Ivanov selected as Wisconsin Teaching Fellow, researches virtual education travel

Dr. Andrey Ivanov

Dr. Andrey Ivanov, associate professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, was selected for the 2021-22 Wisconsin Teaching Fellows and Scholars Program. Ivanov is one of four UW-Platteville faculty members selected for this UW System program, which offers faculty a unique opportunity to collaborate with other teachers from across the system and complete a Scholarship of Teaching and Learning project.

Ivanov’s project, “Live from the Red Square! Virtual Education Travel in History Classroom” explores how the application of hybrid-virtual approaches to experiential field trip teaching will affect the student learning outcome of international awareness. His project stems from the idea that field study abroad has a transformative impact on the student experience, however a number of factors – including most recently the pandemic – often prohibit this experience. 

As a part of his project, Ivanov plans to take students on fieldtrips, virtually, during the 2021-22 academic year, in which he will travel to a site of historical significance and deliver a virtual interactive lecture and tour from the site. His first stops will be the Chazen Museum of Art in Madison, Wisconsin, and the Wisconsin Jewish and Holocaust Museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He plans to add additional sites – potentially international locations – to his agenda. 

"This project was originally proposed in 2019, for the 2020-21 Wisconsin Teaching Fellows program,” said Ivanov. “I was scheduled to travel to Moscow, Russia and then to Ukraine, to deliver live interactive Zoom fieldtrips to places like the Red Square or the Chernobyl National Site in Ukraine. The pandemic, however, had upended these plans and the WTFS program was rescheduled to 2021-22. I am looking forward to carrying out this research through a more flexibly calibrated approach, focusing on our local sites of global historical learning, but being open to expanding the project internationally, if circumstances allow."

Ivanov said he hopes this model makes the opportunity for international experiences available to more students.

"Educational travel always enhances student learning experience in the classroom,” said Ivanov. “I hope that adding a virtual option for such travel experiences would offer a benefit to those who are unable to attend in-person fieldtrips or study abroad."