Student after student, the English Language Institute’s Brazilian graduates spoke on their time and experiences at CSI—in English, without notes, for three to five minutes each. Most would not have attempted it the day they arrived.

What they said mattered as much as how they said it. “I know that when I come back to my college, I will be another person,” said participant Caroline Grellmann Saito. “I will be able to use the experience that I got here on my projects, my career, and my life.” They thanked the faculty who opened laboratories to them, the excursions that took them across New York, the meals, the residence hall—a list that reached into nearly every corner of the College, and a fair measure of how much of the College had a hand in the program.

The August 6 ceremony at the Park Café closed the inaugural Paraná Talents Around the World Mobility Program, a six-week immersion that brought ten merit scholarship–winning STEM undergraduates from three public universities in the Brazilian state of Paraná (Unioeste, UEPG, and Unicentro) to the College of Staten Island and its Center for Global Engagement in partnership with SETI-PR, the Paraná state Secretariat of Science, Technology, and Higher Education. The cohort attended 12 college lectures spanning chemistry, mechanical engineering, computer science, genomics, environmental geoscience, astrophysics, and data science, alongside twice-weekly English instruction, three career workshops, and a full program of cultural excursions.

A delegation from the Paraná state government traveled to Staten Island for the ceremony, led by Dr. Aldo Nelson Bona, Secretary of State for Science, Technology and Higher Education, and joined by Dr. Gisele Miyoko Onuki, Adviser for Institutional Relations and International Cooperation, and Dr. Paola Andressa Scortegagna, Adviser to the Directorate of Higher Education, both of SETI-PR. Also present was Prof. Dr. Cibele Krause Lemke of Unicentro, who spent the program at CSI as a SETI-PR–funded visiting academic observer.

“After seeing the student presentations and graduation ceremony, I am sure that we made the right choice in choosing the College of Staten Island as our partner,” Bona said.

After the ceremony, Secretary Bona and the delegation were hosted in the office of CSI President Timothy G. Lynch, where they were joined by Dean of the School of Education and Social Work Burnette Joiner and Dean of Science and Technology Ralf Peetz. There, Secretary Bona and President Lynch signed a Statement of Shared Interest affirming the two institutions’ intention to continue and expand the partnership.

The visit was an honor. A cabinet secretary of a Brazilian state government and his senior advisers spent the afternoon in the President’s office at CSI—the kind of trip a government makes when it expects a partnership to be worth the distance.

Welcoming the delegation to his office, President Lynch called CSI CUNY’s premier institution. Paraná’s decision to send its students here, and Bona’s assessment of that decision, is another argument for CSI’s rising star. The agreement joins two public university systems doing the same work. SETI-PR signs for the state’s universities, and the working partnership runs to the campuses themselves: Unioeste, UEPG, and Unicentro are large public institutions, understood across Paraná as a route into professional and scientific careers for students who would not otherwise find one, much as CUNY has served New York for generations.

Bona said he liked the idea of sending a larger group of students next year, and both sides hope the relationship will grow to include research and faculty collaboration alongside student mobility. The ten who just went home made that case themselves, in English, without notes.

Stephen Ferst, Executive Director of the Center for Global Engagement, framed the work in broader terms during his graduation remarks, describing international education as a form of diplomacy, an exchange that builds understanding between countries, moves knowledge in both directions, and opens opportunities that neither institution could create alone.

Colleagues from across the College came to recognize the cohort: Jasmine Cardona, Executive Director of Economic Development and Community Partnerships; professors Charles Liu and Jane Alexander, both of whom lectured during the program; and Kristi Brescia, who leads career opportunities for the Careers and Alumni Network. ELI Director and program architect Christian Perticone opened the ceremony, and ELI instructor Patrick Alvarez presented the certificates.

Photo caption: Dr. Aldo Nelson Bona and Dr. Timothy G. Lynch

By Christian Perticone