Activity

We focus on exploring how to make student exchange experiences equal for all participants and avoid valuing dominant or hegemonic practices and approaches over other modes of thinking and teaching. Key tenets of our work include:

• Ensuring that all points of view, experiences and cultures are recognised and valued equally.
• Understanding ‘decolonising the curriculum’ as a continuing process rather than a goal.
• Being alert to ‘decolonial-washing’ i.e. ensuring that changes to exchange programmes are pro-active, substantive and experienced by participants, rather than reactive, instrumental and only policy-based.
• Researching and developing ways of understanding how students engage with difference.
  

Work to date:
The group have shared and discussed current research in this field in order to clarify our understanding of what we understand by the term decoloniality. We have also explored what theories, concepts or instruments might be useful to help us evaluate how students experience and interact with partners in the global south. There are constraints on the concept ‘decolonising’- what can be said and what can be taught. We will elaborate this further the next year in the network.

Looking forward:
Planned future work will first use research (both published and currently being undertaken by GLOSS members) to identify key issues and challenges relating to decoloniality that have been experienced by student teacher exchanges between the Nordic countries and the Global South.  Issues already identified include: exchanges reinforcing rather than dissolving stereotypes (e.g. Klein & Wikan, 2019); (neo)colonial attitudes among both North and south participants; and challenges relating to intra-group dynamics and differing attitudes.

The group then plan to develop shared resources, for example a set of dilemmas for students to discuss, which can be used by all partner universities to help to prepare students for their exposure to different cultural and teaching practices and allow learners think critically about decolonisation. We also hope to agree on or develop tools to assess, describe or represent how students are disposed to engage with difference and other cultural and educational practices.

The tematic group overall goal is to test new virtual learning designs in collaboration with partners in the global south as well as in collaboration with the Nordic GLOSS members. The group meet online twice (or more) per semester to share knowledge on VE in terms of our own practical implementation of VE and to learn from research on VE. 

Work to date:
The group have meetings online to share members’ experiences with VE at their institutions, drawn the structures for the VE research collaboration and the team-work. By the GLOSS network established a communication flow and established a knowledge database with VE research literature. We have reviewed literature on VE – teasing out the patterns and tendencies in VE between the global South and North in higher education. Discussed the implementation of VE/COIL + shared these experiences in the VE group and started a mapping activity at the Nordic institutions involved in GLOSS to gain an overview of who is involved in virtual teaching activities with international partners at our institutions.

Looking forward:

The network group plans to strengthen our internal collaboration by proposing small VE activities for our institutions. This means that the coming year would intensify focus on trying out mini activities in smaller VE groups with partners in the global south. We will discussed at the Nordic virtual network meetings, as well as the plans to include the Global South partners for a version 2.0 of the mini activities. The reason for this approach is based on those experiences we have gained the first year, and we see a need to enhance the VE’s experiences in pilot mini activities, in order to be well equipped for the interactions with the global south partners. The group will continue meetings based on a rotation, where chairing and minute taking will be tasks divided between the institutions from meeting to meeting.

The research group work and discuss how the GLOSS network can elaborate research applications to enhance epistemological and ontological knowledge on internship and practicum for teacher students with our partners in the Global South. Research on sustainable education, inclusive education and well being is a common research issue in teacher education, also regarding the DC and VE research findings in our Nordic network. 

Work to date: 

We have sampled and discussed our research development with partners in the Global South, but need the next year to clarify ethical considerations and clarify routines for research with our partners in the global south. The ‘old’ Norwegian network (GIPS) have conducted a interview study with teachers about their practicum in the global south and we have shared and discussed earlier research.    

Looking forward:

We will enhance research regarding sustainable development in our further work in the research network group in GLOSS.