Northern Virginia Community College, Virginia, United States
Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia do Acre, Amazonas, Brazil
Higher Education on a Global Scale: Student Development in a Foreign Context
Through a new partnership, Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA) and the Instituto Federal do Acre (IFAC) will create a program to address the lack of financial resources for students—particularly first-generation, Pell-grant recipients, and those who are part of the college’s Pathways to the Baccalaureate program at NOVA and indigenous students from families predominately in the farming and fishing industries in the rural areas surrounding IFAC—to pursue international opportunities. The pilot program aims to develop the skills necessary to be successful in students’ college careers, including critical thinking, effective communication, and stress management in new learning environments. NOVA students will travel to Brazil where they will receive classroom instruction in Portuguese language and culture and be integrated with IFAC students and faculty through a variety of cultural immersion activities. After the program, the institutions will continue to further develop their collaborations to support reciprocal visits of students and faculty from IFAC to NOVA in the following year.