Alex Akulli:
So to, to a faculty member who’s interested, I would start with inquiring as to why, what are the goals? What are the outcome that you want to have? And then we work our way through as to what do these learning goals have in common with the larger program goals of the curriculum that you have, and what are, well, what might be some of the prior experiences learning experiences that the students coming into this learning space may or may not have, and which places in the world and perspectives in the world would make sense from a responsible educator perspective to introduce the students and engage the students with.

Heather Shea:
Welcome to Student Affairs Now the online learning community for student affairs educators, I’m your host, Heather Shea. Today we are exploring the topic of virtual education abroad programs and the innovations that increase access. I developed a virtual version of the study abroad program that I lead in 2021. And I’m excited to be joined by two individuals who have experienced leading similar programs. Before I introduce my guests today, I’m gonna share a bit about our podcast and announce today’s sponsors. Student Affairs Now is the premier podcast and learning community for thousands of us who work in alongside or adjacent to the field of higher education and student affairs. We hope you’ll find these conversations, make a contribution to the field and are restorative to the profession. We release new episodes every week on Wednesdays. Find us at studentaffairsnow.com, on YouTube or anywhere you listen to podcasts. Today’s episode is sponsored by Vector Solutions and Stylus Publishing stay tuned to the end of the podcast for more information about each of these sponsors, as I mentioned, I’m your host, Heather Shay, my pronouns are she her and hers and I am broadcasting from Michigan near are the campus of Michigan State University, where I serve as the director of women, student services and interim director of the gender and sexuality campus center.

Heather Shea:
Since 2017, I have traveled each year and served as the program director of the learning culture and technology and Europe program, except for in 2020, when it was canceled. And in 2021 when we were virtual. For those of you who are aware from Michigan, Michigan state university occupies the ancestral traditional and contemporary land, the Anishinaabeg – Three Fires Confederacy of Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi peoples. The University resides on land ceded in the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw. I am so excited to introduce my colleagues and friends today to join me in this conversation. I have worked with Gabby Wahla for a couple of years now when Gabby was a graduate student in Michigan State University student affairs master’s program. She co-led the canceled program and also the virtual program with me. So unfortunately never got to travel abroad but excited that you’re here. Thank you so much for being here, Gabby.

Gabby Wahla:
Thank you, Heather.

Heather Shea:
And Alex, thank you so much as well. Alex and I had the pleasure of sitting on a panel together for international education week back in November. And when I was thinking about this topic, I was like, I’m not, I wanna have a further conversation with you. So and our paths also crossed at one point at Michigan state, although we didn’t know it at the time. So welcome Alex. It’s, it’s nice to have you here.

Alex Akulli:
Nice to be with you. Thank you.

Heather Shea:
So why don’t you each begin give a brief introduction about who you are and what your current roles are on your respective campuses or locations, and then a bit about your connection to education abroad, virtual programs and Alex, I’ll start with you.

Alex Akulli:
Great. Thank you. It’s a pleasure to be with all of you here today. Greetings from the sunny Greenville, South Carolina. I am an alumni of Michigan State University, the doctoral program in higher adult and lifelong education and have worked in the field of international education for almost two decades, hard to believe at both public and private universities, liberal arts and, and more traditionally type campuses. My current role is president of the Fullbright Association, South Carolina, and president and founder of local classrooms, which brings us together today to talk about virtual customized international learning experiences. I look forward to our conversation.

Heather Shea:
Thank you so much, Alex. It’s great to have you here. Gabby, introduce yourself to our, to our viewers.

Gabby Wahla:
Sure. so my name is Gabby Wahla. My pronouns are she her hers. I am right now in Lansing in a is very snowy . I’m just outside of MSU. I have been affiliated with MSU for quite a bit of time. I went here for undergrad. I graduated in 2017 with my residential college of arts and humanities bachelor’s degree. I was a college advisor and then I, for two years I was a college advisor. And then I went again, my master’s in student affairs administration at MSU. I was also the graduate assistant for women’s student services at that time working under Heather. And then I also had the opportunity of co-leading the learning culture and technology in Europe student or study abroad program with Heather which I might be the curse of not being able to go. The first year, my first year at co-leading was the year that it was canceled in 2020. And then our second year was the year that we developed the virtual online program, which was very fun. I’m very excited to talk about that today. Now that I’ve graduated, I am now the assistant director of women’s student services and I’m very excited to be in that position, working with Heather yet it again. So thanks for having me, Heather.

