Education Abroad: Global Finance Studies in Belgium
The finance department offers multiple opportunities to study abroad. Our programs cover Greece, Belgium, Singapore, Dubai, and Shanghai. Global Finance Studies (GFS) in Belgium is a faculty-led Education Abroad (EA) program that has been offered to MSU students since 2011, which makes it one of the longest programs in existence in Finance. The University of Namur (UN) has been hosting the program since its inception. In summer 2023, the 11th cohort of Spartans will call Namur, Belgium, their home away from home for four weeks.
GFS is the only Broad College Education Abroad program primarily geared toward Finance majors. The program also attracts non-Finance majors interested in extending their Finance background in a fun and unfamiliar environment. Participants may be taking their first Finance course in Belgium or a Special Topics in Finance course that is team-taught in collaboration with a Belgian faculty with l’Université St Louis (Brussels, Belgium). All participants will also complete the International Financial Management course, which fits so well in an international setting such as Belgium, with Brussels being identified as the capital of the European Union.
The European financial institutions are at the center of GFS’s curriculum, which includes guided tours of the European Parliament (Brussels), la Banque Nationale de Belgique (Brussels), and the European Central Bank (Frankfurt, Germany). GFS also visits SWIFT’s headquarters in La Hulpe and meets with SWIFT’s representatives to discuss recent challenges in information and money transfers as brought by blockchain and cryptocurrencies. GFS 2023 will introduce a two-day field trip to Luxembourg and Strasbourg, France, with a tour of the European Investment Bank (Luxembourg) and the Council of Europe (Strasbourg, France).
Namur is in southern Belgium; French is its national language. Even though most “Namurois” speak some English, GFS participants are trained in everyday French language and French business etiquette and culture. A daily service project also allows MSU participants to immerse themselves in the community and pay it forward for the tremendous welcome GFS receives every summer in Namur.
When GFS participants are not in the classroom, they go on multiple local excursions as a group: to a snail farm, on a picnic at a medieval castle, through underground military tunnels, or to a chocolate workshop, a perfume factory, a crêpes dinner, visiting Louvain-La-Neuve or the Tintin Museum. Participants are encouraged to discover Belgium during free weekends thanks to a free train pass covering the whole country. Bruges, Antwerp, Brussels, the North Sea coast, the Ardennes, Formula 1 competitions, and music festivals are among popular destinations.
Students love the program.
“The most impactful part of my education abroad experience was learning how to interact in a foreign culture and communicate in a new language,” wrote Finance major Grant Kanak.
Greer Clausen (Finance/Econ major) wrote, “Being able to speak with someone who is actively involved in decision making in Europe gave me a much deeper understanding of European culture and the role of the European Union than I could have ever grasped from a textbook.”