Developing international virtual student exchange to enhance theory-practice transfer

ABSTRACT The aim of this article is to describe our experiences designing a short-term virtual student exchange between Germany and Sweden and to discuss the implications of these experiences. Quantitative and qualitative material from three semesters of student evaluations relating to a course on the global aspects of social work and health in times of crisis is analyzed. The course focused on theory-practice transfer, ethnographic methods, and global citizenship, taking pedagogical and didactic inspiration from problem-based learning and co-constructive pedagogy. Our analysis concentrates on developments to the course made on the basis of student evaluations; it directs attention to the fact that teachers needed to balance giving the students the space to co-create the course, whilst maintaining a focus on learning outcomes. This is exemplified by the need to create a tangible virtual space, to provide the course with a thematic and social framework. To achieve this, not only do the learning outcomes need to be expressed clearly and does teaching have to be adapted accordingly, the digital space also needs to be perceived as welcoming and safe. To build on students’ local experiences, ethnographic methods can be used to highlight global aspects as well as theory-practice transfer.


Introduction
This article analyses students' evaluations from three semesters of the collaborative German-Swedish course in social work entitled Global Social Work and Health, which focused on global aspects of social work and health in times of crisis.As a part of their bachelor's degrees in Social Work, the students had the opportunity to take part in the course, a collaborative short-term student exchange held digitally due to the COVID-19 pandemic.The course yields three credits and comprises three blocks of two-day lectures and seminars, held via Zoom, combined with literature studies and assignments.The aim of the article is to describe our experiences in designing this short-term virtual student exchange and to discuss the implications of these experiences-what are the potential benefits of short-term virtual international student exchange, what limitations did we experience and how can virtual exchange enhance the promotion of theory-practice transfer in future international collaborations?

Background
In autumn 2018, contact was established between the University of Gothenburg and Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences with the aim of developing cooperation in social work education, specifically focused on health-related issues.Subjects concerning health have become increasingly important in the face of growing health inequality among vulnerable target groups, which is why we decided to make global health the theoretical starting point.Teachers from both countries were also interested in comparing different professionalization strategies in health social work, referring to common challenges for the social work community.Moreover, in Sweden, the government had just decided to introduce a professional license for social workers in health care (Healthcare Counselors).An overview of social work education in Sweden had found that current curricula failed to prepare students for health social work (Universitetskanslersämbetet, 2017).The University of Gothenburg in fact administered the only social work programme in Sweden that included a mandatory course on the subject.In Germany, the German Association for Social Work in Health Care (DVSG) created a formal framework for qualifications at bachelor's and master's levels with the publication of the qualification concept for health-related social work in 2015 (DVSG, 2015).The concept offers a curricular framework for establishing health-related aspects of social work in higher education but is also strictly based on the national core curriculum and the European qualification concept.
Thus, international cooperation was seen by both countries as a way to strengthen the focus on issues of health in social work education.The starting point for the cooperation was the development of an optional course for bachelor students in social work at the two universities based on the Swedish course Psychosocial Aspects of Health and Ill-Health and the German course Health Social Work.The aim was to establish a physical student exchange, alternating between German students going to Sweden and Swedish students going to Germany.Due to environmental concerns, we did not want the exchange to be dependent on plane travel and tried to find environmentally friendly and pedagogically interesting ways of making the journey.We therefore started discussing the potential of using ethnographic methods, opening the possibility of traveling by train and making observations of the surroundings and changing landscapes.
However, the COVID-19 pandemic put a stop to these plans, as travel by train between countries became impossible.Still keen on trying to facilitate student collaboration, we started discussing the possibility of hosting the course using digital platforms and tools, combining local experiences with international reflections.The aim was to promote international mobility by making intercultural experiences possible from home.The course goals were, amongst others, to learn about the role of social workers in societal crises with a focus on health issues and to acquire competencies to reflect critically on global challenges for the social work community.The course was based on the overarching aim of enhancing theory-practice transfer, which is why the learning outcomes also included a focus on applying knowledge gained in practical situations and participating in public discourse.The course content included lectures and seminars on the professionalization of social work, societal crises, health and sustainability.The course was taught in English.