Heather Shea:
Yeah. It’s great to have both of you here. And I specifically invited Gabby because of your your student affairs background, but also because we got to work closely together so that I could kind of be the person asking the questions, not the one who’s also saying and also in so it’s great. It’s great to have both of you here today. So Alex, I know we’re focusing primarily on virtual programs today, but I’d love to zoom out a little bit and talk more broadly about the field of international education and education abroad. Can you give us a, just a snapshot of, you know, what supports this as as a program on a college or university campus, like what literature are our programs grounded in. And then also, you know, in terms of their, their work on our college campuses, you know, they require resources, right? So we can talk a little bit about further how you, how you get resources to create virtual programs, but I’d love to hear how do we justify that, what literature supports this work. So I’ll turn it to you.

Alex Akulli:
That’s a great question. And I’ll also mention that I started my career in student affairs, specifically in career and education advising. That was my first full time job out of my master’s program.

Heather Shea:
I love it. I didn’t know that. That’s great.

Alex Akulli:
Yes . So I have grown through the experiences of working with students navigating their career and educational goals. And it was then that I began being acquainted with the study abroad field. And the study abroad is, has a long history. I mean, some say that it goes back to the Aristo days where Aristotle was both teaching and, and learning through mobility, but these programs became more formalized in the, I would say in the early 19 hundreds when, especially coming after the world war I is when countries began to realize that we can establish better understanding of each other by engaging in learning with and from each other. And it was not until like the 19. And I don’t mean to take us on a history path here. The the 1919 or 1920 when the first education program started to become formalized.

Alex Akulli:
So the programs and the impetus for why universities invest so much in these programs is because of how they are suited and situated to help repair the next generation of leaders and practitioners and community engage citizens with the competencies and the frame of thinking that is constructive and productive for, especially the current interdependent and interconnected society is in which we live. And the resources are plentiful. The challenges are immense, of course, but the opportunities and the outcomes far outweigh those challenges and concerns. So we can talk about the resources in a variety of ways. And many of which have become much more formalized and scaled, accessible investment type of opportunities in the current, in the current environment leading up to COVID 19 and even more so now with virtual programming becoming much more acceptable and much more feasible way of learning, not only in traditional education, but also in international education abroad programming as well.

Heather Shea:
Yeah, I think it’s it’s a fascinating field. I did not know all of that back history. So I appreciate you sharing that. As a somewhat of a history buff in higher ed, you’re like when, when did these things become popularized and, and more frequently discussed. And I know you know, from our student affairs literature that we talk a lot about high impact practices and George Ku states that, you know, education being one of them you know, really require considerable time and effort facilitates learning engages students in dialogue and conversation interactions with faculty and Ku also notes that hips or high impact practices can be life changing. Right? So participation in a study abroad program can be life changing. And yeah, this maybe brings us to the point of why virtual is important. The students who can afford to go and a study abroad program during college is limited, right? They’re they can be extremely expensive and they definitely do take resources. What do we know about the, the students who are participating in programs and then talk a little bit about that access piece and how virtual programs can increase access. I’ll keep it with you, Alex, and then Gabby, if you have anything else you wanna add

Alex Akulli:
That that’s a great question. And when we look at the historical data and having been an administrator and faculty member are student affairs professional at three universities prior I can almost describe to a detail, you know, who the students have been, who have gone on programs abroad, and historically it has been the privileged, those with the means and, and access, and the ones with less access to resources have gone into great amount of debt, borrowing student loans, and such to go on a program abroad, understanding and appreciating the value that these programs can bring to a students formation and broadening of the horizon and developing those skills and having those learning experiences. So just prior to COVID 19 pandemic, less than 2% of college students were studying abroad. I mean, and that was our best year historically, right.

Alex Akulli:
I mean, 18, 19 was, was one of the better years in terms of the number of American students who went abroad. So when we look at that data and all of this data is available through IE open doors report, what we see is that majority of the students who went abroad with white female students, and most of them, 56% or, or so went to Europe and a small percentage came out of the the humanities, majority of the students who do go abroad, come from business disciplines, or a variety of what you would assume to be intuitive reasons, right? If you want, if you’re going to be in international business, you wanna know something about international experiences and so on. So when we look at, you know, who has participated abroad from a, you know, diversity, equity inclusion we have significant, significant progress to make in that space.

