Improving Preservice Teachers’ Cultural Intelligence through Virtual International Exchange

Teacher preparation programs are continuously evolving to prepare preservice teachers to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse student population. Research has shown that participation in study abroad experiences allows students to “critically challenge their frame of reference- a necessary condition for becoming a multicultural educator” (Briscoe and Robino, 2022, p.119). Due to programmatic challenges, teacher preparation programs offer limited opportunities for preservice teachers to study abroad (Morely et al., 2019). Virtual international exchange allows opportunities for preservice who may not have the ability to engage in traditional study abroad experiences to have a meaningful virtual international exchange. This presentation will describe a collaborative project between two universities, one in Spain and one in the United States, that combines virtual international exchange with liberatory design. Preservice teachers from both universities collaborated to solve a problem of inequity in education for a population that has been discriminated against in each other’s countries.