Global citizenship, diversified workspaces, and student exchanges
The trend for globalized labor mobility and immigration influences clients' experiences as well as the social work profession.Larsen et al. (2011) describe the importance of globalized workspaces to build competencies for cross-cultural cooperation, minimize risks of social exclusion and develop societal cohesion.The need for globalized workspaces can also be understood as an embracing of the characteristics of global citizenship, e.g. the ability to understand and reflect on global interdependencies and cultural diversity in relation to human rights, equality, global responsibility or existing unequal power relations (Veugelers, 2011).Wihlborg et al. (2017) show that professionals need to be able to critically reflect and handle the differences and similarities in values between coworkers and clients.Introducing international cooperation through learning groups to students' academic training is one way to prepare future professionals for these diverse workspaces.However, previous research shows that long-term physical exchange tends to develop into a one-way road for privileged students from the global north to the global south, rather than the other way round (Mizrahi et al., 2017).Although student exchange has the potential to lift the veil of 'othering' (Turner et al., 2016), it may also risk widening the divide between 'us' and 'them'.
Even though this collaboration was between two countries in the global north, exchanges are still an opportunity accessible only to some students.Thus, virtual mobility can be regarded as an opportunity to improve the mutuality of knowledge exchange between students (Mizrahi et al., 2017) and a way of increasing the accessibility of international exchange for students who otherwise would not have had the opportunity to participate, e.g.students with carer obligations or students from less well-off backgrounds.However, not traveling does not signify a lack of movement.As with a physical exchange, students who partake in a virtual exchange also step outside their comfort zone, e.g. when exploring new ways of communication and engagement (Turner et al., 2016).Engaging in virtual exchange can also help students develop skills to understand and handle the virtual tools necessary for future workplaces (ibid.).
This article focuses on our experiences of designing a short-term virtual student exchange, and the implications of these experiences, using student evaluations from three semesters of the course Global Social Work and Health.The analyses build on previous research on global citizenship and human rights, related to our pedagogical aspirations to support students in critical reflection, mutual knowledge exchange and exploration of virtual engagement in a professional setting.

Theoretical concepts
Designing the course, we focused on two main theoretical inspirations: problem-based learning and ethnographic methods.Our overarching didactic aspiration was to design a course based on the interplay between teachers and students in line with how Backman et al. (2018) and Mathieson et al. (2014) describe co-constructive pedagogy.This requires allowing and supporting students to become active subjects in shaping their education, furthering their explorative approaches by building on their existing knowledge, rather than positioning them as passive receivers.At the same time, we wanted to clarify the learning outcomes from the start and teach in line with these expectations, aiming to develop students' metacognitive abilities, as inspired by Biggs (1999, p. 58): 'Good teaching is getting the most students to use higher cognitive level processes'.
To make the constructivist approach tangible for students, ethnographic methods were a core approach throughout the course, taking students' every day and local experiences as a starting point.Although the course only included a brief introduction to the world of ethnography, inspired by Delamont et al. (2004) and Have et al. (2004), the students were encouraged to go out into their own neighbourhoods-looking, smelling, touching and writing-to observe naturally occurring situations as closely as possible, codifying their intuition for their respective fields for themselves and each other.They were encouraged to try to produce 'thick descriptions' (Geertz, 1973;Geertz & Emerson, 2001) and then jointly discuss potential analyses related to their field notes.This was also an important part of our ambition to promote theory-practice transfer, using and building on locally based observations and reflections often related to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the restrictions and guidelines implemented in different places, and discussing social work in times of crisis and the social determinants of health.Furthermore, this ethnographic focus gave students a new arena in which to learn and put themselves in the role of a professional social worker at a time when university campuses were closed and the physical space for developing their identities as students and future social workers was limited to their homes.
To enhance their reflections on ethnography and the relationship between local and global, we also enabled students to take virtual walks together, watching videos that people had recorded whilst walking in different urban or rural surroundings in countries such as Canada and India.While watching, students were instructed to take ethnographic field notes, and then jointly discuss their observations and interpretations.The focus on students' shared reflections relates to one of the aims of problem-based learning: supporting the development of a critical and investigative approach in learning, as well as supporting students' abilities to work in groups (Biggs, 1999).
To further enhance the focus on the role of social workers in times of crisis, we wanted students to write their main course paper as a blog post rather than a traditional academic text, encouraging them to critically reflect the potential target group and consider theorypractice transfer while articulating their voices as professional social workers.

