As part of the Connecting Carolina Classrooms with the World initiative, the Office of the Vice Provost for Global Affairs (OVPGA) provides faculty with support and funding for implementing Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) as a part of its continued efforts to advance the internationalization of the Carolina curriculum.
Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) is a flexible pedagogical approach to global education. First developed by the State University of New York (SUNY), COIL can be embedded into course curricula in order to connect faculty and students from across the world through shared learning experiences and global, cross-institutional collaboration.
COIL courses involve shared learning between students in a course at UNC-Chapel Hill and peer students at a global partner university. Faculty members at both institutions design collaborative activities for their students lasting at least three weeks, such as completing small group projects, engaging in dialogue drawing on their different societal or disciplinary perspectives, or exchanging scholarly or creative work
SON COIL Faculty
Here at the UNC School of Nursing, our COIL Faculty collaborate with our international partners to broaden students’ perception of nursing, patient care and public health across the world.
Maureen Baker, PhD, RN, CNL, CHSE
Course: N934 Clinical Scholarship and Professional Communication
Partner Institution: St Luke’s International University, Japan
Project: Addressing health care challenges in both countries and creating an evidence-based Shark Tank pitch. Winning pitches included a smoking cessation and support app, Tela-Peer apps for nurses to address burnout and offer peer to peer support and virtual wellness series to combat loneliness and isolation in elderly populations.
Impact: Students use their professional communication and evidence-based practice skills to select and address a pressing problem in both countries. To do this requires a robust exchange of ideas, development of a PICOT question, appraisal of evidence, and creative skills to formulate evidence-based and innovative solutions.
“In working with international partners, we discovered our commonality, celebrated our differences, and learned how to more effectively communicate” Lindsay Powell, DNP Student
Audra Rankin, DNP, APRN, CPNP
Course: NURS746 Health Care Policy and Leadership
Partner Institution: Ramathibodi School of Nursing, Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand
Project: Students will participate in asynchronous and synchronous content focused on health care policy and leadership. The culmination of the COIL experience will include participation in a shared assignment using the social media platform, Twitter. Students and faculty will host a synchronous Twitter Chat, a live conversation that will highlight the complexities of health policy work in nursing and create an opportunity to share leadership theories and best practice examples that can be utilized to increase the efficacy of policy and advocacy efforts for all students. A pre and post survey taken by the students, will provide feedback and reflection on the learning activities as well as feedback on the use of innovative learning strategies, such as social media platforms, to communicate and share ideas.
Impact: In this educational experience, a social media platform, Twitter, serves as both a dissemination and networking tool. Students will share theoretical underpinnings and evidence-based ideas as well as practice communication skills that reflect the true interplay of stakeholders in the policymaking process.
Theresa Raphael-Grimm, PhD, PMHCNS-BC
Course: N864 Biopsychosocial Care 3: The patient in context of families, groups and society
Partner Institution: Jonkoping University, Sweden
Project: Undoing Racism in Healthcare: Students work together, live (synchronously), to analyze racism and discrimination in healthcare contexts by examining real-like scenarios and identifying factors that aggravate and/or mitigate these situations. They also compare and contrast the social issues that contribute to racism within and between the US and Sweden.
Impact:
Students say things like:
- Before this experience I was completely unaware of the negative experience of immigrants in our healthcare system
- I never realized before that ignoring racism does nothing to help fix it. I need to be more active in supporting my colleagues who face discrimination at work.
- People in Sweden have to deal with racism too – I thought it was just an American thing.
- I really enjoyed getting to know the students from Sweden. In so many ways, they are so similar to me. Who knew?
Lisa Woodley, PhD, MSN, RN, CNE, CHPN
Course: N483: Family Centered Nursing Care from Birth through Adolescence -Undergraduate Pediatric Nursing
Partner Institution: The University of Sao Paulo, Brazil
Project: In our COIL project, students work collaboratively together through asynchronous as well as synchronous sessions to learn more about a chronic health condition impacting children and their families in the US and Brazil. Family experiences and the role of the pediatric nurse and compared across the two countries, and students learn best practices around culturally responsive nursing care.
Impact: Our COIL collaboration offers a unique educational opportunity for students at both universities as they learn from and with each other and work together on a shared project. In the process, they also develop a sense of global citizenship, understand the importance of nursing at a global level, and appreciate similarities and differences across countries.
Dr. Woodley is also a COIL Faculty Fellow. As an award-winning faculty member with over 30 years of experience teaching nursing students in two different countries, Dr. Woodley strongly believes in the value of a global education for our future nurses and nurse leaders. Whether they are immersive or virtual, Dr. Woodley maintains that opportunities for global learning in nursing at several touchpoints across curricula are critical for students to develop a deep understanding of core nursing concepts including best practices in culturally responsive care. In her role as a campus-wide leader in Collaborative Online International Learning, Dr. Woodley looks forward to providing support for other faculty seeking to infuse global learning opportunities into their existing courses