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CET Academic Programs

Study abroad programs for college and gap students

Academic Excellence

Our Beliefs, Our Goals, Our Academics

Our academics are focused around the goal of developing our students’ critical thinking skills, comfort with ambiguity, skills for navigating difference, and appreciation for nuance and complexity in approaching the world. We seek to challenge our students, both academically and experientially.

Education in Everything

Academics aren’t just for the classroom. The value of study abroad lies precisely in what students can learn outside the classroom in order to inform and enrich their academic work. We develop programs that bring academics into every facet of the student experience: internships, traveling seminars, language practica, field-based study and research, and excursions with local roommates.
 

A Liberal Arts Ethos For All Disciplines

Our programs cultivate a liberal arts-inspired spirit of intellectual inquiry for students from all academic backgrounds. We challenge our students to engage with their coursework and context as critical thinkers, experiencing formative intellectual growth while progressing towards their degrees.
 

Targeted Programs, Small Classes

Our programs target specific academic themes and learning outcomes. Whether the goal is near-native language skills in Beijing, expertise in film production in Prague, or an understanding of social movements in São Paulo, smaller, targeted programs give us the ability to move nimbly, customize around student interests, and engage meaningfully with our host communities.

How Our Academics Operate

  • In our Academic Policies, we ask students to approach their academic work with seriousness, dedication, and honesty, and to respect the rights of their classmates, roommates, and faculty to do the same.
  • Our Syllabus System balances our US partners’ need to review course content in advance with our faculty’s need for flexibility in updating readings, assignments, and other course elements each term.
  • Our Credit Recommendation System, developed in consultation with US partners, ensures academic rigor in all courses and fair credit allocation across programs.

Schools of Record

Ensuring students receive academic credit for their courses abroad is of utmost importance to CET. All students receive a transcript for courses completed abroad in accordance with CET’s Academic Policies. (More on CET transcripts can be found below.)

The University of Minnesota serves as CET’s School of Record for all programs, except for CET Siena. The University of Virginia serves as School of Record for CET Siena.

School of Record partners review CET courses, policies, and standards. Students who require a US transcript for transfer credit may request one in their CET application for an additional fee. All other students will receive a jointly-issued transcript from CET and their host institutions.

Transcripts for CET Programs

An official transcript is automatically sent to each student’s home institution about six to eight weeks after their CET program ends, provided that the student’s account is paid in full. (Students can order additional official transcripts for a fee.) Students can also view a copy of their transcript in their online accounts.

For students enrolled in programs with a direct-enroll component, we do our best to adhere to the same timeline. On occasion, transcripts with direct-enroll courses may take longer due to differing deadlines at our host institutions abroad.

In most cases, transcripts are jointly-issued by CET and its overseas partner institutions. These are issued in English, contain the seal and signature of the host university, and the stamp and seal of CET Academic Programs. Each jointly-issued transcript lists:

  • • Names of all courses taken
  • • Total number of course contact hours
  • • Grades earned
  • • Recommended credits per course


For US institutions that require additional documentation, students may request a transcript from CET’s School of Record, the University of Minnesota. The University of Minnesota transcript option is open to students on any CET program, except for CET Siena. Students may indicate their preference for a UMN transcript during the CET application process and pay a School of Record fee of $450. Those who “opt in” will be enrolled at UMN as full-time, non-degree seeking students.

For programs administered with a US partner or programs where jointly-issued transcripts are not available, CET provides a School of Record transcript for all students at no additional charge. This transcript lists the courses and number of credits issued by the US partner. The CET programs that fall into this category are:

  • CET Brazil: Transcript from the University of Minnesota
  • CET Colombia: Transcript from the University of Minnesota
  • CET Florence: Transcript from the University of Minnesota
  • CET Siena: Transcript from the University of Virginia
  • Middlebury School in China: Transcript from Middlebury College

Working with US Partners

We understand that each of our US partners has its own academic requirements and priorities. Our approach to serving this diverse range of institutional needs and goals is one of partnership—a genuine, authentic partnership. We aim for a collaborative, communicative two-way street of identifying goals and strategizing how best to meet them.

While our belief in strong academics is consistent, our program models are diverse. We love to find innovative solutions that can meet our partners’ institutional priorities while enriching and enhance our own program portfolio. Making it your program is our way of making it ours.

Learn More about our Programs!