Materials and methods
As empirical material for our reflection, we use qualitative and quantitative student evaluations.The evaluations stem from the Global Social Work and Health courses taught in the period from autumn/winter 2020-2021-autumn/winter 2021-022.In total, 42 students participated in the digital mobility: 13 in autumn/winter 2021 (WT20-21), 16 in spring/summer 2021 (ST21) and 8 in autumn/winter 2022 (WT21-22).All students answered an anonymous quantitative evaluation via the web-based learning management system of Bielefeld UAS.All students also participated in an oral qualitative evaluation.For the oral evaluation, students were encouraged to reflect on the evaluation questions in small breakout groups, without teachers being present.While in their groups, they were asked to write down their reflections anonymously on a pre-prepared padlet (digital whiteboard with access for all participants).After returning to the main classroom, we asked them to present these reflections and tell us what was on their mind when writing them.In analyzing their evaluations, we used an abductive approach: guided deductively by the overarching theoretical concepts used to design the course, whilst taking an inductive process-perspective in understanding and analyzing the emergence and development of the course related to the students' experiences during the three semesters we focus on.During this time, the core team of teachers: the authors of this article, were involved in teaching and in developing the course.

Results
In the following section, we present results from the student evaluations related to the aim of the article.The results stem from the quantitative part of the evaluation and are presented in the form of bar charts.We also include quotes from the qualitative evaluations to exemplify and deepen our understanding of the students' experiences.We start by discussing the results related to designing the course, focusing on content and theory and analyzing whether the course has enabled the students to achieve the learning outcomes.Thereafter, we shift our focus to a process-perspective, highlighting the changes that we made to the course based on the evaluations from the three semesters included in the study.We then contextualize these results in relation to the benefits and limitations of short-term virtual international cooperation, the virtual room as a social space and the expected roles of teachers and students.Finally, we direct our focus to an area in need of further development: using and articulating a professional voice.The section ends by summarizing the findings of the study.

Designing the course-learning outcomes
Overall, the evaluations strongly indicate that students believed the course had enabled them to reach the learning outcomes related to social work and health, as well as the global and professional aspects.This table highlights the course´s learning outcomes concerning theory-practice transfer.As we can see, although the number of strongly agreeing students is continuously rising between the semesters included, students from all three semesters generally agree with having reached these learning outcomes, especially related to the course helping them acquire skills to participate in public discourse.Theorypractice transfer is also emphasized in the qualitative evaluations, from all semesters, specifically in reflections about the course related to the Covid 19-pandemic, such as: One important lesson is that we have many different ideas and focus on addressing global problems, and that we have had the opportunity to learn new ways of thinking about social problems and their solutions.ST 21 We interpret these answers as indications of the course achieving its intended theoretical focus on social work in health and social work in times of crisis, as well as preparing the students for future social work in relation to these topics.The students generally express a need to reflect on social work and health from a global perspective, as well as acquiring knowledge on how to transfer these competencies to professional practice.The evaluations also show that these learning outcomes, to a significant and increasing degree, were perceived to have been met during all three semesters.
To conclude, designing the course in relation to its empirical, theoretical, and professional focus was not the greatest challenge that we faced working with the course.During the three semesters studied we did not make any changes to the course content related to the theoretical focus or learning outcomes.

