COIL Activities

May 25th, 2010

COIL Faculty member, Prof. Anthony Lemieux (in picture), Keith Landa, Director of Instructional Technology and COIL director, Prof. Jon Rubin, all from Purchase College, gave a workshop at theSUNY Conference on Instructional Technologies (CIT) 2010 in Plattsburgh, NY titled Developing Collaborative Online International Courses. In this workshop, the history of COIL courses at SUNY was provided, and the dynamics of establishing and running globally networked courses was explored. Both Prof. Lemieux and Prof. Rubin provided an overview of their experience developing collaborative online international courses, with Dr. Landa providing an IT perspective to their projects.  The workshop concluded with participants pairing up to engage the Faculty Guide to COIL course development as they collaboratively explored hypothetical and potential courses they might develop internationally.

Click here for a description of the workshop.

March 24th, 2010

{mosimage}Prof. Jon Rubin was joined by fellow COIL faculty, Prof. Craig Little from SUNY Cortland, Prof. Wayne te Brake from SUNY, and remotely by Prof. Sarah Guth from University of Padua, Italy, to deliver a pre-conference workshop at the Forum for Education Abroad Conference in Charlotte, North Carolina titled:  Developing International Online Course Collaborations that build Bridges to Study Abroad. 

In this workshop, COIL faculty shared how their students have been working online with peers in other countries through shared syllabi in an experiential learning environment and how this engagement has internationalized their classes and has led to an increased interest in studying abroad on the part of the participating students. During the first hour of the workshop each presenter offered a case study of the course which they developed and taught. These included courses in history (Religion and Politics in Europe - TeBrake), sociology (Social Control - Little), the arts (Cross Cultural Video Production - Rubin), and language (Italian and English - Guth). Those participating in the workshop were primarily Study Abroad staff looking for ways to expand their programs with an online component. 

The image shows Craig Little, in front of an easel with large orange Post-Its that participants used to individually identify what they felt to be the benefits and limitations of Study Abroad and of Collaborative Online International courses. This provided a template through which the workshop participants could consider ways that these two modalities could enhance and benefit each other.

For more information about the Forum on Education Abroad, click here.

November 13, 2009

The Open Society Institute's Higher Education Support Program has funded a two-year extension of a joint grant with SUNY, originally begun in March, 2008, to enhance the distance learning programs at European Humanities University - International, located in Vilnius, Lithuania. A team of six SUNY experts under the leadership of COIL Director Jon Rubin will work with peers at EHU to create a more dynamic and sustainable educational infrastructure.

Two members of the COIL team, Jon Rubin and Eric Feinblatt, visited EHU on November 10-13 to hold a collaborative meeting with EHU administrators, staff and faculty, including EHU Rector, Anatolij Mikhailov. Project activities for the coming two years were discussed, and a number were highlighted. These included: professional development; quality assurance; collaborative international course development; the structure and sustainability of eLearning at EHU; implementation of administrative software and student information systems; the development of an online MA Program and the organization of an eLearning Conference, tentatively to be held in Vilnius in June, 2010.