Dr. Mackay Salley ’95, professor of physics, spent his sabbatical this fall in Stockholm teaching thermodynamics and fluid mechanics, two physics/engineering courses that can be hard to find in study abroad programs at the appropriate level.

Now, Salley wants to show Wofford students majoring in science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields that spending a full semester abroad is feasible for them too.

Salley is teaching through DIS Study Abroad in Scandinavia, a program he says is putting a focus on STEM teaching at its Stockholm campus to give students in related majors an opportunity to gain relevant academic credit abroad.

“Over the years, DIS has had requests from STEM students saying, ‘We would love to study abroad, but our schedule’s so packed that we can’t take a semester off,’” Salley says. “So, DIS has pushed for the Stockholm branch to offer courses like the ones I’m teaching that would be really difficult for a study abroad student to get anywhere else.”

Amy Lancaster ’01, dean of international programs in the Office of International Programs, says DIS Stockholm — which has semester-long and summer courses in engineering, technology, neuroscience, biomedicine and more — is distinctive in that students enroll within a particular core course and then dive into tailored research being done in the region.

“The experiences are so unique. Nowhere else are study abroad participants going to be able to study polar biology or ice cores in the ice ages,” she says.

Lancaster says there is an incorrect perception that it’s much more difficult for STEM majors at Wofford to study abroad outside of the January Interim. While some major tracks like biology and psychology have good representation in semester-long programs, she says students on other tracks, especially pre-health careers, feel pressure to stay on campus to gain critical credits and prepare for the MCAT.

“We encourage students to come see us. We are eager to help them understand that it’s quite feasible for them to spend a semester abroad, and graduate programs are encouraging such experiences,” Lancaster says.

Semesters abroad for pre-health careers students don’t have to be limited to health studies either.

Strom Thurmond III ’26, a biology major and chemistry minor on the pre-medicine track from Aiken, South Carolina, spent the fall semester in 2024 in Cairns, Australia, studying ecology and human impact on the wet tropics bioregion and the Great Barrier Reef through SIT Study Abroad. He swam in the Coral Sea, trekked through the rainforest and spent time with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples — all while getting crucial hours of credit.

“I honestly feel like it put me ahead in some ways, because I left with a lab and a lecture credit. It transferred to my major. Now, I have something awesome to talk about in my medical school applications. I got to do research. Those experiences are invaluable,” Thurmond says.

Serving in an advisory role for several of Wofford’s study abroad partners, Lancaster has seen a growing interest among study abroad organizations in strengthening STEM curricula across the board. With such strong support among Wofford’s faculty, the college is often consulted in program development.

Lancaster is excited for Wofford to be able to offer a robust portfolio of diverse programs for STEM students in addition to programs like DIS programs. These include clinical observation internships in Santiago, Chile; sea turtle and marine mammal research in Croatia; and environmental studies research assistantships in Freiburg, Germany, to name a few.

Lancaster hopes that positive semester-abroad experiences in STEM fields, especially those of faculty members like Salley who can speak to entire classes of students over time, will help raise awareness of the opportunities students can explore around the globe.

“It’s great to have a faculty member like Dr. Salley who can come back and talk about how feasible it is and speak from first-hand experience,” Lancaster says. “We’re also really fortunate that the biology faculty and the pre-med advisors are incredibly supportive and encouraging, because medical schools are looking for these kinds of experiences for their applicants.”