Inclusive Learning: Perspectives on Virtual Exchange and Global Learning

Abstract

Considering the emergent needs involving the pandemic, virtual exchange continues to be relevant and a necessary strategy for internationalization in Higher Education. This chapter will explore the experience between the BRaVE Program at UNESP and the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) at Jefferson Community College. The Arthur O. Eve Educational Opportunity Program is a New York State Legislative program introduced by Arthur O. Eve to provide access and opportunity for low-income students from historically disadvantaged backgrounds. Throughout a 5-week period, undergraduate students engaged in a virtual exchange opportunity called COIL (Collaborative Online International Learning). The experience helped provide scaffolding to learning and growing in the development of college students. We will also explore the importance of engaging students in global learning by encouraging joint tasks and utilizing digital technologies toward the democratization of knowledge, intercultural competence, and student success.

2.1 Introduction

The unprecedented COVID-19 crisis has provided different scenarios in the most diverse sectors of life. In education, it has disrupted face to face pedagogical teaching and created challenges in the continuity of the teaching/learning process. Digital technologies have allowed contexts and possibilities to connect people, languages, and cultures beyond geographical borders and financial and sanitary restrictions. The pandemic put a pause on in person classes and completely changed the college experience. Students were switched online for an undetermined period of time.

This chapter aims at sharing how the virtual exchange/telecollaboration/collaboration online/collaborative online international learning allowed us to engage in an opportunity to bring together students while exploring different cultures and international learning in a virtual setting. We hope to highlight this collaboration involving Brazilian and US American students from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds in higher education.

At the start of this collaboration, Brazilian students were eager to engage in an international linguistic and cultural experience. English Language learners from Brazil were provided the opportunity through Brazilian Virtual Exchange Program (BRaVE-Unesp) and SUNY COIL to establish meaningful intercultural conversation in sustained tasks and discussions with students from Jefferson Community College. While the students were the main focus in this collaboration, the course instructors were given the opportunity to engage in creative and innovative course development to address students’ needs to quickly connect, converse, and collaborate.

Globalization and internationalization have become more visible and desired during the pandemic, in which home mobility programs were being fostered. Assuming that “Internationalization processes challenge the very notion of autonomy, reshaped as interconnectedness and interdependence” (Gimenez, 2020, p. 9), it is feasible to embrace possibilities as such to foster motivation and engagement toward global learning.

Arthur O. Eve (2017) stated in an interview that “Education is the number one issue today, tomorrow and forever.” The Arthur O. Eve Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) combines access, academic support, and supplemental financial cassitance to make higher education possible for students from historically disadvantaged backgrounds. Codified in New York State Education Law §6452, the Arthur O. Eve Educational Opportunity Program, formally established the intent to ensure provision of access to the University for low-income students among other intents to go above and beyond for student success. Disadvantaged students are defined as students who experience historical economic and cultural deprivation. Indicators include, but are not limited to, students who have endured long-term economic deprivation, membership in a group underrepresented in higher education, a record of inadequate schooling, little or no accumulation of assets, and so on. The Arthur O. Eve EOP has proven to be one of the most successful opportunity programs in New York State, graduating more than 80,000 students who continue to live in New York, enriching its economic and social fabric.

Global learning and international learning are among those actions that create and ensure student success. The Arthur O. Eve Educational Opportunity Program will continue to be successful as we look for ways to be innovative and forward-thinking in our program development. High Impact Practices (HIPs), according to the American Association of Colleges and Universities, are evidence-based teaching and learning practices that show significant educational benefits for students who participate in them (AAC&U, 2022) – especially for those students in programs such as EOP. Students who qualify for EOP would rarely be afforded the opportunity to study abroad, as this opportunity is fairly expensive and at times viewed as a disruptor of the path toward completion. The State University of New York (SUNY) COIL provided the EOP an opportunity to engage students in intercultural and meaningful online engagement. EOP works toward ensuring that students who already lack the resources necessary to navigate higher education are provided the opportunity to elevate their college experience.

