News & Events
Keep up on news about UNMC's community of international students and study abroad students.
Our Signature Events
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International Student Welcome Lunch & Ambassador Appreciation
This September event for international students provides a time for meeting and learning about each other and UNMC.
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Celebrate Culture!
An event called Celebrate Culture! is held in in conjunction with Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in May. Interactive tables, representative of these countries, featured calligraphy, ddakji (a traditional game played using folded paper tiles), lantern making, liusu (tassel) making, origami and trivia.
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Holi Festival
The International Student Association hosts the Festival of Colors, an annual spring event celebrating the Hindu Holi Festival. The event, symbolizing rejuvenation and optimism, celebrates the arrival of spring after winter, signifies the victory of good over evil, and, for many, a festive day to meet others, laugh, forgive and forget.
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International Education Week
The annual International Week is a campus-wide event held during the fall semester and features customs, foods, and attire from a variety of ethnicities and cultures represented at UNMC. Ping-Pong and badminton tournaments are also part of the International Week festivities, which are organized by UNMC’s International Student Association.
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Chinese Cultural Fair
The Chinese Cultural Fair is held every year around the Chinese New Year, providing an opportunity to to celebrate Chinese culture with food, crafts, games, music and dance. UNMC’s Chinese Scholarship Council students are the main organizers of the event.
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International Photo Contest
Our annual photo contest, open to all members of the UNMC community, features photos capturing the culture, spirit and landscapes of other countries, inspiring adventure, cultural awareness and diversity. The 2023 grand prize winning photo above, by Devashri Gandhi, is titled "Purity of Soul."
D.J. and Janet Thayer Family Global Engagement Award
Introduction
The D.J. and Janet Thayer Family Global Engagement Award is designed to grow or build collaborations in global health and global engagement by full-time UNMC faculty. Global health and engagement involve the various ways faculty work to connect UNMC to the world through their teaching, research and service.
The D.J. and Janet Thayer Family Global Engagement Award provides up to $10,000 toward building or growing partnerships or projects and may be used for travel expenses, conference attendance or coordination, publications, research projects, etc. that promote global health and global engagement.
Application materials must be received electronically by February 3, 2025 for full consideration by the Global Engagement Award Committee. If you have questions, please contact Jane Meza.
APPLICATIONS CLOSED
2025 International Photo Contest
Official Contest RulesThe photo contest runs from March 7 - 30 and is open to all members from the UNMC community. You can submit up to three (3) separate photos. Photos must be taken from outside the United States and should capture the culture, spirit, or landscape of the country. We are looking for photos that inspire adventure, customs, and cultural experiences. This year, we have three categories: Cityscapes/Architecture, Landscapes/Nature, and People/Animals. Photos will be judged anonymously on originality, creativity, photographic quality, and communication of culture and place. *We will not accept photos submitted in previous years’ contests.
- Purpose: To highlight the UNMC community’s talent and provide visual resources needed to tell stories of global engagement.
- Who May Enter: Current UNMC students, residents, faculty and staff.
- What May Be Entered: A maximum of three (3) high-resolution images may be entered per person. Color and black & white images are accepted. Entries MUST be in electronic format. Electronic images must be saved and submitted as JPEGs of at least 300 dpi. Entries must be the ORIGINAL WORK of the entrant and must be photographs taken OUTSIDE the United States. Photos should capture the culture, spirit or landscape of the country.
- Submission Procedures: Entries must be accompanied by the official online Submission Form (link below), fully completed and signed by the entrant.
- Copyright Policy: Rights are retained by the artist. By signing the submission form and media release form, however, entrants are agreeing that they grant UNMC and the Office of Global Engagement royalty-free use of submitted photographs in displays and in print and electronic publications. The artist will be fully credited in all such displays and publications. Additionally, all subjects within the photo must have given the photographer explicit permission to be photographed.
- Judging Criteria: Entries will be judged on Originality and Creativity, Photographic Quality, and Communication of Culture and Place. All decisions of the judges are final. Entries which do not conform to the contest rules will be disqualified. Prizes will be awarded to the grand prize winner, and the top photo in each category for each division. Entries will require some additional background information (date, location, title, & short description) which might be incorporated into such things as contest displays and later publications.
- Deadline: All entries must be digitally submitted by 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, March 30, 2025.
- Contact Us: For more information, please email globalprograms@unmc.edu.
International Photo Contest Submission Form
Read Our Publications
Keep up with our news, important updates and events through our publications, including our annual reports, quarterly newsletters and monthly bulletins.
All linked publications are pdf files.