State Department grant connects American, Moroccan students through COIL Plus
July 23, 2024UNC Global Affairs
Caroline Sibley knows that an education that transcends the classroom enhances student success and development. So, in spring 2024, she provided an interactive global experience to the students in her advanced Arabic class with support from a competitive grant obtained by UNC Global Affairs from the U.S. Department of State.
Sibley, a teaching assistant professor in the Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at UNC-Chapel Hill, partnered with Arabic language teacher Farida Badr at Durham Technical Community College and English-language instructor Jennifer Crespo at Morocco’s Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UMP6) to develop a three-way COIL Plus experience.
COIL, or Collaborative Online International Learning, offers shared learning experiences and global, cross-institutional collaboration that connects faculty and students from across the globe through technologies such as Zoom. COIL Plus, a form of “blended mobility,” combines the virtual connections of a COIL experience with the physical mobility of a study abroad experience. UNC Global Affairs helps faculty incorporate COIL and COIL Plus experiences into their curricula through Curriculum Development Awards.
The State Department selected UNC-Chapel Hill to receive the grant through its IDEAS (Increase and Diversify Education Abroad for Students) Program. The IDEAS program provides small, capacity-building grants “both virtual and in-person, to help create, expand, or diversify their study abroad programs.” UNC Global Affairs is committed to providing every student with opportunities to receive a global education, a commitment known as the Global Guarantee. Grants, such as this one, ensure Carolina’s menu of options is rich and paths for students are plentiful.
Sharmila Udyavar, associate director for global education at Carolina, served as principal investigator for the grant. An intercultural competence expert coached Udyavar and the three faculty members on shaping the class to increase the students’ language learning and enhance the course’s intercultural outcomes.
Sibley, Badr and Crespo asked the students in the COIL Plus class to work together in cross-institutional and cross-cultural teams to create podcasts about the role of the education systems in the U.S. and Morocco and how these systems shaped the students’ identities. The class was composed of 13 Carolina students and 15 Durham Tech students studying Arabic, and 16 UMP6 students pursuing a career in health care. The course culminated in a faculty-led two-week program in Morocco for eight students from North Carolina. The students stayed in the dorms and traveled with their Moroccan classmates.
“COIL courses open the world to students and give students the opportunity to take what is theoretical and put it into immediate practice,” Sibley said. “COIL Plus lets students travel and interact outside of their comfort zone which helps them develop capacity, flexibility and resiliency.”
During a visit to Morocco that overlapped with the students, Udyavar saw firsthand the benefit of COIL Plus.
“It was positive and uplifting to hear the students talk about the country and see them interact with their peers,” Udyavar said. “Having the students see and experience the culture of a different society helps them to understand other people, from the perspective of shared language as well as in-person connections.”
Udyavar was pleased to support Durham Tech in its first-ever COIL course. “COIL is a great way of providing greater access to global learning,” she said. “For the many students who are unable to study abroad, this opportunity through the curriculum is invaluable.” UNC-Chapel Hill plans to continue to train and support community colleges in the region that are interested in embracing COIL.
Sibley said that it is easier to “COIL” a class than people assume, noting that it is just one element of a course. “It’s essentially having a big project that students work on together,” she said. “Why not make that project global, collaborative and interactive on an even more authentic and applicable level?”
She believes that every course, not just language courses, can benefit from COIL, too. “More than ever, our students are crossing geographical boundaries, from the moment they open up their phone and see the real world in front of them,” said Sibley. “It is important to create courses in which students have real-world applications as part of the learning process.”
Sibley and her colleagues agree that once they incorporate COIL experiences into their courses, it is difficult to imagine it any other way. “When students attend college, they expect to take highly impactful courses in which they not only learn material but also develop ideas about themselves in the world,” she said. “COIL and COIL Plus classes do this and allow students to develop skills that will help them engage in the global workforce.”
That was the experience of UNC-Chapel Hill student Kendall Leigh ’25 who is majoring in media and journalism with minors in history and Arabic. “I strengthened my Arabic speaking skills, expanded my vocabulary and learned Arabic in a real-world practical context,” she said. “Over the course of two weeks, I was able to form deep and authentic lifelong friendships with our partners from Morocco. We were able to connect in a way I don’t think would have happened if I was just a tourist visiting Morocco.”
Graduate student Ellen Perleberg similarly had a memorable experience. Perleberg, who will receive her master’s degree in library science from Carolina in May 2025, said that her time in Morocco made real and put into practice everything she learned, both culturally and linguistically, in Sibley’s class. In addition to enjoying the chance to explore in depth the educational experiences of her classmates, Perleberg expressed appreciation for the interpersonal and intercultural aspects of the course.
“On the second night in Morocco, the American and Moroccan students were trying on each other’s clothes, which resulted in our being very late for the banquet dinner with the people in charge of the exchange,” she remembered. “When [the American students] walked in wearing traditional Moroccan clothing, the director of the COIL program on the Moroccan side said, ‘I think this program worked too well.’”