This course critically examines how leaders around the world make sense of complex, often contested information (data) as they work to solve global challenges.
Terms Offered
Fall 2026
Course Details
The course asks what effective leadership actually looks like in practice, considering how evidence is gathered, interpreted, and sometimes distorted along the way. Drawing on examples at the local, national, and global levels, the course spans private contexts such as transnational conglomerates and public contexts such as governments. Particular attention is given to perspectives from the Global South and indigenous leadership traditions, which complicate and enrich dominant narratives of what leadership can be. Students will assess these varied models and, in turn, reflect critically on their own emerging identities as future leaders.
Number of credits: 3
This fall, the course is piloting a video correspondence exchange with Colégio Salesiano Itajaí, a secondary school in Santa Catarina, Brazil, building on a connection made during HGLO’s education abroad course there this past summer.
Our partners are second-year students (around age 17) in an advanced English course focused on leadership and the future, which aligns closely with HGLO 207’s themes. The exchange runs asynchronously: in the first round, our UMD students recorded short introduction videos sharing a bit about themselves, their views on leadership, and a question for their Brazilian counterparts. Later rounds have turned to civic engagement, since many students in both countries are first-time voters and Brazil is in a major election year, giving students a chance to explore leadership and citizenship through a cross-cultural lens.
This is a Global Classrooms Connections course.
Cultural Connection
Brazil
General Education Credits
None.
School/College
Undergraduate Studies
Prerequisites & Restrictions
Prerequisite: HGLO100, GVPT201.
Restriction: Must be in Honors Global Challenges & Solutions (HGLO) Living-Learning program.
Faculty Highlight
Natalie Vinski Ibrahim
Dr. Natalie Vinski Ibrahim (she/her) is the Associate Director of Honors Global Challenges & Solutions (HGLO) in the University of Maryland’s Honors College. She joined UMD in 2011 after completing a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship at University Hassan II in Casablanca, Morocco.
Prior to her role at UMD, she served as Director of the Office of International Education Programs at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston, where she managed faculty-led travel programs and advised international students.
Her academic and professional interests include international and contemplative education, intergroup dialogue, and gender equity in higher education. She has co-led education abroad programs to Tohoku, Japan, and Santiago, Dominican Republic; participated in the Búsquedas Investigativas research practicum in Havana, Cuba; and will co-lead HGLO’s upcoming program in Brazil in summer 2026.
A wounded survivor of gun violence, Dr. Vinski Ibrahim is also committed to advancing data-driven solutions to the U.S. gun violence epidemic—particularly around school safety—and advocates in partnership with fellow survivors.
She holds a Ph.D. in International Education Policy from the University of Maryland, College Park, a master’s in Intercultural Relations from Lesley University, and a bachelor’s in American Studies from Dickinson College, where she studied abroad in Prague, Czech Republic, through the School for International Training.
PhD, International Education Policy, University of Maryland, College Park
MA, Intercultural Relations, Lesley University, Cambridge, MA
BA, American Studies, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA
Questions & Contact Info
For more course information contact Dr. Natalie Vinski Ibrahim at nvinski@umd.edu.
For general questions, please contact the Global Classrooms team at globalclassrooms@umd.edu.