Much like their American EOP peers, Brazilian students lack opportunities to engage in international learning due to geographical and financial issues, which were exacerbated during the pandemic. Implemented at Unesp, since 2018, as a way to foster internationalization at home, the BRaVE Program aims to promote the resignification and reconceptualization of teaching-learning spaces, including virtual interactions that can enrich student training in soft skills, such as empathy, collaboration, flexibility, and ability to communicate interculturally (Salomão & Freire Junior, 2020). According to Salomão (2020), the class-to-class format of collaboration in the BRaVE Program encourages professors and their university partners abroad to work collaboratively to plan tasks that engage students in learning together through digital technologies, using active methodologies and preferably connected to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The contact established between classes can be entirely online, with synchronous or asynchronous interactions, or in hybrid formats, seeking to create a context that emphasizes learning through experience and joint knowledge construction.

BRaVE/SUNY COIL was the best opportunity to expose students to international learning through authentic scenarios for teaching/learning. This collaboration provided EOP pre-freshman and second-year UNESP students the opportunity to engage in virtual exchange. Students engaged in soft skill development, enhanced their viewpoint of the world, clarified their place in the world, encouraged active listening, linguistic development, boost in self-confidence, and directly impacted their self-motivation and interest in higher education. Immediately, students in this collaboration discovered overlap in their experiences and cultures, discussed their concerns about college education, and explored the various ways they were searching for themselves and who they will be in the future through education.

In this chapter, we will share the outcomes of this pilot collaboration between Brazil and the United States. We will present the theoretical frameworks that guided our pedagogy, discuss virtual exchange, telecollaboration, teacher education in Brazil, and also the importance of global learning as a High Impact Practice for student success. Additionally, we will expand on the collaboration design utilized throughout the collaboration. Then, we will share material/activity that was produced during the experience as well as the students’ reports in order to highlight their perspective. Readers will see the impact that this short collaboration had on students and the importance of global learning in the teaching/learning process.

2.2 Global Learning

Global learning is not an opportunity afforded to every student in higher education. Students are encouraged to engage in international experiences, but as of recently, opportunities afforded to students to do so generally require social and economic capital. For many students, global learning has been limited to studying abroad, which has yet to be an equitable experience in which all students can partake. However, the skills gained by participating in global learning are what employers are searching for in new graduates.

The National Association of Colleges and Employers outlined eight career competencies of which a career-ready student should exhibit post-graduation: career and self-development, communication, critical thinking, equity and inclusion, leadership, professionalism, teamwork, and technology (National Association of Colleges and Employers, 2021). This collaboration provided students the opportunity to begin to develop four of the eight competencies over the course of 5 weeks. In addition to this, our institutions were given the opportunity to make global learning equitable, inclusive, and accessible for students.

The pandemic has exposed the fragilities and needs of today’s learners and changed the way digital and technological advances, along with the internet, can be utilized to ensure learning. The use of computers and mobile devices has greatly increased in the teaching and learning process worldwide. We cannot deny that globalization and opportunities for transcultural access, education, and communication have broadened perspectives.

According to Vassallo and Telles (2009), broader perspectives are offered to professors of foreign language students through the new learning environments that are mediated by the computer. As Ware and Kramsch (2005) state, web-based technologies have become promising examples of computer-based learning, providing language students with interactions across geographic, linguistic, and cultural lines. The authors have argued that the increasingly complex technological landscape fosters cross-cultural communication and creates scenarios that extend language teacher roles.

Belz states that “telecollaboration is characterized by institutionalized, electronically mediated intercultural communication under the guidance of a language cultural expert (i.e., teacher) for the purposes of foreign language learning and the development of intercultural competence” (2003, p.2). According to her:

Telecollaboration involves the application of global computer networks to foreign (and second) language learning and teaching in institutionalized settings. In telecollaborative partnerships, internationally dispersed learners in parallel language classes use Internet communication tools such as e-mail, synchronous chat, threaded discussion, and MOOs (as well as other forms of electronically mediated communication), in order to support social interaction, dialogue, debate, and intercultural exchange. (Belz, 2003, p.2).

It is clear that telecollaboration can optimize practices performed in classrooms in linguistic, cultural exchange and also allow students to dive into a hands-on experience while learning a language or sharing knowledge. The process of teaching and learning foreign languages can go beyond classes as the students take part in the structuring and constructing of knowledge.

Ware and O’Dowd (2008) note that online communication tools have been taken up eagerly by the foreign language teaching community and that studies have explored the ways different configurations of telecollaboration have impacted students’ language development through online interactions in the target language.