Alex Akulli:
And if there is, if there is a, an exciting promise, which there is that virtual can allow us, is it can increase the access point and participation by making international learning experiences available to all students, not just only to those who either have a lot of resources or are taking on additional debt to do that. And that’s not to say that virtual is going to replace the in-person learning about experiences, if anything is going to increase that because by way of helping students to visualize being exposed, to introduced to places around the world, that they would have never considered going to. More, more of them will want to have that interest and experience as well when they can when they’re ready to, or when they have both the resources as well as a time cost opportunities, a real thing when we take students abroad for three weeks or a month or a semester, whichever the case may be. So I’m excited for virtual promise.

Heather Shea:
Gabby, I think Alice kind of just described our cohort of our program, right? Not only were we going to Europe, but many, mostly all white women. And so I don’t know as much about their socioeconomic background, but I do think that that’s one of the barriers that I think when we were able to, to open it up virtually, it felt really positive. So other thoughts on that before we get into talking about our programs in general?

Gabby Wahla:
Well, I would also say that it definitely increases access. I would agree that it increases access for those who couldn’t necessarily afford to go in person. Specifically like with some of the tasks that we had that were gonna be more of an elective task, if we were to go we’ll talk about this later, obviously, too. But like, we went to a lot of virtual museum visits during our virtual program that would’ve been things that you could opt to do, but could cost like $50. Whereas it was free when the group went virtually and we were able to look at those things like in, on our computers. So , it definitely increased a lot of monetary access. And then I would also say that it also gained physical access too. So things like the Anne Frank House that are very hard to navigate, like moving around in those spaces, if someone were to be limited with mobility that would be something that would be really difficult for them to see and then kind of lose out on that, on that experience. So it was really cool. Our program got to do a virtual visit in the Ann Frank House. So that would be something that, to be definitely increasing access for lots of different students. So

Heather Shea:
That’s great. yeah. Access in all kinds of ways. I think that’s kind of the, the story. So let’s talk a little bit about the specific experiences that we, we’ve all engaged in. Gabby, give us an overview of the way that we adapted our program. And you alluded a little bit to some of the virtual experiences that students were able to have, but you could talk a little bit about that. How we transitioned an in-person experience to virtual space, and then Alex, I’d love to hear more about the programs that you’ve had and about your organization too. So Gabby

Gabby Wahla:
So our program typically spans over several different countries in Europe where we talk about teaching and technology. Typically because we have a lot of teacher education students who are in the program. So it was obviously very disappointing that we didn’t be able, we weren’t able to go abroad and to have those experiences that several students had been able to share that they loved so much, including Heather as well. But we did have some really cool things that we ended up developing. So we had sort of like each week that we had our virtual program was a different place that we would have been during that time. So we did a deep dive on where we would’ve gone on those places. So we did a lot of different historical virtual walks where we literally were on Google maps and walking around on the streets which is very much mimicking what we could have done in person.

Gabby Wahla:
But I would say that it also gave us more freedom because we wouldn’t have to figure out how to run across the city in an hour to go look at a different point. Another thing that we did was we had a list of different things students could work on throughout the week to, and then have a reflection journal about. And then in those reflection journal posts, students were able to learn about the different sites that they weren’t able to see as a group. And that way everyone got to learn about all the different things. So it was definitely helpful. So everyone got to do as much as they could. We also had a very unique experience where we worked on a group project of sorts with students from different schools in Europe. So we were able to partner with two different schools. Heather, I am blanking on some of the names of the schools, but I know PXL

Heather Shea:
Then Fontus university.

Gabby Wahla:
Thank you. so we were able to partner with those two schools and all of the students got together on several virtual days and were broken up into small groups and got to share their different experiences. So some of them had the commonality of being future teachers. So that was very unique for them to talk about how teacher education was different in different areas. So I thought that those were very unique experiences that I don’t think we would’ve been able to do in person per se. I don’t think we would’ve had time to do a lot of things. So as disappointed as some of the students were that they didn’t get to do things like try the food in some of the places or go out to the different fun like there was a pizza cruise but as, as disappointed those students where I think that they left with a lot of different knowledge that they wouldn’t have gotten had we had gone in person.

Heather Shea:
Yeah. That’s great. Great recap. Yeah, and, and I think our partnerships abroad really facilitated the opportunities, right? I mean, it’s hard to do a traveling study abroad, but it’s even more difficult. It can be more difficult when you’re trying to exchange technology and figure out how to build those relationships. So Alex, tell us a little bit about your, your organization, the types of experiences you’ve led.

