Collaborative learning in the office management studies field: a COIL experience between Portugal and Cabo Verde

Abstract

The internationalisation of Higher Education Institutions (HEI) can occur across borders and at home. In recent years, the option for virtual mobility or collaborative online international learning (COIL) has been gaining special relevance. COIL "encompasses projects based on the involvement of teachers and students with different geographical, language and cultural backgrounds, for the development of collaborative teaching and learning processes using online communication tools" [1], thus facilitating not only the consolidation of technical skills, but also of transversal skills. This article describes a COIL project that took place between March and June 2021, involving 26 students from the degree in Office Management and Business Communication (OMBC) of the University of Aveiro (Portugal) and the degree in Public Relations and Executive Secretariat (PRES) of the Public University of Cape Verde. The project, entitled "Communication tools in the context of job search in Portuguese-speaking markets: Portugal and Cape Verde", was streamlined in a context of competences aggregation between disciplines in the area of Portuguese and Computer Science, with the participation of 5 teachers. Each student selected a job offer in the partner country and produced a multiformat CV (digital support and video CV), adapting it to a situation of applying for real job opportunities. The project included familiarisation sessions, open classes regarding the labour market in both countries, extra class meetings between students and moments (in class and extra-class) to follow up the work in progress. After the end of the project, a questionnaire was applied to the students involved, and 24 answers were obtained: 13 from Portugal (all participants) and 11 from Cape Verde (out of 13 possible). The respondents indicated curiosity, the possibility of meeting new cultures/people and acquiring new knowledge as factors that motivated them to participate in this COIL project. Overall, participants were very satisfied with the development of this project. The answers obtained also made it possible to identify the most and least positive aspects in the implementation of the project, to find out the technical and transversal skills developed from this experience, and to list the communication tools/digital tools that the students used the most.