Telecollaboration/collaboration online/virtual exchange can also help students to become responsible for his/her learning goals, to develop reflexivity and intercultural competence when paired with foreigners, and to be aware of issues concerning identity, language, and culture, we agree with the authors when they affirm:

[...] VE has great potential to foster a range of twenty-first-century employability skills including media and digital literacy, communication skills, global awareness, empathy, critical and analytical thinking, foreign language skills and intercultural competences, and it can also be used to supplement and enhance universities’ physical exchange programmes. (Beaven, & O’Dowd, R., 2019, p.15).

The sociological theory of cultural capital introduced by Bourdieu (1986) also informed the reasoning to engage Brazilian and American students in this project. Capital is not only economic but also social and cultural.

Capital can present itself in three fundamental guises: as economic capital, which is immediate and directly convertible into money and may be institutionalized in the form of property rights; as cultural capital, which is convertible, on certain conditions into economic capital and may be institutionalized in the form of educational qualifications; and as social capital, made up of social obligations (“connections”), which is convertible, in certain conditions, into economic capital and may be institutionalized in the form of a title of nobility. (Bourdieu, 1986, p. 242).

The cultural and social capital gained by the practice of global learning provides students with an undeniable opportunity of meaningful intercultural interactions, which is necessary for advancement. There is an urgent need to provide students with the tools necessary to compete in the job market. By introducing global learning, students gain a valuable education that will elevate their student success and begin to create equitable outcomes for low-income students.

The students who participated in this collaboration entered higher education at a disadvantage. Mantsios (2007) expands on how these disadvantages occur when he says, “People do not choose to be poor or working class; instead, they are limited and confined by the opportunities afforded or denied them by a social and economic system.” Higher education is expected to provide those from low-income households upward mobility, but the doors are barely cracked open.

In this collaboration and many others, our EOPs seek to create limitless opportunities that would otherwise not be afforded to our students. Global learning in a virtual space opens up the door to collaboration and engagement on a global scale. Class status is a clear indicator on whether students attend college and graduate from college. This collaboration was intended to reduce the gaps of educational attainment for students from low-income households and to increase success both in college and beyond.

This collaboration helped students gain an understanding of self, society, and history. C. Wright Mills stated that:

The individual can understand her own experience and gauge her own fate only by locating herself within her period, that she can know her own chances in life only by becoming aware of those of all individuals in her circumstances… By the fact of this living, he contributes, however minutely, to the shaping of this society and to the course of its history, even as he is made by society and by its historical push and shove. (MILLS, 1959, p. 5).

Throughout the summer, students were encouraged to share parts of themselves and to learn about each other’s cultures. Additionally, students were transported past their borders and into the lives of their peers. Students engaged in meaningful conversations that encouraged them to learn about themselves and the global world. Furthermore, global learning is fundamentally necessary for all students. The National Association of College and Employers stated that student graduates should “seek global cross-cultural interactions and experiences that enhance one’s understanding of people from different demographic groups and that leads to personal growth” (NACE, 2021, p.5).

2.3 Critical Thinking Skills and Storytelling

At the core of this collaboration was the opportunity for students to engage in two key elements necessary to encourage learning: critical thinking and storytelling. Critical thinking is essential to ensuring students are actively engaged in learning and engagement. “Critical thinking requires us to use our imagination, seeing things from perspectives other than our own and envisioning the likely consequences of our position” (Hooks, 2010, p. 10).

Brazilian and US American students were pushed to use their sociological imagination and to see the world through a brand new perspective. Most importantly, students were encouraged to engage in storytelling throughout the collaboration. Most importantly students were encouraged to engage in storytelling throughout the collaboration. Storytelling is a technique that sparks and ignites students to connect and engage in critical thinking. Stories help us connect to a world beyond ourselves (Hooks, 1994).

Global learning is inherently focused on engaging students with the world beyond themselves and their community. In this collaboration, instructors and students alike shared their unique stories. Storytelling and critical thinking are necessary, as we develop our students into critically conscious adults who are dedicated to deep learning. Each of these theories and theorists provided the foundation for the development of our collaboration. The intricate ways all of these theories intersect throughout the collaboration allows us to develop the young adults over the course of five weeks.

2.4 Methodology

The collaboration started with the introduction of the main professors for the courses from Brazil and America. The professors utilized the COIL methodology to design the course, that is, two classes in different higher-education institutions collaborate during a period of time, as shown in Fig. 2.1.