Alex Akulli:
Brilliant, thank you. And Gabby, those are great examples of how virtual can be liberating and increasing student participation in experiences otherwise would be difficult to pull together. Well, global classrooms is a consulting and service providing company that I established a little over a year ago, a year and a half ago or so pivoting right after COVID started. That is what gave strong impetus for virtual international learning, which in the past, for example, for, has been around for almost two decades and made some gains in, in, in encouraging student and faculty, especially participation in international virtual learning, but with version modality now being both a thing and acceptable way of learning in a, in a much larger scale, it has allowed us to be of service to the universities and to the faculty members to program developers, whether they are student affairs programs or honors colleges or department specific thematic lecture series or whichever the case may be.

Alex Akulli:
It allow us to efficiently and effectively bring perspectives from around the world, to the students, local classroom, hence Glocal and guide them and engage them in an intentional way of learning. The advantage here is in the intentional design of the programs. So Glocal classrooms is a fully customizable approach to virtual learning. So I work directly with faculty members, staff administrators, to design and develop curate and source contributors and content from around the world. And allow us to do that in a session just like this , I am in South Carolina, you are in Michigan, and we’re able to have this conversation. We could very well have brought in colleagues here from Rome or Buenos Aries or from Bangkok or anywhere . So that is what we do. And the exciting part is that this is available as a culture enrichment as a program development, a professional development kind of mode of learning and engagement.

Alex Akulli:
And it allow us to come to a learning experience undistracted one of the, in the years that I’ve sent students abroad and, and led students abroad. One of the observations that you know, we can be quite distracted when we are in person in, in those exciting places abroad while in the virtual space, we’ll miss those selfies and we’ll miss those flavorful treats that come with being present in whichever place in the world. But from an intentional learning experience virtual allows us to bring in our level of focus and curiosity and desire for learning in a way that that we can be effective and productive and also cost effective. So our programs are fully customized. We start with an idea with an interest, with a question, and then we develop a full program that can be scalable and sustainable according to what fits the needs of the unit or the college or the institution overall in a nutshell.

Heather Shea:
Yeah. What I, what I like about your approach? I mean, I feel like we we reacted right. Right when we were forced to go to cancel one year and then forced to go virtual the next year and kind of retrofit, right. We took what we were trying to do in person and tried to make it work virtually. But it sounds like what Glocal classrooms does is really work more intentionally with it. Like, what are the outcomes that you’re hoping for, and then design that program from there, with, with the intent from the beginning that it’s going to be virtual experience or an enhancement of a, of another experience.

Alex Akulli:
So, right. What, what we do is we, we bring in our, in instructional design and program development capacity that we have and we work with the staff faculty member to develop the program through a backward mapping design, which is pretty common in instructional design consulting work. And so we start with the intended outcomes and we’ll work our way back to see, well, what kind of learning experiences will get us to those learning outcomes that you have in mind and how is it that we need to both structure and develop the program and how it is that we need to engage the learners in this learning experience to get us to those, to those outcomes. So in, in our model there is no room for serendipity pedagogy, right? Which sometimes happens in those in-person travel abroad. where, you know, those in-person travel programs have tremendous potential to facilitate transformative learning because they allow us to to, to, to simulate the, the cognitive dissonance that can be difficult to do in a, in a virtual experience because, you know, we’re not necessarily catapulting a person out of their everyday familiar environment to a new environment where they are now forced to figure out how it is that they need to navigate, learn and, and succeed in this new environment.

Alex Akulli:
Although in short term, faculty programs do see quite a bit of programming happening where student and the faculty program leaders are together pretty much all the time. Most of the time . So the virtual program allows us to be quite intentional by design and actually, and actually see through the entire program in a way that the in person travel may or may not necess really carry all of that out the way that we want it.

Heather Shea:
Well, and you have unknowns, right? Sometimes, and you miss a train or there’s a weather delay, or, or, you know, whatever, whatever the incident is. I think it can create those distractions on, on a, on a somewhat, a positive end, but sometimes a complete, like abandonment of the learning outcome that the faculty members trying to get it convey in that particular experience. And that, those are always interesting things when they have their own learning outcomes, right? Like, oh, we just missed a train now, what are we going to do? And how are we going to figure out what our next move is gonna be? But the, you know, you that may not be the intended outcome for that particular program that day.

