Alejandro Fernández Benavides (COIL Professor – Supervisor of the COIL TA Experience)
The Impact of a COIL Teaching Assistantship Team, Nine Years After COIL in Colombia: A Multifaceted Approach to Language Education and Intercultural Development: Intercultural and online mediated communication are some of the major features that characterize interactions in the postmodern era. Language teaching cannot escape this reality; therefore, it needs to be equipped with tools and procedures to integrate the multitude of cultures and technologies that define sociocultural learners’ identities. One of the alternatives to address the nuanced and complex nature of global interactions is COIL (Collaborative Online International Learning). As a teaching methodology, COIL enables learners and teachers to navigate across multilingual, intercultural, and multimodal communicative contexts which provides students spaces to negotiate, mediate and construct agentive practices.
This presentation aims to discuss the experiences of four Teaching Assistants (TAs) who have supported some COIL projects at Universidad del Valle, a public university in Colombia. These TAs report the partial findings of four qualitative case studies based on the experiences of learners who were engaged in the development of different COIL modules within their English lessons at Universidad del Valle. Each COIL experience had a different topic (the American dream, migration, manifestations of racism, problematizing the use of renewable energies) and all of them were informed by the principles of intercultural language teaching and multimodal pedagogies. Results show the impact of these COIL modules in the development of learners’ intercultural skills, the presence of critical positions towards social issues and the acknowledgment of culture as a major actor in language learning.
Professor Alejandro Fernández Benavides holds a B.A. in foreign languages and M. A. in interlinguistic and intercultural studies from Universidad del Valle, where he is currently an assistant professor. With more than ten years of professional experience at schools and universities, his focus on research has been in the areas of interculturality, multimodality and critical pedagogy. Recently, professor Fernández has focused on the fields of multimodal pedagogies and nonverbal communication.
Paula Covans (Universidad de Cartagena Graduate 2017)
Driven by curiosity and the desire to learn English, Paula enrolled in the elective course “Introduction to American Studies,” which led her to join COIL in 2015. This experience not only boosted her English skills, but also broadened my worldview. Paula and her New York partner (somehow) managed to communicate, sharing glimpses of their lives as students in Colombia and the United States. The cultural exchange was so enriching that, by the end of the semester, she wanted to stay involved. During 2016 and 2017, Paula participated in conferences and helped promote COIL in her hometown, Cartagena. The highlight was welcoming students and professors from SUNY-Oneonta to Cartagena, and later visiting New York, where she experienced American culture firsthand—including her first authentic barbecue and apple pie! COIL was her first encounter with another culture, language, cuisine, and country. It helped her recognize similarities as human beings and laid the foundation for her language learning, which, without knowing it at the time, would give her the confidence to learn Dutch two years later. With this presentation, she demonstrates how COIL can be a life-changing opportunity that motivates students to keep learning and exploring while connecting with people who share the same curiosity for meaningful interactions.
Paula Covans is originally from Colombia and has been living in Belgium for the past seven years. After graduating with a law degree from the University of Cartagena in 2017, Paula ventured to continue her studies in Europe. She now lives with her husband in Willebroek, a small town in the Dutch-speaking region of Belgium. Since 2020, Paula has been working in the legal field and currently serves as a contract specialist at the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC). This non-profit organization is dedicated to advancing clinical trials to enhance both the life expectancy and quality of life for cancer patients. Her role involves formalizing collaborations with hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, and other research institutions. Paula truly loves what she does — even though she doesn’t interact directly with patients, her legal expertise plays a part in a much larger mission that inspires her to keep learning and working hard. Paula is driven by the hope that one day, the word ‘cancer’ will no longer evoke the fear it does today.
Haley Fallon (SUNY-Oneonta Graduate 2017)
The Impact of a COIL Student Partnership, Nine Years Ago: In 2015, Haley enrolled in a Spanish course that had a COIL component and was paired up with a student from Colombia. Over the course of the semester, they chatted via WhatsApp and began to learn how different, yet the same, life was across the globe. She became passionate about the work, so the following year, 2016, Haley served as a TA for another COIL course and worked to facilitate cross cultural, meaningful, and informative relationships between her students and their partners. That same year, she traveled to Colombia to explore the home of her new friends and even meet some of them! The following years were filled with attending and presenting at COIL conferences, hosting friends from COIL at her house and, through COIL, discovering her love for deep connections with people who were different than herself. At the foundation of this, a love for teaching and learning grew, which guided her career after graduating in 2017 and moving forward. During this session, Haley highlights the long-lasting impact of COIL and how it develops a web of long lasting, culturally competent, and authentic relationships.
Originally from upstate New York, Haley now resides in Queens with her husband and daughter. After graduating from SUNY Oneonta in 2017, she began working at Classical Charter Schools which serves the South Bronx community, and she has worked there ever since. Haley taught Kindergarten and Second Grade and has worked for several years in school leadership as an Instructional Coach, helping her school to run efficiently and teachers to grow in their practice. After the birth of her daughter, Haley moved to talent acquisition to help balance her new life as a mom with her fast-paced and busy work life. Haley hopes to continue serving communities through culturally competent and informed educational practices.
Michelle Angulo
Michele Angulo is in her fourth year of college towards a completion of a bachelor’s degree in Foreign Languages at the “Universidad del Valle”. Michelle has been working as a teaching assistant for telecollaboration projects at her institution for one year.
Lina Nieva
Lina Marcela Nieva lives in Palmira, Valle del Cauca with her husband. After graduating from Universidad Nacional with a degree in business administration, she decided to study a Bachelor’s Degree in Foreign Languages at the Universidad del Valle. Currently, she is in her eighth semester. She has worked as a tutor since 2022, her involvement has been in two academic groups of the University, GRACA (Grupo de Apoyo a la Cultura Académica), and COIL (Collaborative Online International Learning). These experiences have increased her interest in interculturality, intercultural communication, and social identity.
Valentina Ruíz
Valentina is a foreign language student in her last semester of studies, and she is currently in a concentration to learn how to teach Spanish as a foreign language at the “Universidad del Valle”. She works at a language institute teaching intermediate and advanced levels of English. She also teaches Spanish to foreigners in her spare time. For Valentina teaching Spanish as a second language online does not feel like a real job, but more as a fun activity where she learns along with her students. The job is very flexible and allows her to share a bit about her culture and learn about other cultures. She has recently started a specialization to improve her skills in teaching her mother tongue. Her goal is to be able to teach Spanish around the world. Valentina recognizes the value of the COIL pedagogy and although she has never been a COIL student, she is learning about it from the perspective of a teaching assistant.
Andrea Tarapues
Andrea Tarapues Altamirano, is currently in her fourth year towards completion of her teaching degree in foreign languages with a dual concentration in English and French, at “Universidad del Valle”. Andrea has been a teaching assistant and a researcher of COIL practices. Under her advisor supervision, she has been involved in the field of linguistics, and aims to continue studying a masters in “interlinguistic and intercultural studies” at UniValle. Her goal is to be able to implement telecollaboration in her own classroom after graduation.