Fig. 2.1

SUNY COIL image on how a COIL Collaboration gets started, retrieved from https://online.suny.edu/introtocoil/suny-coil-what-is/ 2022

The SUNY COIL office provided guidance for the ways in which institutions can engage in collaboration online. Figure 2.1 is an example of how COIL collaborations take place across the system.

Figure 2.2 shows the progression of a virtual exchange collaboration. Planning usually includes a sequence of activities to be carried out by mixed teams addressing real-world issues. It usually begins with an “icebreaker” so that students introduce themselves and get to know each other and explore intercultural elements. Then the next tasks proposed should be linked to the common content that teachers intend to explore, usually developed from a problem-solving perspective. The final outputs can take the form of a report, slide show, video production, or creation of a product or campaign.

Fig. 2.2

The SUNY COIL model, retrieved from https://online.suny.edu/introtocoil/suny-coil-what-is/ (SUNY COIL, 2022)

The instructors set out to address the following learning outcomes: Linguistic and Cultural Development, Exploration, Experience, Learn Yourself, Navigate JCC, Get Connected & Stay Connected, Problem Solving, and Global Awareness. The COIL methodology helped the professors design the course in four stages: team building, discussion, project, and conclusion. Outlined below are the methods utilized in each stage and how we were able to accomplish it throughout the course. The collaborative online international learning interactions were conducted for 5 weeks for an hour and a half every Friday. The purpose of the classes was to allow students the opportunity to participate in cultural exchange. In this stage, students were encouraged to spend the class time analyzing and discussing images from both cultures.

Class time was dominated primarily through discussion. The course utilized a seminar style, giving students control of the conversation while allowing instructors to interject when necessary such as to avoid misunderstandings on specific cultural issues for students at both institutions or to redirect students to the main discussion points and questions. Zoom technology was used to create small groups, which encouraged conversation. Discussions were facilitated by the instructors who took turns going to each small group and giving feedback on their work and discussion. This methodology allowed BR and US students to go beyond the English language and engage in conversations surrounding cultural differences and similarities.

Afterward, students were given prompts for additional discussion about higher education. Finally, students were provided the opportunity to create a project collaboratively, which was presented at the last meeting. Based on these stages, the virtual exchange experience we share in this chapter will be reported utilizing a qualitative methodology (André, 2013; Burns, 1999). Data collection instruments involved field notes and students’ weekly written reports.

Collaborative Journey

After several meetings between the professors, assistance from BRaVE, and SUNY COIL trainings, our collaboration began on July 8, 2021. Prior to the Brazilian and American peers meeting the professors set up a time to meet with their new students. EOP Students met their Brazilian instructor and the Brazilian students met with the EOP instructor. At this meeting, the professors introduced themselves to their new students and shared the goals and expectations of the collaboration. Students were reminded that their excitement was welcome and encouraged them to completely immerse themselves in this experience. Professors utilized growth mindset language by encouraging students to hold on to the joy of the project and release the fear and anxiety that comes with meeting someone new. Students were motivated to dive headfirst into this collaboration and to be open-minded.

By the first collaborative class, the students were familiar with the foreign professor, which helped them bond and feel more comfortable to get started. The professors restated the purpose of the collaboration and also some ground rules such as the “one mic rule” (reminding students to leave space for the person holding the mic to speak without interruption), respectfulness, and the confidence to make mistakes and be corrected. Students were presented with maps of each country and locality in order to help students visualize where in their respective countries they were from.

The first meeting focused on breaking the ice between the student groups. The icebreaker activity was intended to foster the first of many conversations that they would have with each other while simultaneously imparting knowledge from their culture.

Students were asked to share their names and career goals, then prompted to go through a slideshow of pictures that represented something from each respective country. Students were divided into small groups to ensure every student was given a chance to speak and interact with each other. In the small breakout rooms, students were provided popular images from their respective nation that could be easily described, providing a space for students to exchange cultural knowledge. Additionally, the professors were hopeful that the images would spark additional conversations around values and cultural significance.

While the photos were intended to allow for students to see the similarities and differences in daily life in Brazil in comparison to the United States, students from Northern New York, Central New York, and New York City found that even within hours of each other, there were fundamental differences in the way they experienced the images on the screen. Some students highlighted the differences in climate, class, buildings, farming, and even the ice cream truck and music associated with it.

