University of Glasgow Connect

Engaging with COIL through a community of practice

Academic staff working at the University of Glasgow, the University of Malaya and the University of Sydney have launched a COIL community of practice.

COIL is an acronym for Collaborative Online International Learning. It provides an enhanced learning experience for students who may not be able to engage in physical mobilities while offering them opportunities to have an intercultural learning experience. Students benefit from synchronous and asynchronous collaborations and the building of international networks. Staff who get involved in the collaborations can build sustainable partnerships with international institutions, sharing expertise on global issues of concern.

Why are we interested in COIL?

1. When we make a move to adopt COIL, we address the on-going dialogue about how to respond to the global climate crisis and play an active part in looking for alternative ways to provide and diversify international experiences for all students. The pandemic demonstrated that there are viable alternatives with flexible online platforms and user-friendly ways of engaging in extended reality that allow educators to create quality online learning environments that meet the needs of students looking to create global networks. Strengthening staff capacity to engage in COIL specifically meets global ambitions of institutions to provide international experiences for students whilst meeting UN goals to be carbon neutral by 2030.
2. It provides opportunities for transforming programme delivery to enable all students to have an international experience. COIL is inclusive and meets the needs of diverse students who are not able to participate in physical mobilities for a variety of reasons (cost, family commitments, professional courses).
3. COIL partnerships enhance student outcomes, allowing them to explore shared learning outcomes within academic fields of study, benefiting from expertise across institutions.
4. COIL strengthens partnership across institutions and facilitates the development of research and scholarship activity.

In partnership, we launched our COIL community of practice through a hybrid workshop. Those attending signed up to develop their expertise and understanding of COIL so they could create sustainable and inclusive ways for their students to have international experiences.

Why develop a community of practice?

Through a series of online conversations across the three institutions, we realised we were collectively asking similar questions on how to support staff. This led to our decision to pilot the use of a tripartite community of practice as an effective way to support staff to develop knowledge and work towards transformations in practice (Wenger, 1998).

What will we cover in the workshops?

Since this was a pilot, we decided to run three workshops across the academic year that would focus on:

1. Getting started in COIL
2. COIL connections
3. Evaluating COIL proposals

The first workshop took place late last year and was attended by over 40 staff, with those from the University of Malaya coming together in one room, while staff from Glasgow and Sydney attended online. Each institution discussed lessons learned so far in the development of COIL, sharing questions, challenges and solutions connected to the practicalities of developing COIL. Time was then created for staff to discuss in breakout rooms a course that they would wish to develop and to think about the logistics in terms of:

• geographical location of the student cohorts
• disciplines
• content focus
• type of communication (synchronous/asynchronous)
• language of exchange
• integration onto a larger programme

The second workshop was held on the 30th May. Community members provided feedback on their progress, using the workshop space to pitch proposals, receive feedback on their proposals and anticipate future challenges to implementation. The community concept of strengthening capacity through sharing was very much in evidence throughout the workshop.

In the long-term, participants also want to get involved in researching the impact of COIL on student learning and engagement.