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A combined teaching and research project by Thomas Mejtoft, Helen Cripps, and Melissa Fong-Emmerson.

Parts of this project has been funded by grants from The faculty of Science and technology, Umeå University, and the Centre for Educational Development, Umeå University.

Since 2017, this international interdisciplinary collaborative program has paired Swedish engineering students at Umeå University with international marketing students at Edith Cowan University to deliver authentic, agency-style projects entirely online. Teams follow a shared design-thinking process, from research and ideation to prototyping and pitching, while navigating real constraints of time zones, language, and culture. This sustained partnership develops professional communication, collaboration, and employability at scale, with no travels and lower participation barriers. The project directly advances UN SDG 4 (4.3, 4.4, 4.7) and strongly supports UN SDG 10 (internationalization-at-home broadening access) and UN SDG 17 (long-term institutional partnership). External recognition includes ECU’s Vice-Chancellor’s Excellence Awards (2020 and 2023) and an AAUT Program Award nomination (2022).

This project has won the Vice-Chancellor’s Staff Excellence Awards 2023: Citations for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning at Edith Cowan University
This project has won the Vice-Chancellor’s Staff Award 2020 Innovative Teaching at Edith Cowan University (Award to Helen Cripps).
This project has been nominated for the AAUT 2022 Program Award (Australien Awards for University Teaching).

Engineering is a profession that has a global impact and it is important that both current and future engineers have a holistic perspective and international understanding of their role in today’s global society.

This is an international, interdisciplinary collaborative project created between two universities — Edith Cowan University (ECU) in Perth, Australia, and Umeå University (Umu) in Umeå, Sweden. The collaboration is set up between a marketing unit at ECU and an engineering unit at Umu. The idea is simple and structured as a potential collaboration between a marketing team (ECU) and a software/UX development team (Umu), located at two different offices of a fictional digital agency. This mirrors a real situation where firms often have different competencies located in different parts of the world, depending on what is being developed and for whom. Together, the teams develop a solution for a wicked problem given to them by a hypothetical customer (the teachers). The problem definition is intentionally kept broad to give the students the opportunity to shape the project, and to reflect the common real-world situation where not all required information is available. Hence, this is close to real situations that students might face when seeking a professional career after graduation.

As professionals, marketeers need to have the skills to face diverse situations with impact from new technology and other professionals, as well as be agile to find solutions and adopt to the current situation.

The research is based on action research methods and data has been collected, since 2017, using interviews, surveys, and observations with students and teachers.

Publications (selected)

For a full list of pedagogical publications here.

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., Fong-Emmerson, M., & Blöcker, C. (2023). Enhancing Professional Skills Among Engineering Students by Interdisciplinary International Collaboration. In G. Reilly, M. Murphy, B. V. Nagy, & H.-M. Järvinen (Eds.), Proceedings of the 51st Annual Conference of the European Society for Engineering Education (pp. 2486–2495). Technological University Dublin/European Society for Engineering Education. https://doi.org/10.21427/NFBV-3930

Cripps, H., Mejtoft, T., Fong-Emmerson, M., Lambert, C., & Blöcker, C. (2023). Spanning physical, cultural and discipline boundaries through international digital collaboration [abstract]. Contribution at the the 8^th IAFOR International Conference on Education, Honolulu HI, US.

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., & Blöcker, C. (2022). International professional skills: Interdisciplinary project work. In M. S. Gudjonsdottir, H. Audunsson, A. Manterola Donoso, G. Kristjansson, I. Saemundsdóttir, J. T. Foley, M. Kyas, A. Sripakagorn, J. Roslöf, J. Bennedsen, K. Edström, N. Kuptasthien & R. Lyng (Eds.), 18^th CDIO International Conference: Proceedings – Full Papers (pp. 453–464). Reykjavik University/CDIO Initiative. 
Download @ Reykjavik University

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., & Blöcker, C. (2021). Internationalization at home: An international interdisciplinary experience. In H. Håkansson (Ed.), Bidrag från 8:e Utvecklingskonferensen för Sveriges ingenjörsutbildningar (pp. 49–53). Karlstad University.
Download @ DiVA

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., Berglund, S., & Blöcker, C. (2020). Sustainable international experience: A collaborative teaching project. In J. Malmqvist, J. Bennedsen, K. Edström, N. Kuptasthien, A. Sripakagorn, J. Roslöf, I. Saemundsdottir & M. Siiskonen (Eds.), The 16^th International CDIO Conference: Proceedings – Full Papers Volume 2(2) (pp. 196–205). Chalmers University of Technology/CDIO Initiative.
Download @ CDIO

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., & Berglund, S. (2020). International experience by interdisciplinary collaborative teaching. In L. Pettersson & K. Bolldén (Eds.), Bidrag från 7:e Utvecklingskonferensen för Sveriges ingenjörsutbildningar (pp. 166–168). Luleå Tekniska Universitet.
Download @ DiVA

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., Berglund, S., Dlacic, J., & Torbarina, M. (2019). Internationalization of students’ learning using online technology: Lessons learned. In A. Pucihar, M. Kljajić Borštnar, R. Bons, J. Seitz, H. Cripps & D. Vidmar (Eds.), 32^nd Bled eConference: Humanizing Technology for a Sustainable Society: Conference Proceedings (pp. 1099–1107). University of Maribor Press. https://doi.org/10.18690/978-961-286-280-0.59

Mejtoft, T., Cripps, H., Berglund, S., & Singh, A. (2018). Collaborative teaching project to increase students’ international experience: Experience from interweaving units in Australia and Sweden. In NU2018 – Abstrakt, Abstract 650.
Download @ NU2018

Cripps, H., Mejtoft, T., & Singh, A. (2017). The use of a business simulation through an online collaboration platform to improve students’ collaborative and communication skills [abstract]. Contribution at the ECUlture 2017 Conference, Perth WA, Australia.

(First published by Thomas Mejtoft: 2022-01-12; Last updated: 2025-11-04)