After interacting with the pictures, students were asked to select a speaker in the group to share and report out with the larger class. They were given prompts to have further discussion about their school and other questions such as: How do you make friends in the virtual world? What are your favorite phone apps? What do you do just for fun? Do you have a job? What do you do? The prompts were utilized to encourage a speedy connection between students in their first meeting as we didn’t have many more meetings before the next stage. At the conclusion of the session email addresses were exchanged before leaving the virtual classroom.

After every session students were expected to share their thoughts on the experience. Throughout this analysis, we will be sharing student feedback. Charts 2.1, 2.2, and 2.3 below show Brazilian and American students’ feedback after the first meeting.

Chart 2.1 Brazilian feedback on the first session

Chart 2.2 American feedback on the first session

Chart 2.3 Brazilian feedback during second session

It is important to note that Brazilian students were in English II classes, so their proficiency was not very high as they are learners of the English language. Besides their fear of not being able to communicate with native speakers, they overcame difficulties in order to take part in the virtual exchange. The comments on Chart 2.1 express their motivation towards the experience as well as expectations to learn. Their first contact was very positive as they mention “sweet people” and “very patient” to describe their international peers. They felt included and a sense of belonging, and this feeling fostered the success of international learning.

American students also provided their feedback after the session by answering a variety of questions as stated below.

Overwhelmingly, each American student shared that the things they were most concerned about did not come true. They were provided the opportunity to be fearless in this collaboration of which many didn’t believe they would be able to handle. However, the first meeting was extremely successful, giving students a confidence boost to do it again. Students from both Brazil and America were energized by this first meeting. Their vigor and excitement to continue this experience permeated our regular class hours respectively. Students asked for more meetings and sessions with their new peers.

At the second meeting with the Brazilian and American students, the professors shared their experience using storytelling. Each professor shared their personal journey through higher education, what they expected it to be like, and the realities that they encountered. After modeling the conversation, professors created small groups for students to share their own journey through education, their expectations, and the realities they have encountered thus far. Student responses to the questions What do your friends and family say about education/college? Do they encourage you to go? Do they discourage you? Why or why not? What are the similarities of education in both countries? and Why did you choose to go to college? represent their summary of the experience during our second meeting (Chart 2.3).

Both groups have realized similarities and differences in the educational system between countries. This helped raise cultural awareness and develop intercultural competence. As for Brazilian students, they shared facts that called their attention such as the concept of private and public schools, extracurricular activities, entrance exam tests, and courses length.

Chart 2.4 presents the AM comments, as follows.

Chart 2.4 American feedback during second session

By the second meeting with each other, students were more comfortable discussing their ambition and desire to attend higher education. They expressed many similarities in their motivations from familial pressure to the need to be successful as an adult. Students throughout this session were more vulnerable as they shared their fears of letting their families down. They talked about the joy that their families had when they were admitted to college and how they hope to hold on to those happy moments when they begin to struggle in college.

Brazilian students who were well into their second year of college also provided words of wisdom to their American peers who were only in the early stages of their higher-education journey. Students were warned to avoid procrastination and to pick the right friends. Brazilian and American students also discussed holding on to their dreams and to not allow difficulty to get in the way of their goals.

At this point of the collaboration, the professors were well into weeks of collaboration and meetings. Our role as instructors shifted to more listening and less facilitating becasue they students were taking the reigns. Students were engaging in deep conversation touching on some issues that affect them and the impact they hope to have on the world.

For the third session, students were asked to choose a social problem and engage in discussion to how they, their peers, and people around them were affected by it. Chart 2.5 shares Brazilian students’ reports.

Chart 2.5 Brazilian feedback during third session

The comments here, even shy, show unemployment and climate change as their chosen social problems in the collaborative discussion. It is important to highlight that critical thinking skills were expected in this activity, but as mentioned before, Brazilian students did not have a high level of English proficiency as it can also be seen in their writing. Even if the instruction was to write in either Portuguese or English, many chose to do it in the foreign language, and those are the comments brought to this study. Overall, their bravery to do so is already a huge achievement as expressing in the written modality of language is a great step for English learners. The collaboration opened up the opportunity for us to boost the self-esteem of our learners, which is crucial for their well-being and future endeavors.

By the end of this session, students were engaging in deep conversation while drawing from their previous educational training on topics. While they were learning from one another, we found that some students were also teaching each other. Often students would share articles, their own completed projects and other items in the chat for other students to review.

