From Cornell's earliest days, the university has looked outward. The first entering class of 407 students boasted five international students. In the 19th century enough Brazilians could be found at Cornell to support a Portuguese-language magazine. For more than a century, Cornell has educated Chinese students and participated in large-scale research and scholarly exchange with China.

This year the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, a key hub of international activity at Cornell and the university's primary lens on the world, celebrates its 50th anniversary. "The university needs a robust, vibrant center for international studies," said Einaudi Center Director Fredrik Logevall, the John S. Knight Professor of International Studies. "We harness, direct, organize and support much of the international programming at the university."

The Einaudi Center provides a home to seven core programs and supports 11 thematic international programs, and, through the 800 Cornell faculty members associated with its programs, makes an impact on virtually the entire student body. It acts as an umbrella organization that contributes to 18 programs as well as its own initiatives, such as its rigorous international relations minor, the Foreign Policy Initiative, and administers the Fulbright Fellows program.

"Cornell was a pioneer in the emphasis on regional expertise in many disciplines," Logevall said. "This was an interdisciplinary enterprise from the outset, bringing people together to educate Cornell students about the world, and many in cases make a contribution to solving problems. It's a very rich history. Today, we're reinventing ourselves to make our best contribution to the university's vision."

The center has hosted such foreign policy players as CNN commentator Fareed Zakaria; Mo Ibrahim, founder of the Mo Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership; former president of Brazil Fernando Cardoso and president of the Czech Republic Václav Klaus as Bartels World Affairs lecturers and as participants in the center's Foreign Policy Distinguished Speakers Series.

The center also conducts K-12 outreach, sponsoring college students to share their expertise on Africa, East Asia, Europe, Latin America, South Asia and Southeast Asia.

Launched in 1961 as a focal point for international studies and activities, the center expanded its operations in the '70s and '80s to include international development, and its drive for innovation also led to the founding of the Peace Studies Program (now the Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies), the Western Societies Program (now the Institute for European Studies) and several other programs.

Asked by Cornell trustees to organize the undergraduate experience in the '80s, the center created Cornell Abroad that, along with the International Students and Scholars Office, moved from the center to allow it to focus on research. In 1991, the center was renamed in honor of its founder, Mario Einaudi, the Goldwin Smith Professor of Government.

Upcoming plans for the Einaudi Center include bolstering the popular international relations minor and further developing the Foreign Policy Initiative by establishing a diplomat-in-residence program and by taking the center's popular faculty-alumni roundtable discussion of contemporary issues on the road, first to Washington, D.C., and eventually to other cities.

Logevall said the center also hopes to offer a postdoctoral fellowship program focused on international affairs. Peer universities, he said, offer such programs, and "we need to be a player in that game." Several peer schools, he noted, have devoted major resources to international studies and international relations. "Going back a couple of decades, Cornell has not made that same investment," Logevall said. "We're paying a price for that. ... It is by no means too late, but we have work to do."

Certainly, the world is not going away. "A skeptic might say that given the lack of attention to foreign policy and international affairs in the current Republican nomination battle, interest in foreign affairs has dissipated," Logevall said. But in an increasingly interconnected world, that interest is sure to revive, and Logevall stressed that Cornell must be part of the conversation.

50th Anniversary Symposium

At its anniversary symposium Nov. 14-15, "International Studies in the American Research University: The Path Ahead", Cornell President David Skorton will outline his vision of international studies at Cornell and the Einaudi Center's role.

"President Skorton believes that the international dimension of Cornell has to be a priority," said Einaudi Center Director Fredrik Logevall. "Many alumni careers will have an international dimension, and I think it's more important than ever that we have a strong international dimension in teaching. We want to bring Cornell to the world and to increase international students and scholars coming to Cornell."

Other speakers will offer perspectives on Einaudi Center's achievements, discuss how international studies has developed at other universities, explore language-teaching issues, reflect on the changing role of international studies in the American research university, and consider how best to chart a course for the future.