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Episode 6: Internationalisation
316 Plays19 days ago
This episode features a rich discussion on internationalising higher education with experts Professor Mark O’Hara, Professor Martha Caddell, Professor Chris Wigginton, Professor Cláudia Sarrico, Ts. Dr. Jaya Kumar Karunagharan.
The conversation explores how the concept of internationalisation has evolved from simply recruiting international students to a more comprehensive approach that includes internationalising curriculum and preparing all students for global engagement.
The experts share practical advice for educators looking to internationalise their practice, suggesting starting with small steps like virtual exchanges and international case studies while maintaining curiosity and avoiding judgment. They emphasise the importance of colleague involvement, community engagement, and celebrating successes to create a welcoming learning environment.
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Transcript
Introduction to Student Success Pod
00:00:12
Speaker
Hello and welcome to our podcast, Student Success Pod. I'm your host Stuart Norton and here we discuss the core thematic areas of student success. Please do remember to follow the series to make sure you stay up to date with new episodes and activity related to student success.
00:00:28
Speaker
I am again joined by fellow colleague and co-host, this month is Mark O'Hara. Hello Mark.
00:00:35
Speaker
Hi Stuart, how are you? Very well, thank you. And thank you for joining us.
Internationalization in Higher Education
00:00:39
Speaker
Professor Mark O'Hara has subject matter specialism in the area under review, that of internationalization of higher education, a very topical subject and one that impacts greatly across the spectrum of student success.
00:00:51
Speaker
And we have four fabulous guests from across the sector talking to the topic of internationalizing and student success from their perspective and sharing insights with you, our listeners. Hello, Martha.
00:01:03
Speaker
hi there, Stuart. And Martha, please tell me a little bit about yourself. So I'm Professor Martha Cadell. I'm Director of the Learning and Teaching Academy at Heriot-Watt University.
00:01:16
Speaker
And I've got responsibility for inspiring learning and teaching across all of our global campuses in Scotland, in Dubai and in Malaysia. Fantastic. Thank you so much for joining us.
00:01:27
Speaker
ah Next, Chris, if I can come to you. Hi, I'm Chris Wiginton, Professor and Pro Vice-Chancellor, Exec Dean at Ulster University, which I joined at the beginning of ah February.
00:01:40
Speaker
I'm responsible for the university's broader global engagement and importantly as well, like Martha, it's partnerships too. And we have significant partnerships in Qatar, in China, um in India and and across the world.
00:01:53
Speaker
ah So really glad to be here. Thanks for the invitation, Stuart and Mark. Thank you so much. And thank you for joining us. Claudia, if I can come to you next. Hello, Stuart. So my name is Claudia Sorrico. I'm a professor of management at the School of Economics, Management and Political Science of the University of Ninho in the north of Portugal.
00:02:15
Speaker
And I'm also a senior researcher and board member of CIPES, a center for research in higher education policies, also in the north of Portugal. And yes, we we have seen increased internationalization in Portugal.
00:02:31
Speaker
Maybe due to demographics, you know, there's less natives and and we have the installed capacity. And of course, we also have the Portuguese speaking countries, the which makes it easier in terms of the language of instruction.
00:02:47
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. And completing our stellar lineup of guests, Jai, if I can come to you, please. Hi Stuart and hi everybody. My name is Dr. Jaya Kumar Karunagaran and I'm born and raised in Malaysia um and I'm with the University of Nottingham Malaysia and I'm an assistant professor here in biology and psychology.
00:03:12
Speaker
as well as the director of the Nottingham Recognition Scheme, which is an accredited scheme for colleagues to obtain recognition for their teaching contributions.
00:03:23
Speaker
And I'm also the chair of the ASEAN Senior Fellows Network.
00:03:30
Speaker
Fantastic. Thank you so much.
Cultural Insights: Biscuits and Dunking
00:03:33
Speaker
So listeners by now will be familiar that the first thing we have to do is discover if our guests are are dunkers and what their favorite biscuit is. Listeners new to the series, this is the famous edgy biscuit section of the podcast, and I'm delighted to reveal that our current top-ranked biscuit amongst educators is the chocolate hobnob.
00:03:50
Speaker
Whether it stays in first place, which we'll have to wait and see, with a wealth of guests on the show this month, I'm having to keep this part brief, but it wouldn't be edgy biscuit without a biscuit-related fact. And this month, I wish to cover if we know the tops to the bottoms of our biscuits.
00:04:04
Speaker
Listeners in the UK will certainly be familiar with the most purchased biscuit of all, that of the chocolate digestives. but is the chocolate on the top or the bottom of the biscuit? Guests, please, a quick poll. Top or bottom? What do we think?
00:04:18
Speaker
I would imagine the top.
00:04:22
Speaker
i was going the bottom I'm going to say the bottom. Yeah, yeah there there we go. Go on, Mark. Well, I know the answer. that So I think I'll have to i think i shall have to disqualify myself.
00:04:37
Speaker
Well, it is in fact the bottom. McVitties have declared this officially as all biscuits are dunked into a reservoir as part of the making process. So there you go. And this means that when placing my biscuits in our biscuit tin at home, I put them in upside down and eat them that way too.
00:04:53
Speaker
And for listeners outside the UK, the biscuit tin is very much a thing. With over 60% of Brits owning one, a great invention to keep your biscuits from going soft that's been around since 1861. So I'd also like to put a shout out to listeners in the east of Anglia, as apparently Norwich is the city with the most biscuit tin cells.
