Short-Term Faculty Exchange Program - Consortium for North American Higher Education Collaboration

The purpose of this program is to match a faculty member from a CONAHEC member institution with one or more faculty members at another CONAHEC member institution in a second country who, as a pair or group, will collaborate in the partial design and teaching of a course. In ideal circumstances, we’ll attempt to match a third faculty member from a third country to create a trilateral collaboration. Each professor will be expected to travel (assuming conditions allow for it) to the partner institution for a week to ten days during the winter/spring semester (between January and June). The host institution will prearrange activities to take advantage of their visitor’s presence. For example, among other possible ways to interact with the academic and regional community, during that visit the professor will participate as a visiting lecturer in a class hosted by the local institution’s professor (will not substitute for the professor of record but will rather participate as a guest), will attend meetings arranged by the host institution with other faculty members in order to discuss potential collaborations, offer an open lecture to the community and/or visit relevant business sector actors etc. Partnered professors are also expected to organize a virtual activity through which they offer their students the opportunity to interact and collaborate with their partner’s cohort of students. Sending institutions are expected to cover the cost of the return flight for their own professor as well as the costs of accommodations and meals for visiting professors they receive. As such, an institutional support form is required which provides complete details of what the institution commits to before the visit can take place.

Expected Outcomes:

Students at each participating institution will be exposed to some of the content, analysis, teaching methodology and classroom interactions from the partner professor’s institution. This process will contribute to the internationalization of the curriculum, promote joint teaching programs, open doors to possibilities for subsequent collaboration with partner professors and with other academics at the other institution. Implemented strategically, participation in this program can create ongoing international engagement, collaborations that become deeper and more academically meaningful over time, and can create pathways for students to engage in life changing international academic work. Over time this can also establish trust among professors their departments and institutions, and can result in the institutionalization of collaborations in the form of collaborative degree program offerings, faculty led semesters abroad etc.

How it works:

Interested CONAHEC member institution representatives will be responsible for reaching out to the faculties and schools within their own institution to identify and encourage faculty members interested in participating. Interested faculty members should complete and submit the Academic Profile Builder form on the CONAHEC website. In addition to personal contact information, this Academic Profile Builder form can be revisited periodically to chronicle academic production in terms of publications, courses taught, academic interests, ideas for future projects etc. The more complete the profile provided, the more easily CONAHEC staff and institutional contacts can find potential partners for international collaboration projects. Joint proposals from universities who wish to collaborate are encouraged, in which case the respective faculty members in question are encouraged to complete the Academic Profile Builder form identifying their partner faculty member and institution at that time so that the match can be formalized within the CONAHEC program. CONAHEC will use submissions through the Academic Profile Builder system to identify potential partners and will notify them and their respective institutional contacts to initiate exploratory conversations. Please note that suggesting a potential partner faculty member or partner institution will considerably increase CONAHEC and our institutional contacts’ chances of helping faculty members initiate a partnership through the program. The group of collaborating faculty members will design the elements of the course syllabus involved in the collaboration and the timelines and activities to be implemented during the respective visits. A preliminary timeline, academic and collaboration plan will be shared with CONAHEC program staff as the initial required deliverable. Selected faculty members will work together leading up to the visit to ensure that students and partners receive a valuable contribution through the collaboration. Each respective partnering faculty member will then participate in the short-term faculty exchange visit during the semester following the one in which the match was established. Any delays or changes to the timeline and plan will be communicated to CONAHEC. This program is intended to pair with CONAHEC’s Virtual International Partnerships Program and as such participating faculty members are encouraged to submit proposals that involve fully virtual collaborations using a COIL-based methodology or another carefully considered set of virtual collaborations. In the event of ongoing subsequent collaborations, we encourage participating faculty to revisit and update the Academic Profile Builder system to keep us apprised of this progress.

Partners are expected to complete the following tasks:

Before the Visit:

CONAHEC and/or the CONAHEC member’s institutional coordinator introduces a potential match to faculty the member. Faculty members proposed as a potential partnership are expected to establish communication to have an initial exploratory conversation. If the partnership will go forward, this fact is to be communicated to CONAHEC and the respective CONAHEC member institutional representatives. After the partnership is confirmed, faculty members are expected to establish ongoing periodic communication to cooperatively identify and agree on the activities planned for the collaboration and the short-term visit. As part of the planning exercise, please be aware that all activities undertaken should be chronicled for inclusion in the reports. Collection of evaluation surveys from students, participating faculty and CONAHEC member institution representatives should also be foreseen. In addition, please advise students that testimonials will be requested so they can attest to the academic and personal value of the experience. A completed planning activity document should be sent to CONAHEC before the end of the semester prior to the one in which the visit will take place. Participanting partners are responsible to make their own travel plans and/or flight reservations and will coordinate with international host institution about housing and meals during the short-term visit (one-week to ten days). It is not intended that participating faculty take this as an opportunity to permanently move to another country or accept a paid position at the international host institution as part of this visit.

During the International Visit:

(each professor is expected to participate in a one-week to ten day visit to the partner institution during the semester in question hosted by their partner):

Visiting professor will teach or co-teach his/her colleague’s classes as a visiting professor (fully hosted by the professor of record of the course in question).
Visiting professor will offer a presentation in his/her area of expertise open to the academic or larger community.
Visiting professor will meet with representatives of appropriate academic departments at the host institution to discuss potential subsequent collaborative initiatives.
Visiting professors are highly encouraged to participate in a community outreach activity if conditions allow.
Partnering professors will organize an online/virtual activity to offer their respective student cohorts at their home institutions the opportunity to interact with the other professor’s cohort of students. This activity could take place anytime during the semester and in some cases has lasted the duration of the semester.

After the Visit:

Professors are expected to complete the CONAHEC Short-Term Faculty Exchange Program Evaluation Survey and administer it to their own cohort of students.
Each professor will submit a final report to CONAHEC by the end of the semester.