Jacob Minniear with a summer 2024 College of Education teaching internship/practicum group in France.

Jacob Minniear, Ph.D. ’22 C&I, began a new position in the Office of International Programs team in early 2024. However, he’s worked to shape globally minded educators in the College for nearly a decade.

A northwest Indiana native, Jacob's passion for international education was sparked during his high school and undergraduate time studying in France. He holds a master's degree in Second Language Education from the University of Kansas and a Ph.D. from the Department of Curriculum and Instruction in the College of Education at Illinois. Jacob has taught various courses in the College, focusing on bilingualism, literacy, social studies, and international education. His research explores the impacts of study abroad on teacher development, the sociological aspects of bilingualism, and virtual language teaching. He is particularly interested in exploring how the role of cultural and social capital impacts study abroad experiences.

Having lived abroad for most of his adult life, Jacob’s career began as a middle school teacher. He then taught English as a Second Language (ESL) and English as a Foreign Language (EFL) to diverse groups of children and adults in the United States, France, and Turkey. He has since been involved in several U.S. government programs, including as an English Language Fellow with the U.S. State Department, a Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellow specializing in Arabic and Turkish, and a researcher with Fulbright and EducationUSA in Peru.

You’ve studied and lived all over the world. Tell us why you now choose to call Champaign-Urbana home.

Jacob Minniear: In 2015, I first led a study abroad program in France along with (professor) Allison Witt here at Illinois. Throughout my doctoral program I continued being involved and helped lead College of Education study abroad programs in France, Greece, Italy and Singapore.

I am passionate about travel and language learning and teaching. There are very few positions where one can combine their passions and professional journey. The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is one the most global campuses in the world, and our College of Education has some of the most unique international experiences available to students. As a graduate student, working with Allison Witt and Wei Liu to establish these programs was one of the highlights of my career, so when presented with the opportunity to return to Illinois, I had to say yes. I want these programs to do well because they have a direct impact on future teachers and their students. I’ve personally experienced the transformative effects of studying and teaching internationally, and I love helping our students navigate through these amazing experiences. So this new position as IGlobal coordinator was a great opportunity to keep doing what I’m passionate about.

Being somewhat new to the IGlobal program, how would you describe it? How does IGlobal compare with a traditional teach or study abroad program?

JM: In the College, we have two international teaching opportunities. The first are the traditional mobility programs where you can do a short-term study abroad experience in Spain or Italy or you can do a longer practicum in France or Thailand. The second is the international virtual teaching program, IGlobal, where students can gain international teaching experience while learning about online teaching strategies.

Both programs offer teaching opportunities for our students. Our students in IGlobal are freshman to seniors, so for many of them it's their first time teaching—likewise for students doing study abroad, like the undergrads who went to France this summer, for example. They haven't been in a placement yet and suddenly now they're in a classroom for five weeks. So as sophomores, they've now had five weeks of teaching compared to the rest of their cohort that hasn't. They’ve had a really interesting challenge as they're trying to teach students of different cultures and languages. Before, during, and after—both for IGlobal and study abroad—students participate in courses to prepare for and unpack these rich experiences.

IGlobal provides a similar experience and challenge to teaching abroad professionally, but I think the main difference between the programs is that in teach/study abroad experiences you're living there and you have to constantly interpret the new culture and language.   

IGlobal is two or three hours a week. It's more controlled and scaffolded because Dr. Witt and I are with students and we're unpacking the experience as they go. It's like, “You had a great session. Why was it great? Let's talk about it. You had a challenging session. Let's talk about it,” and we can help them improve and think more critically. We can't always do that with students while they're abroad. That's a big advantage to IGlobal for sure—that immediate feedback processing component to what you're learning in the experience.

Another real advantage to IGlobal is the opportunity to learn and practice how to teach online. Which, I think, is a significant take away from IGlobal—the digital classroom experience. Then you have the cultural part, then the language piece. It's multifaceted. There’s also a research element of IGlobal for undergrads that allows them to investigate topics in teams for a research project and provides students a $400 per semester stipend.

What are you enjoying most about your new role?