Alex Akulli:
Right. And, and the virtual programs are not necessarily going to quite subsidize. I wanna use the word subsidize the in-person experience of let’s say you are abroad for a semester. We’re not talking about that because being, and navigating learning how to immerse and create community during a semester or year long program is a whole different way of learning. What I, what I’m referring to are largely focused on the short term faculty led programs, because that is also what know where the majority of the American students do participate in programs are abroad. The vast majority of those students go on those short term programs where these kinds of learning experiences that I described earlier do you know, appear. So the virtual, especially for those short term programs can be quite quite a vehicle for how to get us to learning outcomes that we intend , but also on the semester programs you can integrate right. Thematic programs throughout the semester. So, but it’s not going to be quite like being abroad for 24 hour hours every day for six months or however long.

Heather Shea:
Right. I think one of the things that we often talk about associated with education abroad is this idea that you’ll gain some level of global competency or intercultural competency on a short term faculty led program that be really limited considering that students don’t often step outside of that bubble. Right. They’re with the people that they’re traveling with 90% of the time or 99% of the time. And it’s just simply not long enough. Right. potentially. And yeah, I think global competency still has meaning, and it’s often directly tied to these types of programs. Gabby, talk a little bit about what you, how you define global competency and how you saw it displayed or demonstrated in our virtual program.

Gabby Wahla:
Sure. So I think the global competency kind of is this thing. That’s people talk about like achieving it, but I don’t think that global competency necessarily means like, check . I did it, I have competency on a global level. And I don’t think that’s what it means. I think that it’s something that you constantly have to be seeking learning to do. So to me, global competency kind of means the ability to like, be a open to different experiences throughout the world and being willing to learn about different experiences and different cultures. So I would say that a, a study abroad for a student who has not done quite a bit of traveling, or in our case with a lot of the students on our study abroad program had never the state of Michigan. I would say that a study abroad is definitely a jumping point to start a global competency process.

Gabby Wahla:
And a virtual study abroad is I think a pretty unique way to start that in a student’s life. And I wouldn’t say that it always starts at the beginning of a study abroad experience. I think it starts when you’re learning about other cultures as a kid in school, or when you’re looking up all the different programs for study abroad and learning about the places that you might go. So I think that the ways that we saw competency being developed and demonstrated it in our virtual study abroad kind of had to do with how students were growing and learning in those spaces. So some very obvious examples of when they were sort of growing in their competency where, when they were interacting with students abroad. So we had a scenario where we had students sit in, in a virtual classroom with some students.

Gabby Wahla:
So we had a group of, We had a couple future elementary teachers sit in an elementary classroom. I believe they were in Belgium, the, the classroom that they sat in. So sitting in on that classroom in person obviously is going to feel much their different than sitting in it virtually and learning about the students over a computer. But when they came back from that conversation and told the whole group about it, you could tell that they grew in lots of different ways as future teachers, but then also learning about other cultures and being able to talk about those cultures. So I would say you are constantly growing in your global competency, as long as, as you are open to growing in that I would say that sometimes people might not be open to growing in that, so they aren’t necessarily globally competent, but I would say that you aren’t, you, aren’t just one experience check I’m competent now forever, globally. But then you never revisit what you learned or seek to in that learning. So and so I guess for your next question, can I, can someone gain global competency through a virtual experience? I would say yes, if they are open to learning about a different culture.

Heather Shea:
Great. Alex, what about, what about you, how would you define and what kinds of experiences happen in virtual space that lend us towards developing our competency in that global area?

Alex Akulli:
That’s a great question. Well, I think of global competency as a lifestyle, really, I mean, academics have defined global competency in a variety of ways. And the most widely adopted definition is, you know, the framework that addresses the knowledge, skills, attitude, and values that demonstrate one’s ability to live harmoniously in a increasing multicultural environment and demonstrating curiosity about other cultures and other people’s way of thinking and so on and so forth. But as, as Gabby was saying, it is not a one experience, and then you check off the box, but it’s a lifestyle. And it’s a, that that continues for one’s lifetime. Once you’ve made a commitment that you are going to be an engaged citizen that demonstrates those competencies. So in the virtual space, the virtual international learning allows us to facilitate that type of learning every day.

Alex Akulli:
For example, let’s hypothetically say that you are teaching a course for this spring semester, and you have intentionally designed it in such a way that you wanted to facilitate global competencies, you know, progression through the various levels and the various components and constructs of global competency. And then you integrate into your, whichever course you’re teaching. You can integrate global perspectives on that. So let’s say that you are teaching a course on women’s issues. For example, you can bring in global perspectives from around the world and in introduce the students and connect them to conversations and perspectives from various places around the world in an efficient and intentional way. And you assess that through the designing of the assignments that you develop. So it’s not only the conversations students are having, but why are they having those conversations? What are the takeaway lessons and, and conclusions that they make?

