would like to see more funding and financial support for the global engagement office.
Her goal for the future is to grow in her position her at Marian she would love to receive greater support from the university to do so, she wants to remain in international education, “that is my vocation,” said Hinkle.
She also wishes for the international students to have a space or organization where they can do events to display who they are and what their culture represents. She would like them to able to have organizations such as the Union for Black Identity (UBI), Student Organization of Latinos (SOL), Asian Student Association (ASA), she believes this will help them feel encouraged to embrace their culture without any criticism.
“I am so grateful that you are here and that you are so brave and courageous for being far away from home,” said Hinkle.
Contact Information:
Rhonda J. Hinkle, Ed. D
Executive Director, Global Engagement
PDSO, International Student Success
+1-317-955-6670
