Work in progress: Assessing intercultural competency in an e-Learning environment

Abstract

As the world rapidly progresses toward a complex global community from a collection of independent nation-states, it is increasingly evident that the future of education lies in preparing students to collaborate, communicate, and cooperate in dynamic, multidisciplinary, and multicultural spaces. The development of discipline-based differences, vocabularies, and personalities is nothing new, and as bodies of knowledge continue to grow and increase in complexity, the difficulty of translating across disciplines to address increasingly broader global challenges also increases. Similarly, the need for cultural competency is expanding beyond the number of students realistically supported by traditional study abroad programs. This project utilizes global health as the paradigm within which to pursue a novel e-learning environment in partnership with Njala University to develop this capacity for international interdisciplinary translation.