VIRTUAL: Applying Education

Abstract

Virtual International team teaching at the university level is one avenue, widely available, to access another tool in the engagement toolkit. Students crave authentic experiences, the professoriate at its best seeks authentic student engagement and connection. The Virtual Exchange pedagogy has cultural competency and collaboration at its core. Interdisciplinarity offers the opportunity to create a curriculum more closely aligned to an international and collaborative work environment. Students are highly attracted to unique learning experiences and global perspectives. For the professors, team teaching offers so many benefits and can be highly motivating. Experiential and interdisciplinary teaching are often held up as high impact practices but there seem to be barriers to those practices. If your institution values research over teaching, they may not support you in ways that would make interdisciplinary and experiential education accessible. Also, it can be daunting when it comes to the mechanics of an interdisciplinary collaboration between different institutions. We found creative solutions to the challenges we faced bringing American community art students from an HBCU (historically black college or university) and British business students together from a TWI (traditionally white institution). Although we pursued this collaboration in response to the pandemic, we discovered that the benefits of international virtual exchange far outweigh the challenges. We were more resourceful and resilient as a collaborative team than we would have been individually. Additionally, the students demonstrated a level of authentic motivation and engagement beyond what we would normally expect.