Benefits and limitations of short-term virtual international cooperation
However, the evaluations show substantial differences regarding how students from the three semesters experienced the course with regard to the potential benefits and limitations of short-term virtual international cooperation.These experiences are not specifically related to the course content or learning outcomes, but to questions of pedagogy and didactics, which will be the focus of the analysis.
We start by presenting these results in the form of quantitative bar charts, focusing on experiences of using virtual/online tools and participating in the seminars.Subsequently, we include quotes from the qualitative evaluations, to exemplify and deepen the understanding of the students' experiences of the course related to these dimensions.
With regard to these tables, we can see clear differences between the three semesters included, with regard to the virtual format as well as the teachers' abilities and the structure of the course.The virtual tools and overall online format were experienced as difficult by almost half of the students during the first semester, but this feeling fell dramatically by the last semester.We can also see substantial improvement regarding how the students experience the teachers efforts to encourage them to take active part in discussions.After the first semester, only 38% of the students express being given many suggestions and encouragements.By the time of the third semester, this number had risen considerably, to 88%.We interpret this as being generally related to the COVID 19pandemic and the sudden need to, quickly and without proper preparation, change from campus-based to virtual education.The results are therefore not understood to be related primarily to the specific course but rather the adjustment to online teaching and learning in an international context over time.In parallel, we see a rise in the number of students who experience the online format as an enabler for participation, perhaps specifically for students who were not able to travel.

The virtual room as a social space
The challenges expressed by the students are in other words not interpreted as primarily related to the course being online per se, but rather related to the structure of the course and experiences of the pedagogical conditions and environment.These social dimensions are expressed in several quotes related to how the students value experiencing the teachers as dedicated and competent, as well as people with whom you can interact socially: The instructors made a confident, competent, and professional impression.WT 20-21 Lectures were/are very friendly and communicative.ST 21 These results underline the students' experiences of the virtual room as a social space, which might have been especially important during the COVID 19-pandemic, when many other arenas to meet new people closed.This virtual social space has specific interactional prerequisites, but students' perceptions of it as an arena in which they feel welcome and able to take initiative and interact relates to factors beyond the perception of teachers.After the first semester of WT20-21, several students commented that they thought the course lacked structure with regards to what was expected of them and what they could expect of the course.This is expressed in comments such as: Would like to get information beforehand for example how the presentation structure is supposed to be.WT 20-21 Upon receiving these evaluations, we decided to make a number of changes in terms of how and when information about the course and expectations of students was provided.Primarily, this involved employing a student who had previously taken part in the course as a tutor responsible for student communication during the first semester.Being present during all lectures, they were a visible resource for students and helped with administrative tasks such as creating breakout rooms.While not providing students with any new information, they were an accessible point of contact and reassured students concerning the expectations of them.They also organized extracurricular social activities during the course and gave tips on writing the final blog post.The effects of these changes are expressed in several quotes from the evaluations of the following semesters: The aid from the tutor helped support the lecturers and offered more assistance and socializing events to the students outside of the course's main hours.WT21-22 These results are interpreted as an effect of the tutor taking and advocating a studentperspective.By informing us about how the students experienced the course, they also made it possible to integrate formative evaluations during the course and adapt the schedule to student needs.

