CISP utilizes its university-sponsored, statewide and regional network of eight sites to conceptualize, organize and conduct standards-based programs to bridge cultures, cultivate equity and provide access to high quality instructional experiences for California's diverse student population. CISP engages teachers in a range of professional growth experiences designed to strengthen participants' classroom instructional practice, including summer institutes and school year programs designed to improve historical and contemporary knowledge of the world by exploring the international themes and issues that are inherent in geography, economics, government, world and U.S. history, regions, cultures and religions. The focus is on world history in an international relations context and on cultures, world regions, and contemporary international problems with an interdisciplinary emphasis.

This collaborative network is dedicated to providing the highest quality international studies instruction, with a special focus on meeting the needs of English learners (as articulated through the Common Core State Standards), native speakers with low literacy, and students from economically disadvantaged communities. Headquartered at the University of the Pacific, CISP belongs to a larger network of discipline-specific programs known as the California Subject Matter Projects, administered by the University of California, Office of the President.