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The University of Arizona’s Global Campus is a remote academic experience for those students caught in the middle of international travel and visa restrictions.
In the wake of the health crisis, different options have been offered to students to continue the school year online. However, student sectors in more vulnerable situations, such as those international students with no possibility of returning to their country of origin or who were affected by visa moratoriums, find themselves stranded in a delicate landscape.
Fortunately, helpful projects such as the implementation of global campuses offer timely initiatives for all those students affected by the measures implemented due to COVID-19. This system, as explained by Yong Zhao, transforms the learning environment from traditional physical classrooms to a hybrid environment. It also allows students to learn with and from anyone, wherever they or the teachers are. It also suggests changes in the present student organization of groups of people of the same age, offering to compose teams made up of people of different ages, backgrounds, and skill levels from various locations. The premise is to reformulate the concept of higher education by combining the advantages of the traditional campus with the virtues of virtual training affirms Francesco Pedro for the digital library of UNESCO.
This concept is already being tested in some institutions, such as the University of Arizona’s Global Campus, launched on May 4th. It spans 34 countries and more than 130 cities in five continents, including countries such as China, Ireland, Mexico, United Arab Emirates, India, and Japan. Also, it partners with the best universities in the world to provide a complete university experience to international students anywhere. In this way, its programs are offered in exclusive, convenient locations worldwide to facilitate getting a full degree from the United States or credits from Arizona.
“The Global Campus is a long-term effort towards meeting the United Nations’ sustainable development goal of providing accessible quality education to the world.”
The Global Campus offers ten personalized undergraduate paths to more than 200 undergraduate careers, ten post-graduate certificates, and 60 fully online undergraduate and graduate degrees. For students enrolled in this University of Arizona system, a mix of virtual courses would be offered with live-in experiences at partner universities, including world-class institutions such as Amrita University and Jindal Global University in India, and Tec de Monterrey in Mexico. Those who choose to learn through face-to-face classes will have access to in-person academic support, computer labs in the associated schools, study areas, libraries, recreational facilities, clubs, and student activities. Thus, having an approach to the best modalities both online and residential, as UA News explains.
Another alternative offered is to live and study in residential communities in 58 other Global Campus locations. There are specially designed accommodations for students that provide safe and attractive communities through partnerships with Global Student Accommodations, Uninest, The Student Housing Company, and Nexo, worldwide leaders in student accommodations in Spain, England, Germany, Ireland, Australia, China, Japan, and Dubai.
“The Global Campus is a long-term effort towards meeting the United Nations’ sustainable development goal of providing accessible quality education to the world,” said the University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins to UA News. “We are truly making affordable, world-class education available to global citizens around the world, and, in this time of the COVID-19 pandemic, it has never been needed more.”
The launch of the Global Campus was accelerated to provide an immediate option to those international students whose plans were interrupted by the pandemic and who cannot begin their studies abroad. “This program is tailored to meet the access needs of international students,” said Brent White, dean of Global Campus and vice provost of global affairs at the University of Arizona. “Many afford to attend college in the United States; some do not have high-speed internet required to take classes online, and nearly all are unable to travel internationally, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Global Campus addresses all of these issues.”
“We are truly making affordable, world-class education available to global citizens around the world.”
This system already had precedents in the institution. Its first micro-campus was launched at the Ocean University of China in 2015, and the concept of Global Campus was advanced after offering online courses to students. Likewise, in Latin America, a similar project was put in place at the Peruvian University of Applied Sciences. Its successful and sudden presentation was because “Global Campus is based on two existing strengths: our network of micro campus locations and our world-class Arizona Online system,” as Liesl Folks commented.
Right now, the University of Arizona is beginning its admissions process for the fall of 2020. It will offer the Global Campus to any interested student, providing various options as paths to an undergraduate degree or even working with an advisor to create a personalized plan. The global educational transformation has forced us to seek the most useful and equitable resources that address the current crisis. Equitable solutions like these help us to visualize a much clearer horizon for the future of learning and teaching.
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This article from Observatory of the Institute for the Future of Education may be shared under the terms of the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 
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