PROFIC

The Baseline study will: a) will outline the needs of all target groups, and b) it will identify and explore issues related to interculturality within the Latin American HEI partners. The Baseline study will aim to identify components of IC (intercultural knowledge, skills, awareness and attitudes) needed for professionals taking part in the study.

For this purpose, the WP3 will consist of a study visit lasting 3 days at each institution during which researchers will familiarise themselves with the institution and its policy and professional development provision. During the study visits, at least 6 interviews will be conducted at each of the LA HEI partners (minimum N=48), allowing for a stratified sample; combining the different roles participants perform in their organisations. The interviews will be based on an in-depth qualitative analysis using a critical incident interview methodology.

The qualitative data will be used to assist the development of the Learning Programme. Academics and administrators real-life experiences will be captured and used as ‘content’ for developing participative learning activities contextualised during the Learning intervention phase. Moreover, at least one 1 focus group will be organised at each partner LA HEI making sure that different student groups are represented (local student who never studied/worked abroad, local students who previously studied/worked abroad and international students). A total of minimum 80 administrators,academics and students will reached through the combined qualitative methods.

The Bassline study will be underpinned by scoping studies of current provisions on intercultural competence professional development in the partner LA HEI’s as well as a further investigation of existing policies and practices across other LA HEI’s.

In the Learning Programme development phase, the data and findings from the Baseline phase will be used to develop the PROFIC Learning Programme. The Learning Programme will be piloted in the LA HEIs and will consist of a blended learning approach involving 2 separate workshops: a) developing IC and b) coaching for trainers. The first face-to-face workshop on developing IC will last 4 days and will focus on the reflective development of the IC of administrators and academics.

The second workshop will take a form of ‘training for trainers’ and will last 3 days. Training for trainers will focus on enabling academics and administrators who deal with students to develop learning activities and incorporate IC development for students in their own activities, in addition to training on using the IC Toolkit. A subcontractor will be procured to work on developing the an interactive online learning platform. The learning content will be provided by the Partners. The Learning Platform will be used for learning activities before and between the two face-to-face workshops and utilise mobile technology (tablets) in addition to other media. The platform will include a personal IC reflection tool, collaborative learning activities, information on the main concepts related to IC and resources for further reading and exploring IC.

The online tool will allow participants to reflect on their own experiences, exercise the use of concepts learned throughout the workshops, discuss intercultural issues with other participants and find other resources to support their fluid learning about IC. The individual learning will be complemented by facilitated online ‘hang-outs’ where participants can discuss specific issues related to IC based on their experiences during the Learning Programme as well as discuss the use of relevant IC knowledge, awareness, skills and attitudes in their work.

Emphasis will be placed on collaborative work, participative learning and reflection around intercultural issues experienced by the participants throughout their work. In the period between the two workshops, participants will engage with resources, online activities and meetings through the PROFIC Online Learning Platform in order to further reflect on their learning and capitalise on the knowledge gained in the workshops. Both face to face workshops will be organised for all of the LA countries, to bring all partner HEI’s from their respective countries together for an exchange of knowledge and for purposes of cost-efficiency.

During this WP the LAHEIs staff who attended the training will implement knowledge gained from the PROFIC Learning Programme in their work.The implementation will be supported by the PROFIC Tool kit which will be flexible and adaptable and the practitioners could use it as they see fit. The practitioners will be supported by the PROFIC project experts through a mentoring approach and online meetings.

Through online mentoring, practitioners will be invited to reflect on the usefulness of their learning and teaching practice, issues and challenges of developing IC of students and any potential improvement to the online Toolkit. Although the main purpose of this WP is to provide support and advice to HEI practitioners, ideas and best practices will also be gathered for potential inclusion in the PROFIC Toolkit.

PROFIC Toolkit development will involve on-going work on developing and updating the Toolkit. The work will build on the EMIC Toolkit developed in the previous project and expand it with adaptations to the specific needs of academic and administrator in LA HEIs.

Input from other phases (WP3, WP4 and WP5), will be used in order to finalise the toolkit into a holistic and integrated set of tools and support documents for the professional development of academics, administrators and students.

The Toolkit will be made available as an open-education resource with an open licence (adaptable and shareable with referencing).

The PROFIC Toolkit will published as an OER with a Creative Commons licence (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License).

Coordinate dissemination activity, forming and executing a dissemination plan including presence online and social media presence, presentations on external and internal events.

The dissemination and exploitation for the project activities will define horizontal activities to be developed in order to ensure that the project’s activities and results are promoted to a wide a public as possible and that the project results are effectively exploited to ensure that the results are sustainable.