The expected roles of teachers and students
Experiences of a lack of structure from the first semester were, however, also directly related to the student-teacher relationships, beyond the teachers' abilities to be perceived as competent and friendly.Rather, they related to the expected roles of teachers and students, and how the teachers influenced the students.In the evaluations from the first semester, several students expressed a sense of uncertainty about what was expected of them and a corresponding wish that the teachers would: Be more forthcoming about what exactly we're going to do in each synchronous meeting so the students can be more prepared and know what's expected of them.WT 20-21 These experiences of uncertainty were not always expressed negatively, and some students described the seminars as being vivid and/or flexible: Very dynamic seminar structure!WT20-21 Despite interpreting these results as being somewhat ambiguous, we decided to make changes regarding the structure and composition of the student groups.Instead of changing group compositions for each seminar, enabling as many students to meet as possible, we decided to try fixed groups, focusing on group cohesion and supporting interaction to develop stable performance-oriented student-student relationships.These changes and their effects are reflected in the following quote: It was a good thing that it was a smaller group, it felt like a safe area.WT21-22 We interpret this as emphasizing the importance of actively working with the relational dynamics of the virtual space, beyond the teacher asking the students to present themselves and then assuming that student participation will occur by itself-perhaps especially so in virtual spaces.In the international context, insecurities about language and norms also affect students, teachers and interactivity.Language insecurities, resulting in feelings of being inhibited in their participation, were expressed by many of the students, English not being their mother tongue.As teachers, we also became aware of how differences between countries affect communication, not least the formality with which students and teachers address each other, either using the term 'professor' or 'you'.It becomes clear that participation, interaction and the feeling of a safe space cannot be taken for granted.It requires a clear structure and the feeling of knowing what is expected of you as a student, as well as the establishment and maintenance of supportive relationships between students and between teachers and students.Furthermore, we made several efforts to contextualize the course in terms of its structure and theoretical framework, to clarify the expectations, not least related to the blog post that serves as the final examination.This was perceived as, and continued to be, more difficult for the students than we anticipated, which is expressed in quotes such as: It was both fun and challenging.Never thought about the complexity behind the layout before.It was also challenging not to write academically but to a target group.WT 21/22 The examination was intended to align with the course's overarching aim of theorypractice transfer: to focus on communicating global social work and health issues with a client and/or target groups rather than academia.We did not expect this to be as challenging for students as it appears to have been.We do not interpret this as students finding it difficult to write a blog post per se but rather being expected to write a blog post from a professional perspective, and in this role speak to a target group and/or the public.
To sum up, after the first semester, there was a need for improvement to the course.Rather than being related to the learning outcomes, theoretical focus, literature or methods of examination, these improvements were made with the aim of realizing our pedagogical ambitions and didactical goals in problem-based learning and co-constructive pedagogy.These goals have proven to be dependent on a dynamic structure and the creation of a feeling of a safe space, neither of which can be taken for granted, especially in international exchange in virtual spaces.It requires a sense of a clear structure and a feeling of knowing what is expected from you as an individual student, as well as the establishment and maintenance of supportive relationships between students, and between teachers and students.The conclusions from these results, related to how virtual exchange can enhance the promotion of theory-practice transfer in future international collaborations, will be the focus of the following sections, discussion and implications.

Discussion
This small-scale and short-term international exchange succeeded in attracting students who were interested in gaining international experiences but, who for various reasons, mostly related to their family situation and role as carers, were unable to travel.Unlike other exchanges, meaning individual students traveling to another country, students in this exchange were mutually engaged in gaining new knowledge and experiences together (cf.Mizrahi et al., 2017).
The small size of the internationally mixed student groups can be understood as having provided a safe space for enhancing mutual knowledge exchange and training in global citizenship (Larsen et al., 2011;Veugelers, 2011).Within these groups, students informed each other about social work and social work education in their respective countries whilst also helping each other to identify value differences and similarities.By using ethnography as a method and critically reflecting on their mutual observations, the students were also supported in developing professional cross-cultural work competencies (Wihlborg et al., 2017).Using their home environment as a place for investigation, they were able to commonly identify social work and human rights issues and global responsibilities, as well as discuss the impact of national and local social crisis management and its effects on health from an international perspective.In this way, they learnt to deal with the uncertainty that will always be a part of social work and link their local experiences and knowledge to global dimensions.
The international student groups also seemed to enhance discussions about power relations, as well as their links to social exclusion and cohesion, not least related to the ethnographic approach and attempts to produce 'thick descriptions' (Geertz, 1973;Geertz & Emerson, 2001) for phenomena that are taken for granted in their local communities.Altogether, these experiences can be understood as a base for increasing students' ability to transfer newly gained experiences and knowledge from this exchange to other situations.In contrast to earlier virtual exchanges, during the COVID-19 pandemic students increasingly perceived their competencies around virtual tools as a necessity to facilitate virtual exchange, rather than a skill they needed to improve.
The students who chose to take part in this short-term virtual exchange can be assumed to be open-minded about their education and interested in international collaboration.It is an opportunity that requires them to experience something new, and many aspects of the course can be understood as them entering previously unexplored territory.Many of the students also expressed uncertainty over their English language proficiency, especially in the beginning of the exchange.Taking part in the exchange, in spite of these uncertainties, can be interpreted not as an expression of high self-esteem in an academic context but instead as motivation, interest and an explorative approach to education, making the participants somewhat of an ideal rather than 'normal' group of students to work with pedagogically.
Nonetheless, combining ideals of a co-constructive pedagogy (Backman et al., 2018;Mathieson et al., 2014) and taking an ethnographic starting point in the students' everyday environment (Delamont et al., 2004;Have et al., 2004) at the same time as aiming to enhance their metacognitive abilities and basing the course on problem-based learning (Biggs, 1999) turned out to be a delicate balancing act between giving the students space to co-create the course while keeping a priori constructed focus on learning outcomes, lecture plans and methods of examination.Inviting students to actively participate in building on their prior knowledge is likely always challenging but especially so when both the form and content of study is experienced as being new and challenging.
The students did not have much prior knowledge in the fields of social work and health, societal crises or international social work.As we noted earlier, these subjects are not yet a priority in social work education (Universitetskanslersämbetet, 2017).Initially, neither students nor teachers were used to the virtual space used in the course, at least not in their professional/educational capacities.In addition, the students were unfamiliar with writing blog posts using the voice of a social worker and had probably spent prior semesters becoming experts in academic writing.Those with experience of blogging may have blogged in their spare time, on different topics and in a different 'voice'.However, blogging can be seen as a useful communication tool for professional social workers, not least to communicate outside academia with other professionals, clients, politicians and the greater public.
Therefore, during this exchange, we focused on helping students develop this tool for communicating as professionals.
These experiences have taught us that even with an 'ideal' group of students, enabling coconstructive pedagogy with students as active participants requires teachers to create a tangible space, in both form and content, that frames study thematically as well as socially.Only by giving the students an idea of which tools they can use, and what kind of structure is expected, are they able to enter this space as co-constructors, building on their different knowledge bases and local experiences to co-construct the course.To achieve this, not only do the learning outcomes need to be expressed clearly and teaching adapted accordingly, but the arena also needs to be made to feel welcoming.The space needs to feel safe.However, 'safe' in this context cannot be understood as free of risks, rather as a space open for theoretically anchored debate.This is especially important for teaching social work, a subject that in theory as well as in practice focuses on analyzing and handling, and sometimes just learning to cope with, uncertainty and unpredictability, not least related to health, ill health and societal crisis.

