Challenges facing Virtual Exchange in the new global educational landscape
Universidad de León, Spain
Abstract
Virtual Exchange (VE) refers to the numerous online learning initiatives and methodologies which bring learners in online collaborative projects together with partners from different cultural backgrounds as part of their study programmes and under the guidance of teachers or trained facilitators (O’Dowd, 2023). Although VE has been employed in higher education for over 25 years, it has received much greater attention since the recent COVID-19 pandemic and many recent surveys on the state of play in international education confirm the high level of importance attributed to VE as a tool for introducing intercultural and international elements in university classrooms (European Association for International Education, 2024; Marinoni & Pina Cardona, 2024). Despite this rise in popularity of Virtual Exchange, practitioners are currently navigating an educational context markedly different from that encountered by their counterparts in the 1990s and in the first decade of the new millennium. This new context of Higher Education involves more critical and tired attitudes towards online learning and communication due to students’ mixed experiences of emergency online learning during the pandemic. It is also characterised by tension and confrontation on campuses and in classrooms caused by international conflict and political and religious extremism. However, more positively, it is also marked by increased collaboration between educational institutions in the global north and south and also by the efforts of universities, democratic institutions and organisations to promote in young people an understanding of active citizenship and a positive attitude to engagement in democratic processes through the integration of frameworks such as the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Council of Europe’s Reference Framework for Competences for Democratic Culture. The challenges which emerge from this educational landscape affect all aspects of university activity and are, of course, in no way exclusive to Virtual Exchange. However, I will argue here that they are particularly relevant to this pedagogical activity as VE brings both teachers and students into contexts where online communication, engagement with global issues and the negotiation of international relationships are integral parts of the learning experience. Based on qualitative and quantitative data taken from recent VE projects and studies, this article explores how VE practitioners are confronting these challenges and what the future of this activity make look like.
European Association for International Education (2024). EAIE Barometer: Internationlisation in Europe (Third Edition).
Marinoni, G & Pina Cardona, S. (2024). Internationalization of Higher Education: Current Trends and Future Scenario.
O’Dowd, R. (2023). Internationalising higher education and the role of VE. Routledge.
Biography
Robert O’Dowd is full professor for English Studies at the Universidad de León, Spain. He has taught at universities in Ireland, Germany and Spain. He has published extensively on the application of Virtual Exchange in higher education and has coordinated 3 Erasmus+ projects, including the European Policy Experiment ‘Virtual Innovation and Support Networks for Teachers’ (VALIANT) (2021-2024). He collaborates with organizations on the promotion and integration of Virtual Exchange in higher education and his most recent book is Internationalising Higher Education and the Role of Virtual Exchange (2023, Routledge).He was recently listed in Stanford University’s ‘Ranking of the World Scientists: World´s Top 2% Scientists’.