Yes, Penn State collaborates with NGOs on student volunteer opportunities, research programs, and educational resources.

Student Affairs collaborates with many NGOs to provide student volunteer programs.  Student Affairs promotes ways to get involved with local service organizations such as Big Brothers Big Sisters, ClearWater Conservancy (a local accredited land trust), and tutoring with the State College Area School District.

As a member of The Forum on Education Abroad Penn State collaborates to advance the SDGs through Education Abroad. Penn State Global was been selected as the recipient of The Forum on Education Abroad’s first Award for Advancing the U.N. SDGs through Education Abroad based on its partnerships with the University’s academic units and Penn State Sustainability to implement curricular integration, programmatic updates and operational changes to continue its mission of advancing the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Penn State Global’s Strategic Partnership efforts include:

  • The Africa Advisory Committee to develop strategic partnerships with institutions and organizations across Africa
  • Penn State and the Indian Institute of Science signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) in 2019 which strengthens expansion of the partnership that aims to foster innovative solutions to global challenges through joint research and academic exchange.
  • Tohoku University, a top strategic partner in Japan, which features 4 active agreements with Earth and Mineral Sciences, Arts & Architecture, Education Abroad, and a university-wide MOU, respectively. Faculty and administrative champions from both universities have played a significant role in our multi-dimensional partnership for decades. Key collaborative areas include Geosciences, Geochemistry and Resource Geology, as well as research-oriented student mobility.
  • A strategic partnership with Leibniz University Hannover is paving the way for groundbreaking discoveries that address humanity’s greatest challenges and shape a more interconnected world.
  • Penn State’s partnerships in Latin America and the Caribbean are central to our strategic goal of creating regional networks that address global issues with a local perspective. These collaborations foster long-term engagement, nurturing transformative and equitable partnerships that include: the Páramos soils project which aims to characterize the microbial diversity in Colombia and investigate how climate change will affect microbes’ functions; The Colombia-USA Water-Energy-Food (WEF) Nexus Alliance – an international, transdisciplinary partnership focused on understanding and addressing the complex challenges associated with water-energy-food systems.

Dr. Osama Awadelkarim in the College of Engineering at Penn State serves as a UNESCO Chair and collaborates with a variety of NGOs to increase the number of youth and adults who have advanced technical and vocational skills. 

The Sustainable Communities Collaborative collaborates with NGOs to connect them to faculty for engaged scholarship opportunities. 

Connecting Humans and Nature through Conservation Experiences program is an interdisciplinary environmental education program that collaborates with NGOs to support study abroad international field courses that immerse students in real-world environmental research and conservation efforts.