Implications
We would like to end this article by highlighting and summarizing some implications of our experiences of designing this short-term virtual student exchange in social work between Germany and Sweden.First, we would like to underpin the importance of the learning outcomes, even if they have not been the focus of our analysis.Not only do we need to teach in accordance with them and enable students to meet them, but, related to the course, we need to highlight their importance to the subject itself.The students articulated a strong interest but little prior knowledge in the fields of health social work, health and societal crises in both a local and a global context.These are important issues that we feel need to be addressed in social work education.
Related to our focus on pedagogical and didactic issues, we would further like to underline the importance of understanding and considering that though students might be used to online activities, interactions and writing, such as blogging, this does not mean they feel prepared for online teaching or learning.Interacting and writing online in your personal life is not the same as doing so as a student or future professional, taking on a professional role or articulating a professional voice in a virtual space.This must be considered when teaching, and to a greater degree than we anticipated.Actively working to create the feeling of a safe space for online reflections is therefore essential in international virtual exchanges-focusing on interactions as well as structure.
To move forward, and beyond the pandemic, our ambition is to combine virtual and real-time exchanges.Ethnographic methods and co-constructive pedagogy have proven to be fruitful ways of connecting the local and global, theory and practice, especially when travel was not possible.The virtual format also opens the possibility of international exchange to students for whom physical exchange is not an option for various reasons.However, in the future we have decided to alternate between physical and virtual exchanges.Although the virtual exchange worked far better than we hoped, virtual walks cannot provide a tangible sense of a place.Situational factors, as well as the joy and inspiration some people feel when traveling and physically interacting, are difficult to replicate.As such, the hope in the future is to travel by train as well as Internet.

Table 1 .
Reached learning outcomes concerning theory-practice transfer answered by students (1=strongly disagree and 10=strongly agree).The charts in Table1indicate mean-values.

Table 2 .
Experiences of using virtual/online tools for participating in online seminars.The students were given the opportunity to answer yes or no to the claims presented.The charts in Table2indicate the percentage of students choosing a yes-answer.