Introduction

UNESCO has been promoting Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) since 1992. The Sustainable Development Goals represent a guide for society toward being more accessible for social development, human dignity, and demanding justice at all stages (Emas 2015). The role of education is crucial for altering behaviors and promoting analytical thinking toward a more sustainable society (Kopnina, 2015; Frantz and Mayer, 2014). Throughout their education, students develop the abilities in a multidisciplinary manner to understand the paths to sustainability that have financial, environmental, and social components.

During the Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL), American students and students from the Netherlands were given a safe environment to explore real issues in various contexts. According to the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA, 2014), a safe environment is a crucial tool in the development of appropriate professional behavior. 

For four years, we have been working on our COIL between The Hague University of Applied Sciences (THUAS) and Penn State University Scranton Campus (Penn- State). The courses were matched based on the similarity of course content. The Penn State Scranton students were enrolled in a Child Maltreatment Course. The students from THUAS were pursuing the Minor in Global Perspectives on Child Rearing and Family Support. During the development, evaluation and adjusting of this module we have been aware that one of the elements of education’s sustainable development is the use of innovative teaching methods (Kopnina 2015) and interactive education (Ghilardi-Lopes et al. 2013). The use of interactive education encourages students to apply what they have learned and to have a deeper understanding of how individual actions have implications. 

Through the instruction we gave our students during this COIL, we ensured that students understood how sustainable living, gender equality and human rights are connected. The aim of this collaboration was a deeper understanding of global citizenship, respect for cultural diversity, and culture's role in advancing sustainability (United Nations, 2015). We were aware of the fact that behavior change is one of the traits of Education for Sustainable Development. This collaboration prepared our students to be more conscious, responsible citizens who can incorporate what they have learned into their future actions as a professional. 

The students researched a non-governmental organization (NGO) in the US and in the Netherlands with an active role in advocacy of Children’s Rights. This was done via a review of current support/programs in their respective NGO’s in the US and the Netherlands. The students had to compare the two NGO’s based on how the image of a child in a country influences the work of the NGO’s with respect to SDG’s. Additionally, the students had to make clear correlations between the images on Child-Rearing, the rights of the child and to link them to sustainable development goals (SDG’s).  

Methods The aim of this collaboration was to learn how we are similar and different from those living around the world. To achieve this, we needed to be mindful of how our projects reflect the broader goal of intercultural communication. In order to be successful we encouraged the behavior of our students to be creative, logical, assertive, and independent (Steiner & Posch, 2006; Mingazova, 2014). To this end, we used google classroom as our learning platform for the collaboration. We let the students choose how they would be in contact with each other. We encouraged students to use a communication (messaging) application of their choice to establish meeting times with their group mates. To increase intercultural learning, we included the completion of mini assignments. The first of these mini assignments were icebreakers. A second mini assignment explored cultural differences and similarities in relation to child rearing practices. A third mini assignment encouraged students to gain a greater understanding of the importance of teaching younger generations about sustainable development goals. The students engaged actively in creating activities/exercises that could be used to teach children about the sustainable development goals in their future professions. These mini assignments were built towards strengthening their relationships with each other during the collaboration and increasing the students' understanding of NGO’s and their role in addressing the SDG’s. These mini assignments gave them the opportunity to not only get to know each other better but also spend more time to collaborate together on the final project.

Conclusion COIL is defined by SUNY “‘as a way that students reflect with each other, thereby facilitating a cross-cultural dialogue that brings a global dimension to the course content. COIL contributes to internationalization at home in that it purposefully integrates international and intercultural dimensions into the formal curriculum. It is an inclusive internationalization strategy, which contributes to realizing the goal that all students should benefit from internationalization” ( http://coil.suny.edu/). As an international mixed group, this COIL was designed for students as an opportunity for both intercultural communication and an exploration of NGO’s around the world and how they address the SDG’s. The overarching goal of this collaboration over the past 4 years was to focus on "Partnerships for the Goals," which makes clear that a variety of actors, including the private sector, governments, civil society, educators, policy makers, local communities and more must be involved in order to realize all of the SDGs.

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