Carey Student Trip to Rwanada Cancelled

In August, the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School informed students that a scheduled trip to Rwanda in January 2015 would be canceled.

This comes in the wake of ongoing outbreaks of the Ebola virus in West Africa. The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a health travel notice for Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea urging against all non-essential travel. Meanwhile, less severe health travel advisories related to the Ebola outbreak have been issued for Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

While there have been no outbreaks or travel advisories out of Rwanda, the nature of the student projects required that a decision regarding travel to Africa be made at this time rather than waiting to evaluate conditions in January. The school determined that late cancellation of the course and trip would have severely affected the learning of the students, and therefore would best maintain academic integrity.

Carey requires first-year GMBA students to study abroad as part of its Innovation for Humanity program where students work over a six-month period to develop and research business plans to address real-world issues. While international travel is one component of the program, school leadership weighed the benefits of the trip to Rwanda in relation to the risks, and whether or not those benefits could be obtained at lower risk by traveling elsewhere. Due to the cancellation of the trip, students impacted by the change will travel to Ecuador to work on their projects.

regions: Washington, DC

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