Students from North Island College are connecting with counterparts in the U.S. and Mexico to explore what it means to have a more inclusive, prosperous and climate-resilient hemisphere through regional education co-operation and exchanges.
This work is happening, in part, because of a grant from the 100,000 Strong in the Americas Innovation Fund, which supports institutional partnerships in the Western Hemisphere. Also taking part are the Universidad de Colima in Mexico and Kapi olani Community College in Hawai i.
"This is the first time when they actually have three countries participating at one time in an online collaboration," said Romana Pasca, the Manager of International Projects, Partnerships and Global Education for NIC's Office of Global Engagement (OGE).
Global Studies students Harmanpreet Singh and Rohan Adhikari work on a sustainability scavenger hunt assignment as part of the discussion around the local environmental in the global context.
This fall, the NIC students in instructor Margaret Hearnden's Global Studies-Culture, Communication and Global Citizenship class have been discussing a local environmental issue in the global context.
This means working online with classes in the two other countries through participating in what is called a Collaborative Online Indigenous Intercultural Learning (CO[I]IL) pathway a set of interactive resources to support faculty in reflecting on how to create Indigenous-focused online projects. The CO[I]IL pathway was developed to encourage co-teaching between Indigenous and non-Indigenous instructors to ensure respectful and appropriate Indigenization of courses.
"The theme is around sustainability and climate action," Hearnden said. "The two other instructors and I have been working closely together to co-create this project."
In the Comox Valley, the NIC class has been learning about the Kus-kus-sum water restoration project a suggestion of NIC Elder-in-Residence Fernanda Paré. For Hearnden's class, the work offers an opportunity to think about the term "global citizen," and what it might mean to them or to others in a local context.
As part of this process, three Indigenous Leadership students are supporting both the students in Hearnden's class and Hearnden herself as she strives to be more Indigenous-focused in her teaching.
"I'm a student in that respect as well," she said. "I think it's good for students to see that as instructors we don't stop learning either."
Pasca said the groups in each institution will work independently at their local project before bringing what they have learned forward to share with the partner classes in early 2025.
"It's not a typical online collaboration," she said.
In February, the plan is for the three Indigenous Leadership students from NIC to go to Hawaii to meet with their Hawaiian and Mexican counterparts to share what they have learned on each project. The trip is being made possible because of the grant from the 100,000 Strong in the Americas Innovation Fund.
Hearnden would like to see this model continue, at least in an online setting.
"I'm hopeful that this will be something that maybe we can do in future classes," she said.
The 100,000 Strong in the Americas Innovation Fund is a public-private sector collaboration between the U.S. Department of State, U.S. embassies, partners in the Americas, corporations and foundations that promote higher education partnerships between the U.S. and the rest of the Western Hemisphere.