Alex Akulli:
How informed are those conclusions from diverse perspectives? So all of this comes together quite conveniently through the virtual modality, because we could be bringing into a 90 minute class session or, or whichever format. You have perspectives from a variety of places around the world with, with activists and leaders and community members who are engaged at their local community, but we are making the connections across the world, in an intentional way, because we are thinking about, well, how does that issue or topic or, or initiative look like in my local environment. And what do I need to be thinking about how this refers to sustainability and, and and scalability of, let’s say you have a product that you want to launch. What are the implications of that? What are the opportunities for that? So whatever the topics and the conversations may be, the virtual modality allows us to be present and intentionally engage in diverse perspectives in real time, in real space, not something that we can do for two weeks in next July, but we can do it here and now, and continuously, sustainably and scalably throughout the entire year.

Alex Akulli:
So the opportunity that, that is what is exciting about the, the virtual modality, which we now have accepted as a, as emergently as a preferably have learned. I mean, look, what is happening in the changing nature of work with remote work telework? I mean the younger generation and, and not so younger generation are choosing to work from places that they have always wanted to work that now remote work is allowing them to do that. So think global teams, you know, where whichever industry you are in, you are collaborating in real time and asynchronously with colleagues from anywhere in the world. So the changing world of the changing nature of work, as well as sourcing of global talent around the world with a change in nature of work is shifting the way that we think about how we learn and how we live and how we work. And virtual allows us to engage intentionally in that pursuit of how we prepare and educate the next generation of professionals and leaders and citizens.

Heather Shea:
Yeah, I feel like what you’re really making the case for is that beyond just a response to the pandemic and our like, kind of being forced to find other ways of doing things like these are actual long, longer, lasting solutions to some of the, the bigger issues, right? Whether it’s cost of travel or whether it’s you know, the ability to get the right group of people in the right room at the same time. Like we can, we can do a lot of things now because we have the technology. I mean, we’re not at the like conference call level of engaging with people across, across time zones. Now we’re at a, in a much richer, inner interactive even space. And so I, I actually feel you know, beyond increasing access and obviously safer during a global pandemic there’s lots of reasons why we should continue to explore this as a, as a primary way of enhancing global competency and whether it’s within a classroom space or beyond, right. And you’re talking about work. I think it made me think about all the different ways in which this could be applied as well. So I don’t know any, anything else you wanna add about like making the case not just a reaction or a solution to a problem it’s actually maybe a whole brand new modality.

Alex Akulli:
This is a whole new brand brand, you know, way of learning. And this is going to be sustainably adopted across, across the world. That is not to say that this is going to replace you know, the person travel, but this is going to allow us to be intentional in how we prepare today’s students to be not, not to be cliche, but how to, to be competent in their life and their work life and private life. Because that is the purpose of education to prepare competent citizens in this, in this, in this way, then how do we do that? When we know that the, of work in the future of learning is going to be increasingly interconnected and interdependent much more so than we, what we have seen in the past. So virtual learning abroad is a way of the future is a sustainable, scalable environmentally responsible way of learning.

Alex Akulli:
What, however much one can say that a student can learn in a 10 day, two week intensive faculty led program abroad. When you also think about it from an environmental carbon footprint perspective, and consumer is perspective. Of course, it has dividends for the host communities who rely on tourism. And so I’m not undermining, I mean, under, under estimating that impact, but also , if we are environmentally conscious, what, what promise does virtual have to help us make a positive impact and that direction as well? So virtual international learning is a long term strategy. It is not, we started with the reactionary approach because that is what was plausible at the time. But those who have been working behind the scenes for a longer time, COVID basically just created the environment for this to become a much more adaptable and acceptable way of learning.

Heather Shea:
I love it. So, Gabby, I know you did a project while you were in your master’s program to talk with our education abroad office. And, and maybe this can be linked into our next question. If you were a faculty member about to start a new program thinking about your project, you know, what would you say are the key components to an effective virtual experience?

