Key Aspects for the Implementation of Virtual Mobility

Abstract

MOOCs and SPOCs have been key elements in accelerating the digital transformation of many higher education institutions. The fact that higher education institutions can offer online courses, such as MOOCs or SPOCs, facilitates also the virtual mobility of students so that a student enrolled in one university can take online courses from other universities at the same time. This has the great advantage that students can take exams at their home university with local invigilation, in this way solving one of the problems with MOOCs. Nevertheless, there are numerous aspects that should be considered when implementing virtual mobility. These aspects affect several stakeholders besides students: teaching staff, teaching support services, IT services, etc. This paper discusses nine of these key aspects: 1) course selection, 2) teaching, 3) lab, 4) office hours, 5) communication, 6) documentation, 7) exam, 8) transcripts, and 9) campus life. For each of these nine aspects the who (students’ identity), the what (contents) and the how (tools) are analyzed, based on the experience gained in the European Virtual exchange (EVE) project, and proposing new improvements for these aspects.