If you couldn’t attend the December installment of the Gateway Learning Webinar Series titled: Not A Bandaid For COVID: Virtual, Online, And Hybrid Programs, you can still learn about innovative new ways to engage students in global learning by exploring Study Abroad Association’s (SAA’s) 360 GLE™ (Global Learning Experiences).
SAA’s 360 GLE Florence
Christian Alyea, Founder & Head of Innovation at Study Abroad Association spoke on the webinar panel about how SAA created its 360 GLE™ platform, which helps institutions build globally competent and competitive students by providing interactive and immersive asynchronous international education learning materials. SAA created the 360 GLE™ based on feedback from institutional partners looking to find a solution and foundation to campus internationalization, capable of reaching every corner of campus. While there has been a rise in virtual, online, and hybrid offerings, many because of the pandemic and the disruptions to in-person programs, these offerings can fill a greater need in the field to expand global education to the other 98% of students who will never study abroad. Additionally, access to virtual, online, and hybrid global experiences can greatly help encourage students to study abroad later.
For example, Bryan Shuler, Humanities Instructor, at Hillsborough Community College in Florida shared his experience with webinar attendees about incorporating SAA’s 360 GLE™ into his Honor’s Program and courses and the impact it had on his students now wanting to study abroad. One of his students said “I just finished my Honors Humanities class using this amazing software in the curriculum and it was a very insightful experience! Made me want to study abroad ASAP.”
As we move through the ever-changing pandemic landscape with continued limitations to travel abroad and as we review internationalization goals for campuses with a wider lens, we need to continue to explore these new modalities of global learning to engage students and spark their curiosity, which will eventually lead to more than 2% of students studying abroad.