Gabby Wahla:
Sure. So my project that I did with the education abroad office at MSU was an office consultation project. And so in that project, they were seeking on how to ensure that students were becoming resilient and growing from their experience while abroad. So while the specifics about how they’re going abroad is kind of irrelevant in this conversation, I would say that something that we really did a lot of research on and took away from that whole conversation was how students are being prepared to have conversations about global competency overall and their experiences, but then also giving them a space to reflect internally and externally. So if a faculty member who wanted to start a virtual program came up to me and asked me what I thought that they should definitely incorporate, I would say different kinds of reflection experiences, because I think people reflect in different ways but is definitely essential for a student to who reflect in order to grow from their experiences.

Gabby Wahla:
So someone who’s more of an internal processor might seek to reflect with like a journal or sort of like a meditation space. An external thinker might want to have like a conversation and speak with other individuals who had an experience and share their experiences and debrief through that. I am a talker, so I like to work through things that I am going through out loud and with other people. So something that I hope to integrate into our virtual program was both of those experiences. So we had a series of journals that students completed and we gave them several different avenues of how they could complete those journals, which I always think is a great way to help students figure out what’s best for them. So while a journal, obviously yes, is a great way to gauge a student’s learning, especially if you’re giving them a grade at the end of the day.

Gabby Wahla:
I also think that a journal shouldn’t just be for that, it should be a good space to, for them and what works for them. So we had a lot of students who shared photographs and like did comments on photographs. We had students who did drawings and sort of debrief through drawing. We had a student who solely recorded voice memos , which is totally what I would do in that space . But it was just, it was just so unique to see how different people process things. But then also alongside all those different things, we had a space in class where we were reflecting on what we were doing. So if we were to go out into a physical program where we were gonna go to a school and work with students, I would then have everybody sort of like huddle up, or come in at the end of the experience and sort of talk about what we talk, what we saw what we kind of like gained from that experience and sort of like how that shifts views, so sort of providing different sort of experiences are pretty, I would say they’re essential to most students whether some students gained as much from other experiences as other students did, I’m not sure, but I found it to be helpful as a staff member so I would say it’s helpful for students too.

Gabby Wahla:
So that’s the main thing I would tell a faculty member.

Heather Shea:
That’s great. That’s great. Alex, how about you? If somebody came to you and said they wanted to start a program, no program exists at the current moment. What are the key components to the effective virtual experience?

Alex Akulli:
That’s a great question. Effective key components for when faculty are develop an an in person travel abroad program, one of their greatest asset is a reliable, well seasoned tour operator travel company that puts together logistics and delivers and experience that goes flawlessly and so on. Yep. All things considered. In the virtual environment while that is also that element is also important from my perspective, the instructional design is critical, and that is not to say that the instructional design is not critical for in person. It is critical, but it doesn’t always take the central stage in the virtual program design program development instruction design can and should be the central stage element. So to, to a faculty member who’s interested, I would start with inquiring as to why, what are the goals? What are the outcome that you want to have?

Alex Akulli:
And then we work our way through as to what do these learning goals have in common with the larger program goals of the curriculum that you have, and what are, well, what might be some of the prior experiences learning experiences that the students coming into this learning space may or may not have, and which places in the world and perspectives in the world would make sense from a responsible educator perspective to introduce the students and engage the students with. So for example, if, if a, if, if students have already had quite a bit of exposure to perspectives from Europe, then why don’t we also broaden their horizons and perspectives by bringing in perspectives from Africa, from Latin America or Asia or other parts of the world or, or we can zoom in to a particular or the regional or country, depending again, what the, the learning objectives and the course focus may be. So the instructional design, especially one who has the background, both from international education and academic preparation could be the faculty members best resource in that case.

Heather Shea:
Yeah, I can’t say enough about how important having those people who have those areas of expertise, whether it’s the travel expertise or knowing how to design, effective learning experiences. So I think those are those are definitely great examples. And for the virtual experience, there’s just no replacing the sequencing and the intentionality right. Of, of knowing kind of where you wanna end up and how do you get there through intentional learning experiences. I always hard to imagine where we’re already at the end of our time. So thank you both for engaging with me today around this topic. As I always end every episode our podcast is called Student Affairs Now I’d love to hear what you are thinking about pondering questioning you know, considering now at maybe as a result of this conversation, or just in general in your, in your work life. So Gabby, I’m gonna start with you.

