During the final session of the workshop, the Vice President of Academic Affairs, Dr. Abdulsalam AlKhayyat, delivered remarks in which he praised the faculty members for their exceptional leadership in international and innovative teaching. Dr. AlKhayyat expressed his appreciation for their dedication to providing students with valuable academic and intercultural experiences.

COIL is a virtual exchange program that enables students from different cultures and geographical locations to engage in sustained academic collaboration using various communication tools such as Zoom, Skype, WhatsApp, messenger, and email. The An Najah Virtual Exchange Collaborative, led by the External and International Affairs Office and the Vice President of Academic Affairs, takes the initiative to design and implement these virtual exchange programs in collaboration with VE Faculty Members from various disciplines.

The four-week training program consisted of six modules focusing on COIL pedagogy and best practices. These modules equipped faculty members with the ability to foster respect and trust among their students, prepare them for intercultural communication and online collaboration, develop a central question or problem for the curriculum, define disciplinary and intercultural student learning outcomes, provide clear instructions for collaborative tasks, determine suitable tools for virtual communication, and design reflective activities to assess disciplinary and intercultural learning. 

Thirteen faculty members from An Najah University representing the Humanities, Engineering, and Medicine and Health Sciences departments completed this workshop. They were joined by twelve international faculty members from ISET Beja Institute of Technology in Tunisia, Bielefeld University in Germany, and several universities in the United States, including Elon University, Middle Tennessee State University, University of Memphis, Arizona State University, Florida International University, Northern Essex Community College, Pennsylvania State University, and Clemson University.

The selection of participants for this specialized workshop was based on their previous achievements in the field of virtual exchange and their demonstrated commitment to innovative teaching. The faculty members who attended the workshop include Abdulkarim Zawawi, Ahmad Abadi, Aysar Yasin, Basma Damiri, Eman Alshawish, Khaled Alsahili, Mahmoud Assad, Maysa Abu Zant, Mohammed AlSayed, Mutasim Baba, Ramiz Assaf, Safaa Abujarour, and Sameh Mona.

The curricula developed during this workshop will be integrated into official virtual exchange courses, which will be launched in the upcoming academic semester. To learn more about the An Najah Virtual Exchange Collaborative or get involved, please visit the following link: https://www.najah.edu/en/virtual-exchange/