International collaboration brings valuable experiences to SUND

IN NOVEMBER, a team of five COBL specialists embarked on a journey to Delhi in north and Vellore in south India to conduct workshops and produced video content for an online course. The workshops focused on technology-supported blended learning approaches that activate students in their learning process, while the video content was tailored for an open online course addressing cardiometabolic diseases (CMDs), a health concern on a steep rise in India.

Over two weeks, COBL organized 16 workshops attended by 305 faculty and support staff, including 120+ undergraduate and postgraduate students from three Indian institutions: All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Delhi, the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI), and the Christian Medical College Vellore (CMCV).

While the primary goal of the ”Partnership for Education of health Professionals” (PEP) is to enhance the capacities of AIIMS, PHFI, and CMCV to benefit from educational technology and creating centres of excellence, COBL specialists found themselves gaining valuable insights to bring back to SUND.

Anne Kirkegaard, COBL's Learning Designer, notes, "During learning design workshops with teachers at the Indian partner institutions, I have gotten insights into the challenges they experience around lack of student engagement and activity in classes. And though some cultural issues, like the stronger hierarchy, are very different from what we see at SUND – the reflections and solutions used by the Indian teachers are focused on many of the same approaches that we seek to strengthen at SUND, for example creating safe learning spaces, and providing continuous feedback to students throughout the courses. This experience makes me even more convinced that we must do more to incorporate continuous feedback in safe learning environments at SUND

Graphic Designer Gert K Nielsen shares, "Because India is such a culturally diverse country, the interactions and many questions from our Indian colleagues help my understanding of the diverse groups of teachers at SUND too. This insight allows me to adapt and improve the workshops I facilitate here.”

BY EMBRACING and incorporating experiences like the one mentioned, COBL's international collaboration contributes not only to enriching workshops and course development at SUND but also to the professional growth of its specialists.

Anne-Marie Mosbech, leading the PEP project from COBL, emphasizes, "Supporting capacity development within integrating technology into education at partner institutions requires that you yourself are at the forefront in your field and familiar with the relevant research. International collaboration offers an extra incentive to nurture that."

The visit, which occurred from November 14 to 24, is part of COBL's broader engagement in the Novo Nordisk Foundation’s Partnership for Education of health Professionals (PEP) program.

Participants from the ABC learning Design workshop at the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) facilitated by Learning Designer Anne Kirkegaard from COBL. One of the participants commented in the evaluation: “ABC Learning Design was an excellent brainstorming session and is really good for preparing a module outline for the courses.”

Graphic Designer, Gert K Nielsen facilitated a number of AI-workshops and PowerPoint workshops, including inputs for presentation techniques during the site visit in India. Here at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) where one of the faculty afterwards said: “You have opened my eyes to a completely new way to teach with PowerPoint. I always knew there had to be another way, and now I have seen it.”

Over 100 AIIMS undergraduate students and more than 25 CMCV postgraduate students actively participated in a 45-minute student-centered f2f-lecture on cell biology conducted by Professor Nicole Schmitt at both institutions. The lecture was also attended by faculty members, who joined a hands-on session training practical skills after the lecture.

Media producer Jonas Nilaus Vilhelmsen on field recording. When finalized the videos will be implemented in a joint UCPH-CMCV open online course. The course focus is on cardiometabolic diseases, e.g. showcasing CMCVs approach to reach health professionals, patients, and relatives in villages and more remote places in the tribal areas of the Vellore region in Tamil Nadu, South India.