JM: I’m always thinking about new ways we can support and educate teachers—that’s my passion. In this role, I also consider how do we prepare students to teach globally? I enjoy developing courses, developing curriculum—the teacher education piece. I teach a weekly class for our undergrads, and because IGlobal is a unique program, both the students and I are learning what is needed to effectively teach in a virtual classroom that is multicultural and multilingual. As part of IGlobal, students can participate in research projects. In the spring, we had two groups of students present at the campus’ Undergraduate Research Symposium.

Next year, I hope that all our students present. The other part about coordinating IGlobal that I really enjoy is connecting with middle school students and teachers, especially, building partnerships with middle schools around the world. Lastly, I am so delighted to coordinate study abroad programs because it’s an opportunity to be in the field with preservice teachers while they try to operationalize concepts from their coursework and have to navigate the complexities of their identities.  As a teacher educator, it’s a privilege to share these moments, and, hopefully, guide the students on these personal and professional journeys.

What are your goals for coordinating IGlobal and continuing to lead teach and study abroad experiences for the College?

JM: For IGlobal, ideally, I would like more undergraduate students to join our program (though I am happy with our numbers because we had over 30 students last spring). I want students to have a place to learn about international education but also a place to build community. Also, I want to continue expanding our participating middle school classrooms in Illinois and internationally. When I was in France last month, I met with former colleagues there and we now have around 12 French schools that are joining IGlobal in the fall. I met with the United States Embassy in Turkey, and we will have we’ll have many students participating from there, too.

But besides looking at the map and trying to involve as many students as possible, I think the most important part is how we consider the impact of the digital divide. For example, we have students in IGlobal from Hong Kong where technology is accessible and English is easy to find in Hong Kong, right? And then we have students who join from Angola who have one teacher connecting with a cell phone that they pass around. So the need to participate is very different and as a program we’re trying to better understand the role IGlobal can play while also knowing that we make sure that we have equitable practices in offering and implementing IGlobal, and also have this discussion with our undergraduate students.  

In terms of teach and study abroad, I would like to encourage more students to join our programs.  As my background is language education, I often develop course and program themes around language and culture. However, I want to develop programs that focus on accessibility and connecting with Special Education undergrads. For instance, a basic example: this spring we went to a Montessori school in Verona, Italy which was such a meaningful experience. But the school had four floors with no elevator. These accessibility issues then lead to great discussion about accessibility in Illinois. So, we are working with Sue Talbott (Office of School and Community Experiences) and Laurie Andrews (Department of Special Education) to integrate special education curriculum into our study abroad programs. Last, I want to focus on outreach so we can share participants’ experiences throughout the College. We also want these study and teach abroad experiences to be financially accessible and equitable for all Education students.

Scholarships—both from the College and from the university—are available to make sure cost is not a huge barrier to doing a study abroad program.

How has teaching internationally made you a better educator?

JM: I am not sure about “better,” but it has made me a more reflective educator. It’s been so powerful and transformative for me. It's been such a reflective journey; every experience abroad teaches me something different about myself and about pedagogy. Teaching internationally helps me support my students to think and teach globally. Most think about the picturesque moments of being abroad, and, yes, our programs are full of amazing and exciting experiences, but being abroad is an opportunity to question your beliefs, practices, and sense of self, personally and professionally. You might be in the French Alps, but if you’re not sure how to effectively communicate and teach your students, you must reflect and develop a teaching toolbox for this new context. So for students working with our office, we encourage them to reflect and realize that international education is complex.

This fall, we're going to have an extra course which is about language and power for the students who are going to teach abroad for eight weeks in Europe. It’s intended to help them understand their positionality; the power they're going to have when they enter the classroom. They see themselves as sort of struggling because it's a new culture. But their hosts are looking at them like, “You have all this power and opportunity because you're an English speaker and you're in our classroom.” And we need to think about how we reconcile these different perspectives.

Students can sign up to join IGlobal during the first week of fall semester, from August 26-30, 2024. The deadline to apply for Spring 2025 teach and study abroad opportunities is September 1, 2024. Stop by the International Programs Office in 260A Education Building to get more information or schedule an appointment with Jacob Minniear or Wei Liu to learn more.