$4.4 million gift from Susie Holden McCurry ’71 extends reach of Global Learning Program at Grinnell College
January 23, 2025 — The Global Learning Program (GLP) at Grinnell College has flourished over the last decade by giving students a chance to explore interdisciplinary topics and global issues through faculty-led coursework and travel around the world.
Thanks to renewed support from retired Trustee Susan Holden McCurry ’71 and The Roland and Ruby Holden Family Foundation, many more first-year students will have similar opportunities for global learning over the next decade. McCurry recently pledged a $4.4 million gift to renew and expand the GLP.
The gift was announced Jan. 5 at a reception in Naples, Florida, hosted by McCurry and the Office of Development and Alumni Relations.
Bernadine Douglas, vice president of development and alumni relations, center, speaks during a conversation with Susan Holden McCurry ’71, right, and Brigittine French, assistant vice president of global education, at an event announcing the GLP’s renewal.
“Today we get a chance to celebrate Susie McCurry, and her remarkable belief in and passion for Grinnell and its students,” said Bernadine Douglas, vice president of development and alumni relations, to begin the event. “The tremendous interest in global education the last 10 years – both from the students and faculty – is largely because of Susie. Thank you so much for sharing your vision and for your transformational support.”
GLP courses are interdisciplinary, semester-long courses for first-year students co-taught by two faculty members from different disciplines. Each course is comprised of 15 first-year participants who engage in course themes aligned with Grinnell’s Global Education Learning Goals through both classroom-based learning as well as the travel components over academic breaks. The faculty and students travel together to at least two distinct global sites as a cohort to bring the curriculum to life and to deepen students’ knowledge and understanding of the course theme through experiential learning activities.
With administrative support from Institute for Global Engagement (IGE) staff, the GLP aims to create an inclusive, accessible learning environment with additional support for students who receive institutional need-based financial aid. Each year there are participants for whom the GLP travel is their first time traveling outside the U.S. For last year’s courses, 86 percent of the student participants received need-based financial aid.
“Studying abroad is something I have always wanted to do, but I didn’t think would be possible since I come from a low-income background,” said Indigo Overlar ’27 who visited Cuba and Brazil last year during the Sugar, Science, Slavery: Visualizing modernity in the Americas course. “To be given the opportunity to visit and study in two of the countries I have dreamed of visiting in my first year of college is truly a dream come true.”
Fredo Rivera, assistant professor of art history, right, is joined by GLP students in Cuba for the Sugar, Science, Slavery: Visualizing modernity in the Americas course.
Now thanks to this new and increased support, IGE will be able to expand the program to meet high student and faculty demand.
“Not only has Susie opened doors and minds, she has opened hearts,” said Brigittine French, assistant vice president of global education. “Her vision of GLP is holistic. When we talk about global education, we are thinking about the ways and possibilities that students can engage in mobility and reflection throughout their four years.”
McCurry initially established the GLP program in 2015 with a $4 million gift. The first two courses began in 2016.
“President [Raynard] Kington at the time challenged the trustees to think about ways that would distinguish Grinnell from our peers,” McCurry said at the Naples event. “I was thinking what I could do that would connect with some of my experiences in traveling and learning while I traveled. I was a psychology major at Grinnell, and I am always very curious about human behavior and customs. The first-year experience at Grinnell was unique, and interdisciplinary teaching was something gaining importance at Grinnell since the early 2000s, so we combined them into the GLP.”
GLP students in the New and Emerging Infectious Diseases course are pictured at sundown at Kruger National Park in South Africa last March.
There have been 16 GLP courses thus far, including one taking place this spring, Theorizing Dance and Language. Taught by Cynthia Hansen, associate professor of anthropology, and Celeste Miller, emeritus professor of theater, dance, and performance studies, students will travel to Prague in March and London in May. “The faculty are wildly creative,” French said. “Anything you can imagine and dream, GLP is the place to try it out.”
Faculty members have found teaching a GLP course to be rewarding in the ways it reinvigorates their own teaching. French notes she has recently seen a surge of faculty interest in teaching GLP courses. Plans are underway to have three GLP courses in 2026. Because of the demand, there’s a competitive application processes for both faculty and students.
“We have much more student demand than we have courses, so it’s great the program has been renewed and expanded,” she said. “Ten years ago, the students were like ‘what is this?’ Now, incoming students tell us the GLP is part of the reason they come to Grinnell. They are knocking on our door.”
International travel has long been important to McCurry whose parents had a history of international business relationships. McCurry joined the family businesses Holden’s Foundation Seeds, Inc. and Hawaiian Research, Ltd. in 1978, serving as CFO. Both companies specialized in seed research and development.
McCurry talks with fellow Grinnellians during a reception and luncheon she co-hosted in Naples, Florida, on Jan. 5.
She remained involved in the companies until the sale of Holden’s Foundation Seeds, Inc. in 1997, and Hawaiian Research, Ltd., in 2001 to Monsanto. She was elected to the Grinnell College Board of Trustees in 2003 and has served on several other boards and organizations over the years.
McCurry meets with students and faculty on campus for a reflection luncheon after they complete their GLP experience. “They are brilliant students and it’s really exciting to hear from them,” she said. “They often communicate they have thought about taking other classes at Grinnell that they had not previously considered. For some students, a new direction in what they were hoping to accomplish at Grinnell has changed their course of study.”
When asked why the GLP matters, French said the idea is by having first-year students take part, they are learning what it is to see and think like a Grinnellian.
“They are learning about how they fit in the world,” she said. “The beauty and magic of the GLP are these very special courses only for first-year students that are team taught by faculty with an inherit interdisciplinary perspective built in. The students are beginning their journey into the world as who they want to be as citizens and professionals.”
—by Jeremy Shapiro