Special issue on Online Global citizenship, Open Education and Civic Collaboration
My colleague Prof. Katherine Wimpenny, from the Centre for Global Learning: Education and Attainment (GLEA), at Coventry University, United Kingdom, and I are editing a special issue focused on Online Global citizenship, Open Education and Civic Collaboration, at Sustainabilty Journal. We strongly believe that the concept of citizenship must evolve to an international scope, where open, free and universal resources can be produced and shared. And not just for the sake of knowledge but because of civic duty (individual) and social responsibility (corporate, institutional). Following, we paste the call-for-papers, open until December, 2020.
«Whilst contested and multifaceted terms, the notion of being ‘global ready’ and a global citizen are often viewed as key graduate attributes, featured in international education strategies as part of higher education service missions (Gaudelli, 2016; Yemini et al., 2018; de Hei et al, 2019). Some of these attributes relate to the world of work and are deemed as necessary to compete in the job market in an increasingly globalised workplace (Higher Education Academy, 2014; Jones & Killick, 2013; Killick 2015; Bourn et al., 2016; Scheunpflug et al., 2016; Algood & Green, 2018). Arguably more eminant attributes relate to encountering multiple ways of knowing, including ways to socially negotiate the unique and common qualities amongst diverse perspectives and ideas, linking notions of the local and global, the individual and collective, what is known and not known, what separates us and what binds us together (Green & Whitsed, 2015). These attibutes are vital to the sustainability of our specis and planet given the mutiple and complex (wicked) global challenges we are facing and will have to face in the 22nd Century. Indeed, a necessary connection between education, global citizenship and the critical action and reflection necessary for intercultural and transformative sense-making for addressing global challenges is required. And not least, in reclaiming focus of education towards interconnection and sustainability, rather than towards competition and economic imperatives.
«These attibutes are vital to the sustainability of our specis and planet given the mutiple and complex (wicked) global challenges we are facing and will have to face in the 22nd Century»
As universities across the world mobilise their teaching operations online, in the midst of the global pandemic Covid-19, renewed emphasis is focused on the benefits of interconnected communicative (Third Space) learning environments. Along with the benefits and opportunities for the sharing of knowledge using Open Education practices, important discussions are required to examine and understand how sustainable collaborative online models of education delivery offer new scenarios to advance the mind-set and dispositions required for global citizenship as part of cross education-industry-community initiatives focused on common educational goals (Tam & El-Azar, 2020). In this special issue we invite papers that analyse how curriculum infrastructure is responding to online collaborations in ways that propose new pedagogies that can respond to achieve sustainability goals, and in inclusive ways, which engender wellbeing. Further, as (Third) online spaces can also be experienced as destabilising, disquieting spaces, we ask what facilitation and follow-up is required when considering online exchanges, including ways in which knowledge traditions and assumptions can be safely challenged (du Preez, 2018). Moreover, how might action-orientated change through collaboration in the online space translate back into the learners’ locale for civic learning? We welcome international and comparative case studies as well as conceptual papers proposing innovative ways to bring cross and trans-disciplinary perspectives together including public collaboration.»
April, the 17th, 2020
References:
Algood, C., & Green, M. (2018). Creating a sustainable global learning model for minority-serving. Global education & minority serving institutions in us higher education, 35.
Blackmore, C. (2016). Towards a Pedagogical Framework for Global Citizenship Education. International Journal of Development Education and Global Learning, 8(1), 39-56.
Boni, A., & Calabuig, C. (2017). Education for global citizenship at universities: Potentialities of formal and informal learning spaces to foster cosmopolitanism. Journal of Studies in International Education, 21(1), 22-38.
Bourn, D., Hunt, F., Blum, N., & Lawson, H. (2016). Primary education for global learning and sustainability. UCL. Retrieved March 21st, 2020 from https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1475170/
de Hei, M., Tabacaru, C., Sjoer, E., Rippe, R., & Walenkamp, J. (2019). Developing intercultural competence through collaborative learning in international higher education. Journal of Studies in International Education. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/1028315319826226
du Preez, P. (2018). On decolonization and internationalization of university curricula: what can we learn from Rosi Braidotti? Journal of Education, 74, 19 – 31.
Gaudelli, W. (2016). Global citizenship education. In Global Citizenship Education (pp. 41-72). Routledge.
Green, W., & Whitsed, C. (2015). Critical perspectives on internationalising the curriculum in disciplines: reflective narrative accounts from business, education and health. Rotterdam, Netherlands. Higher Education Academy. (2014). Internationalising the curriculum. Retrieved from https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/system/files/resources/internationalising_the_curriculum.pdf [30.08.2018]