Chart 2.6 shows AM students’ comments on the social problem they chose in their group work.

Chart 2.6 American feedback during third session

Embarking on the second to last in person class meeting, we found that students were attending both the morning and evening sessions, though students were only expected to attend one session a day, so that they may have more time talking with their peers. Students also began to turn their cameras on and show their pet dogs and cats.

It became tradition for a Brazilian student to turn their mic on so that the class could hear the church bells signaling the start of the group discussion. The chat box became full of curious questions and comments about Zoom profile pictures and best movies to watch. By this class session, students did not want it to end. Each class began to run over five, ten, and sometimes fifteen minutes past our usual meeting time. Students shared their thoughts about the experience after that class below (Chart 2.7).

Chart 2.7 Brazilian feedback during fourth session

The positive experience is registered in the Brazilian students’ sharing both in our synchronous sessions and in writing. The international experience provided them with some self-evaluation perspectives as well when they pointed out what they could have done differently or what they aim to do.

Having some real conversations with their partners and working collaboratively made them feel a part of a significant learning process in English. Brazilian student G also said that the experience brought her joy. This fact also brought joy to educators as they realized that all the time invested in planning the COIL was really worth it and highly impacted the students.

Chart 2.8 presents the American students’ comments.

Chart 2.8 American feedback during fourth session

The group project showed us as instructors that our students already understood the value in collaboration. Students were providing solutions to social issues that were timely and showed that students began to develop critical thinking skills and team building skills throughout the summer collaboration. Some students also showed a high degree in applying previous knowledge to the contemporary global context by mentioning projects they completed in high school and assignments they were working on in their summer class with EOP. What was more remarkable and important as an instructor was the ways in which our young, college aged adults recognized the faults in our society and had creative, forward-thinking plans to ensure an equitable future.

2.5 Conclusion

This collaboration between Jefferson Community College (SUNY COIL) and UNESP (BRaVE) is necessary for all students because we want our students to thrive. We want them to experience all that there is in higher education, and that includes global learning. Our students, despite coming from extremely diverse backgrounds, benefit from global learning in many different ways: from engaging in soft skill development, enhancing their viewpoint on the world and their place in it, to directly impacting their self-motivation and interest in higher education. Higher education is fundamentally interested in educating global citizens who can and will make a positive impact on the world.

This collaboration started with a small idea. Opportunities to provide students with global learning by utilizing technology instead of traveling seemed far-fetched. After finding a community of people who understood the vision and the urgency to provide students with this opportunity, we found that what seemed to be a small idea has grown into a collaboration of creative minds invested in making a large impact on the student experience, learning, and programs.

The collaboration was not easy. Merging teaching styles, adjusting to student needs, and concerns throughout the weeks was challenging. The true planning began when we were paired. We had to quickly set the foundation of getting to know each other just as our students had to adjust during their classes. We spent multiple meetings getting to know each other, exchanging cultural experiences and discussing the similarities. After hours of sharing details about our personal lives and academic journey, we dived into developing a course that flowed nicely with our already designed course to synchronous Fridays. We needed to engage our students during regular class sessions and weaving the global learning component throughout the course. This prepared students for the live meeting every week.

This collaboration was an immense success that cannot be quantified. Our students, despite proficiency level, engaged in meaningful dialogue about their education and what drives them to their degree programs and to college overall. Remarkably, our students found themselves with similar familial motivations and economic motivations. Many of our Brazilian and American students saw higher education as the vehicle to freedom from the cycle of poverty. Very quickly, around week 2, they found that they were more similarities than differences and that revelation is what made this collaboration extremely successful. Students found through global learning and conversation that despite being many miles away, they can find commonality and exchange in meaningful discord with people across the globe. This is the start of global citizenship and community.

One of the concerns that was overwhelming during this collaboration was that students would not enjoy the experience because it was virtual. In the midst of the pandemic, many educators were dreading the challenge of keeping students engaged through a camera. The professors put that fear completely to the side and jumped headfirst into this experience. What we found is that while some students took more from the experience than others did, not one of the students regretted it. Just as no one would ever say, studying abroad was a big mistake of their academic career. COIL can be something that sticks with students forever or be an anchor that reminds them of their wonderful college experience. Students who participated in this collaboration today feel limitless. They are seeing that despite their background, nothing is out of reach including one day studying or traveling abroad. Greetings from São Paulo, Brazil, and New York, United States.