Gabby Wahla:
Well, I don’t know. I mean, I am no longer necessarily affiliated with the study abroad experience anymore, but I would love to get back into that. That’s definitely one of those functional areas that I have always been interested in. So I’m definitely gonna be seeking out a personal experience where I can get involved in this again. But I really just love hearing about everything that Alex has said and everything that glocal classrooms is doing. It sounds amazing. And I can’t wait to see all the cool stuff that you all get to do.

Heather Shea:
Great. Thanks Gabby. Alex, how about you? Final thoughts.

Alex Akulli:
Thank you, Gabby. And at glocal classrooms, that’s what we do is we combine expertise in instructional design, program development, global logistics of sourcing and curating and procuring contributors of content and perspectives from around the world. So what, what I find exciting is the opportunity to work with faculty in this capacity and and staff members who are thinking about thematic programming for student affairs or honors, or lecture series that engage alumni friends, some the community members and so on is that we can do this collaboratively by deploying these resources. And in many ways make the work of the faculty or staff member much, much more easier because we do the bulk of the work not only from the design part, but also on the logistics and sourcing and hosting the programs together with one of you, for example so that you don’t have to take your time out of your teaching and research and working with students every day to think through and, and take care of all these matters. You know, we take that on so that you can continue to focus on doing your work the way that you need to do your work and the way that your students need you to do your work without being burdened by these important elements, which glocal classrooms can take care of. So I thank you for the opportunity and looking forward to collaborating.

Heather Shea:
Absolutely. Thank you so much. It was hearing all about both of your experiences and for your time and energy and contributions to the conversation. I’m really grateful. Also send heartfelt appreciation to our dedicated behind the scenes program assistant Nat Ambrosey will make us all look and sound great, make sure she gets all, everything published on time. If you are listening today and you’re not already receiving our weekly newsletter, please visit our website at studentaffairsnow.com and scroll to the bottom to add your email to our mailchimp list and while you’re there you can check out our growing archives. If you found today’s conversation helpful, you can share it on social media and just build our learning, help us build our learning community. Our sponsors for today are Stylus and Vector Solutions. So a little bit more about each of them.

Heather Shea:
Stylus is proud to be a sponsor for the Student Affairs NOW podcast. Browse their Student Affairs, Diversity, and Professional Development titles at styluspub.com. Use promo code SANOW for 30% off all books, plus free shipping and you can also find Stylus on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter at @Styluspub. Vector Solutions. How will your institution rise to reach today’s socially conscious generation? These students report commitments to safety, well-being, and inclusion are as important as academic rigor when selecting a college. It’s time to reimagine the work of student affairs as an investment, not an expense. For over 20 years, Vector Solutions, which now includes the Campus Prevention Network (Formerly, EVERFI), has been the partner of choice for 2,000+ colleges, universities, and national organizations. With 9 efficacy studies behind our courses, you can trust and have full confidence that you’re using the standard of care for student safety, well-being, and inclusion. Transform the future of your institution and the community you serve. Learn more at VectorSolutions.com/StudentAffairsNow. Please take a moment to visit out website and click on our sponsors link to learn more about these organizations and others. Again, I’m Heather Shea, thank you to our listeners and to our two guests today, and everyone who is watching and listening. Make it count everyone.

Websites:

NAFSA ‘s Education Abroad Knowledge Community:

NAFSA on Supporting Diversity in Education Abroad

Forum on Education Abroad 

Institute for International Education Open Doors Report 

Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad 

AAC&U Global Learning 

Books:

Deardorf, D.K. (Ed.). (2009). The SAGE handbook of intercultural competence. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

Lewin, R.(Ed.).(2010).The handbook of practice and research in study abroad: Higher education and the quest for global citizenship. NY

Vande Berg, M., Paige, R.M., & Lou, K.H. (2012). Student learning abroad: What our students are learning, what they’re not, and what we can do about it. Sterling, VA: Stylus.

Article citations: 

Goode, M. L. (2008). The role of faculty study abroad directors: A case study. Frontiers: The interdisciplinary journal of study abroad, 15, 149-172.

King, P.M., Baxter Magolda, M. B., (2005). A Developmental Model of Intercultural Maturity. Journal of College Student Development, (46)6, 571-592 

King, P. M., Perez, R. J., and Shim, W. (2013). How College Students Experience Intercultural Learning: Key Features and Approaches. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, (6)2, 69–83

King, P. M. (2014). Enriching the Student Learning Experience: Linking Student Development and Organizational Perspectives. About Campus, (19)1, 7-13.
Wong, E. D. (2015). Beyond “It was Great”? Not so Fast!. Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad, 26, 121-135.