UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
Office of Educational Assessment
Program Evaluation Division		 Updated 07/24/02

Global Classrooms
 
EVALUATION SUMMARY

This site is intended to facilitate communication among members of the Global Classrooms Team and to serve as a readily accessible archive of evaluation documents to assist Global Classrooms leadership in reporting to external stakeholders.


PROGRAM DESCRIPTION
 

The goal of the Global Classrooms Program is to integrate international academic exchange and understanding into students’ educational experiences at the University of Washington (UW). A project of Undergraduate Education, Global Classrooms provides faculty support for innovation in international education and research.

UW faculty and student teams and their international colleagues design and deliver parallel courses that utilize technology to facilitate intellectual and creative exchanges. The three courses developed during the 2001-2002 academic year are:

  • Life Histories in Communities in Transition: Eritea, South Africa and the USA -- delivered Spring 2002
  • International Design: China and the USA -- A 3-quarter experience for the academic year 2001-2002
  • The Global Citizen Project with Universidad de San Andres -- delivered Spring 2002

Project Goals:

The program aims to internationalize the undergraduate experience, to integrate teaching and learning environments with faculty scholarly communities, and to develop technology’s substantive as well as mediating capabilities for achieving the international dimensions of general education for students. Specifically, the project will enhance students’ ability to:

  • Communicate and negotiate across cultural, geographic, and linguistic contexts to develop a more interconnected view of human experience.
  • Appreciate perspectives that differ from their own and the contribution these diverse insights make to enhancing understanding of common problems, questions, and creative possibilities.
  • Appreciate and articulate the relationship between theory and local iteration, global and local scales and contexts.
  • Foster collaborative relationships, build communities of learners, and develop the skills of civic interaction in technologically mediated environments; capitalize on the capacity of internet technology to foster collaborative aspects of learning and build community.

EVALUATION PLAN
  The Evaluation is divided into two phases: the course design phase and the course delivery phase.
 

Table 1. Project Timeline and Evaluation Activities
 
Oct Nov Dec   Jan Feb Mar   Apr May Jun   Jul Aug Sep
First Year: 2001-2002
Course Design
  Course Delivery
(a)   (a), (b)   (a), (b)   (a)
 
(a) Case study methodology (b) Focus groups

FINDINGS
  The OEA is closely chronicling Global Classroom program development through on-going faculty conversations and UW student focus groups. The following reports describe program activities and outcomes in terms of "What We Did" and "What We Learned."

International Design Presentation and Discussion
Faculty Course Design Interviews
Student Focus Groups: Lessons Learned
Year Two Faculty Course Design Interviews

Copyright© 2001-2002 UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON Office of Educational Assessment