Mission & History
SAIS’s mission is to provide an interdisciplinary professional education for the next generation of global leaders; and to foster scholarship and public engagement which contribute to addressing the pressing international challenges of the 21st century.
For eight decades, students have come to the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) to learn from renowned faculty and distinguished policy practitioners, build their professional networks, and gain hands-on work experience.
The school was founded in 1943 by Paul H. Nitze and Christian A. Herter, statesmen who sought to prepare the next generation of leaders to meet the complex challenges the U.S. and the world would face following World War II. A distinguished faculty of scholars and policy experts developed an innovative curriculum that emphasized international politics, economics, and foreign languages. That program, combined with skills training and experiential learning, helped prepare students to make a difference in government, civil society, and the private sector. In 1955, SAIS established a campus in Bologna, Italy, and in 1986 the school initiated one of the first Western university programs in the People’s Republic of China in Nanjing.
Today, SAIS carries on this tradition. Johns Hopkins SAIS alumni number more than 20,000 graduates, a network of professionals working across the globe. From private-sector executives to entrepreneurs, leaders of nongovernmental organizations to ambassadors, and international media correspondents to energy consultants, SAIS alumni are defined by their innovative thinking, analytical approach, and policy expertise. They are leaders in their fields, life-long students committed to the betterment of the world.