Abstract:

While there are numerous benefits in providing international program offerings from education institutions, there are also many factors behind a successful delivery. In Canada, British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) has been providing international programs to many other countries for more than 17 years. These programs range from short 4-week programs to full international diploma program that spans 3 years. Each program is unique in its program content, student experiences, and expectations, institutional and governmental requirements from both sides, etc. In this paper, we like to report on a relatively new program between BCIT and Dongguan Polytechnic (DP). The program has been in operation for almost two years now, and unlike other international programs that BCIT has offered in the past, this program relies heavily on technologies as one of the main supporting components. we emphasize that it is only one of the main supporting components of the program because we believe that, at least for the time being and in the immediate near future, the students we experience at DP as well as other students in similar colleges in China, even at BCIT in Canada, do need the face to face, in-class experience to learn well. Technologies do play an important role in our international program delivery, but we foresee that the combination of personal interactions with the appropriate use of technologies will provide the best learning experience for the time being. In this paper, we will describe how this hybrid learning mode is achieved in this international program. We will also provide details on the program development, the use of technologies, faculty involvement from both institutions, the English language requirements in the program, the operational and academic challenges we have faced, the constant need to modify and adapt to the students and learning environment as each institute learned more about each other, the benefits to both the BCIT and DP faculty, and some of the future extensions to this program.

Keywords:

Technology, international program, online delivery, digital content, collaboration, virtual classroom.