Author: rt-col-web

Many international university networks have wasted no time in facing up to our current challenging times to coordinate activities towards supporting higher education institutions and students as they adapt their working arrangements to slow the spread of COVID-19.

Here are some examples of what’s happening right now.

The EUA (European University Association) is providing online training and guidance through the EUA Erasmus+ Virtual Exchange Team by disseminating resources and setting up  webinars, masterclasses and virtual exchange activities. The EUA has also created the hashtag #UniversitiesAtHome to share good practices among teachers and learners through social media.

The University of Aveiro has a partnership with the University of Coventry (UK) to implement virtual mobility experiences for students (collaborative online international learning COIL). The promotors of this initiative are currently developing new online student exchange experiences through several departments at UA, supported by weekly information and training sessions.

The Columbus Hub Academy, an initiative of the Associación Columbus network, has been engaged in promoting collaborative online learning between students since 2016, an initiative in which ISCA has been involved by delivering online modules in collaboration with the Universidad de Colima (Mexico). Thanks to this, Associación Columbus has a large amount of available resources and the experience of professors from the Columbus network who will share their experience in a series of webinars to begin already in April.

Meanwhile the ECIU supports a wide variety of physical and virtual spaces where teachers can innovate and deliver classes, meet peers and share best practices, fostering creativity with learners, industry and public organizations. The ECIU’s InGenious initiative, minor programmes, summer schools, researcher mobility scheme, leadership development programme, industry and innovation events and joint research initiatives are carried out in virtual and physical environments and represent some of the best that higher education in Europe has to offer.

In addition, the European Commission has published a selection of online resources and tools for learners, teachers and educators during the outbreak of COVID-19 and notes that “an upcoming review of the Digital Education Action Plan in mid-2020 will further support the development of online learning at different levels of education across Europe”. The Commission also has also been running an Erasmus+ Virtual Exchange initiative since 2018 in the field of intercultural learning.

Course designers often consider non-conventional settings for their teaching and learning arrangements. Some better known examples include traineeships, student exchanges, intenshive programmes, project and problem-based learning, embedded COIL experiences (virtual mobility), gaming and others. Or perhaps too you’ve read about or had the opportunity to participate in a Creathon or an iWeek.

Now here’s something truly ingeious. To bring younger students together with more experienced lifelong learners, while creating value for companies and other social and economic partners, the ECIU is becoming keen to invest in challenge-based learning arrangements. And this is one way ECIU wishes to tackle the greatest challenges of society, focusing on SGD 11.

InGenious (https://www.in-genious.eu/) builds on the collective experience of Demola, a co-creational platform for talented students, companies and universities, developed at Tampere University of Technology. The methodology has since been further developed by the Universities of Linköping, Stavanger, Aveiro (Ingenua) and Twente into the concept of InGenious. InGenious is a five-month project course with real life challenges and aims to “stimulate the brainpower of young university students, fostering the thrive, capacity and vocation to think and investigate, in the most varied scientific areas, promoting collaborative work and interdisciplinarity through the development of challenge-based projects.”

Challenges are provided by researchers, companies and organizations that are interested in creative solutions. They are posted in a pool where students can apply to those of their interest. Inter-disciplinary teams that fits the challenges are set-up by a facilitating team and a network of specialized tutors from academy, research institutes, companies and public organisations, as fits, are provided as support.

Our ColLab partners from Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH) shared with us a few useful leads and links regarding communities of pedagogical practice in the German higher education sphere, especially linked with digital tools.

::. On www.e-teaching.org you will find scientifically sound and practice-oriented information on the design of higher education with digital media. The non-commercial portal is a service of the Leibniz Institute for Knowledge Media. Content is provided by experts in the field mainly. Next to written information webinars are organized or podcast created. Web-Page (and all offers) is in German.

::. The Hochschulforum Digitalisierung (HFD) is a think tank that “orchestrates the discourse on higher education in the digital age”, with a mission to inform and advise and networks universities, politics, business and society in general in the field of digital education. Founded in 2014, the HFD is a joint initiative of CHE Centrum für Hochschulentwicklung, Hochschulrektorenkonferenz (HRK) and the Stifterverband and is sponsored by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.
(Note that most resources available in German).

::: The Lehren Community of Professionals brings together higher education professionals different disciplines and universities to accompany their work and strengthen the community, with the aim “to establish the network as a forum for the systematic development of higher education. The expertise lies in the institutions themselves and in the network’s members who, beyond Lehren, are ideally also experts in the field of teaching development and training”. Webpage is in german only, Flyer available in English.

::. The German Association for Educational and Academic Staff Development in Higher Education (DGHD) is the association of German speaking countries (Germany, Austria, Switzerland). According to the website, “its members are institutions or persons that work and do research in the field of academic development or that are interested in developing the quality of Higher Education in German speaking countries”.