This document discusses course design in international partnerships. It emphasizes the importance of clearly defining the partnership through assessing needs, sharing visions and goals, and outlining roles and responsibilities. Constructive alignment is presented as a framework, where intended learning outcomes, teaching activities, and assessments are logically aligned. Examples of course objectives from PhD programs in Sweden and the University of Botswana emphasize developing knowledge and skills, intellectual independence, and contributing to society. The document stresses that effective course design in international partnerships requires understanding different educational systems and societies, as well as mutually beneficial collaboration.

1. Course design in an
international partnership
context
Natalie Jellinek
Educational Development Officer
October 2013

2. Thematic courses:
Thematic subject courses that are integrated in ongoing
collaborations between SLU research schools, capacity
building programs or major research programs.

3. WHY!?

4. Who IS your partner?

5. “The sum of our partnership
equals something greater”
 What type of partnerships?
 Mutually-beneficial partnerships?
 Needs assessment?
 Shared vision? Ownership?
 Purpose? Common goals?
 Working methods?
 Roles & Responsibilities?
 Sustainable?
 Barriers & challenges?

6. Higher education is of critical importance to the long-term development
of knowledge societies.
Knowledge generation and innovation to meet both local and global
societal and economic needs.

7. ”The educational systems in different kinds of societies in
the world have been, and are, very different in
organization and content. They are different because the
societies providing the education are different, and
because education, whether it be formal or informal, has a
purpose. That purpose is to transmit from one generation
to the next the accumulated wisdom and knowledge of
society, and to prepare the young people for their future
membership of the society and their active participation in
its maintenance and development.” (p.268)
Julius Nyerere, former President of Tanzania
Freedom and Socialism

8. Course design

10. Constructive alignment
alignment = arrangement
constructivism = learning as a process
(mediated by social environments, social
constructivism)
* Students construct their knowledge by what they do
in the course
* The teacher must make sure the learning outcomes,
learning activities, and assessment are aligned in a
clear and logical way.

11. Constructive
alignment
Intended Learning
Outomes
Assessment
Teaching &
Learning
Activities
Biggs, 2003

15. Kummel

16. PhD education in Sweden:
Objectives
Knowledge and understanding
For a degree of Doctor research students must
- demonstrate broad knowledge in and a systematic
understanding of the field of research, together with deep
and up-to-date specialist knowledge in a defined part of
the field of research;
- demonstrate familiarity with scholarly methods in general
and with methods in the specific field of research in
particular.

17. PhD education in Sweden:
Objectives
Skills and abilities
- demonstrate an ability to engage in scholarly analysis
and synthesis and in independent, critical examination
and assessment of new and complex phenomena, issues
and situations;
- demonstrate an ability to identify and formulate
issues, critically, independently and creatively, and
proceeding with scientific precision, and to plan
and, using appropriate methods, conduct research and
other advanced tasks within specified time limits, and to
scrutinise and evaluate such work;

18. Skills and abilities
- demonstrate, in a dissertation, their ability to make a
substantial contribution to the development of knowledge
by their own research;
- demonstrate an ability to present and discuss research
and research results with authority, in dialogue with the
scholarly community and society in general, orally and in
writing, in both national and international contexts; demonstrate an ability to identify their need of further
knowledge;
- demonstrate a potential to contribute to the development
of society and support other people’s learning, both in the
field of research and education and in other advanced
professional contexts.

19. PhD education in Sweden:
Objectives
Judgment and approach
For a degree of Doctor research students must
- demonstrate intellectual independence and scholarly
integrity and an ability to make ethical assessments
relating to research;
- demonstrate deeper insight into the potential and
limitations of scholarship, its role in society and people’s
responsibility for how it is used.

20. University of Botswana:
Mission & Vision
a. To be a leading academic centre of excellence in Africa
and the world
b. To improve economic and social conditions for the nation
while advancing itself as a distinctively African university
with a regional and international outlook.

21. Thank you!
natalie.jellinek@slu.se