Delegates of the DMMMSU-UNDIKSHA virtual teaching internship had just disembarked from the two-month exchange period last December 2021.

Eighteen students were digitally turned over back to UNDIKSHA, and 30 DMMMSU pre-service teachers re-instated to their in-campus teaching internship.

“At first, I thought it will be really hard to adapt with a new situation especially in another country…but at the end, I feel so grateful because I became a part of this program,” shared Ketut Andita Savitri (UNDIKSHA) in a gratitude letter to her DMMMSU cooperating teacher.

“Thank you for this amazing opportunity, I feel so motivated and really got inspired,” she concluded.

Savitri belongs to the English Language Education program, one of UNDIKSHA’s selected participating programs (the other being Primary School Teacher Education).

DMMMSU, on the other hand, deployed Bachelor of Secondary Education aspirants who specialized in English, Mathematics, and Science alongside Bachelor of Elementary Education and Bachelor of Early Childhood Education senior-year students.

During the virtual exchange, participants were able to immerse themselves in virtual elementary or secondary classrooms as teacher assistants, field observers, synchronous and asynchronous topic discussants, and learning assessors.

Ms. Maria Elaine D. Pinay-an, the supervising instructor of the inbound students at the DMMMSU’s North La Union Campus, stated that the “…partnership did not only bring aspiring future educators in both universities the chance to put the knowledge and skills they learned during their formation years into practice in an international level, but also opened the opportunity for them to harness their global and growth mindset.”

Home-based internationalization, such as this endeavor, continues to forward offshore student mobility at the safety of their homes amid the pandemic.

Also pursuing richer research culture, UNDIKSHA and DMMMSU collaborated for the 4th International Conference on Innovative Research Across Disciplines (ICIRAD) last November 2-3, 2021.

This year, another set of practice teachers will be sent to UNDIKSHA for the virtual practice teaching program. Likewise, DMMMSU students will be participating in UNDIKSHA’s Student Mobility Program (Credit Transfer) for the 2nd semester, 2021-2022. Study program includes computer science, language education, mathematics, social sciences and law. (Joshua Justin Lee C. Bautista)