Students will investigate how cultural differences and similarities shape communication by engaging directly with international pen pals and university language partners, documenting user insights through structured interviews and empathy mapping to ground future problem definition in real evidence.

Students will synthesize insights from their pen pal and university partner interviews to define a focused, evidence-based problem statement that guides the design of their intercultural action prototype.

Students will generate a wide range of user-centered solution ideas addressing their How Might We statements, then evaluate and narrow those ideas using evidence from pen pal and university partner interviews to select the most promising concepts for prototyping.

Students will build, test, and refine low- to mid-fidelity prototypes of their Global Connections Action solutions using direct user feedback from pen pals and university language partners, documenting iteration decisions grounded in real evidence.

Students will validate their refined action prototypes with new users, synthesize final feedback, and present their full design journey—from intercultural empathy to tested civic action—at the Global Connections Gala, demonstrating how cultural understanding shapes communication and problem-solving across borders.