00:05:10
Speaker
So for colleagues at the University of East Anglia, feel free to get in touch and let us know about your biscuit habits too. um So without any further ado, to our guests, what are your favourite biscuits and are you a dunker? Jaya, I'm going to come to you first.
00:05:24
Speaker
I'm definitely a dunker. And I was going to go with the Hobnobs at first. ah you You can feel free. Feel free. You can keep it at the top of the chart. let let's Let's try and see if we can topple it off the top of the chart.
00:05:36
Speaker
i'm I'm going with a local favorite here in Malaysia. It's called the Chipsmore. And for obvious reasons, it's got more chips and this one comes with chunks instead of chips.
00:05:51
Speaker
And so the the um it really was my favorite growing up. So this this segment actually made me go down memory lane.
00:06:03
Speaker
And so yeah, the chips more. Chips more. There we go. Fantastic. Martha, I'm going to have to come to you next. I am definitely not a dunker. I don't. I'm all about the coffee being kind of the the star of the show. But I do occasionally like to have a biscuit on the side. I would go for a chocolate ginger biscuit would be my favourite to have alongside a good cup of coffee.
00:06:32
Speaker
Fantastic. ah Claudia? Hi. So, yeah, no, definitely not a dunker. Just like Marta, I prefer my coffee. Unadulterated.
00:06:43
Speaker
I really like some Portuguese biscuits called raiva, which means rage. ah Each is individual, so they all have different shapes and, they you know, they... and funny shapes but I've eaten them all so I can't show them to you but my second favorite are the Italian Cantucci like veggies they're very hard and I like biscuits fantastic thank you Cantucci actually made a appearance on our last episode because it is a biscuit you can dunk in wine so listeners please good do go back and listen to the yeah previous episode to find out more about that ah Chris can I come to you
00:07:25
Speaker
and So I'm definitely a dunker and I'm kind of old school. So I like rich tea in my tea. So like a double tea hit. I also, the controversially, quite like a Jaffa cake, but is it a cake or a biscuit? You may well have had this debate before. so ah But yeah, rich tea for me and definitely dunked.
00:07:46
Speaker
Fantastic. Thank you, Chris. Yes, the Jaffa cake biscuit debate came out in episode one. And the rich tea, in in fact, Prince William and and Kate had a rich tea cake at their wedding. Very famous amongst the royals, rich tea. So you're in good company there, Chris.
00:08:01
Speaker
Mark, you're not going to escape. Let me come to you. oh Well, I'm definitely not a dunker either. And I think ah my choice would be pretty close to Jaya's, actually.
00:08:13
Speaker
i don't know I don't know whether you can get these in Malaysia, but in the UK we get something called Fox's Half Coated Milk Chocolate Cookies. and they really are to die for. Perfect.
00:08:26
Speaker
Well, with that, I think it's time to talk about student success.
Defining Internationalization Locally
00:08:31
Speaker
Today we're talking about internationalising higher education. But first, I think it's important that we cover some definitions.
00:08:37
Speaker
So what does this term mean? what's it term What does the term mean to you in your own context? who would like to Who would like to go first?
00:08:47
Speaker
I can do. Fantastic. Please, Claudia. I think it has actually changed because Portugal was not really a major destination.
00:08:58
Speaker
We would have some students from the ex-colonies when when I was studying, for instance, in the ninety s but It was not a big thing.
00:09:10
Speaker
It's, you know, with with the a drop in demographics, there's not, you know, the number of 18 years old is decreasing. So institutions are trying to attract and they've been successful in attracting.
00:09:26
Speaker
more international students. So I think it has been a shift internationalization when we had little, a few students international students, I think it was much more about internationalizing the curriculum and preparing natives for an international outlook.
00:09:42
Speaker
and Now, I think it's much more about ah making the most of the experience of the natives and the international students that come.
00:09:54
Speaker
So the international students can learn from the natives, but the natives can also have the experience of learning alongside people from other countries and getting that perspective.
00:10:08
Speaker
No, that's interesting, Claudia, and and and I think you're right. it is going to mean different things to different people. um Martha, what would you like to come in on? Yeah, I think that's exactly that. is Even within our own organisations, we've got different terminology, different understandings of what it might mean. So internationalisation of the curriculum, as Claudia has highlighted there, ah making sure that our student experience and the the learning that takes place is is a really rich and global focus and in terms of the content of it, focus on global challenges, global kind of student student community.
00:10:42
Speaker
But there's also those kind of thorny issues around student fees and funding, who counts as an international student, and the wider support that we offer out to students. So in Harriet Watt context, for example,
00:10:54
Speaker
in our Dubai campus, most of the students there will be international to Dubai as a context, but will be living there. and So the kind of incoming students who are international, who travel into Dubai purely for the purposes of study, need support in terms of being um getting adjusting to the the new environment.
00:11:16
Speaker
but there So I think there's a more complexity and a kind of nuancing of our understandings of international that we need to to be thinking through. And then, of course, what we talk about as T&E and our kind of global campus networks, that again is shifting and changing as the landscape globally is is moving.
00:11:37
Speaker
Yeah, those nuances are really, really important, aren't they? Because it does have to be contextualised depending where we are.
Challenges in Internationalization Partnerships
00:11:43
Speaker
um Chris, what's your experiences on?
00:11:48
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, as as as Claudia and and Martha have said, you know, there are a range of different ways of thinking of internationalisation. And, you know, it is quite a baggy monster, but it's quite useful in those terms as well. You know, on the one hand, it's about kind of internationalising the curriculum.
00:12:04
Speaker
It's also about internationalising the campus, you um It's about global skills and global experiences. It's also, you know, the the solutions to the world's problems and lots of universities link their education to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are not to be found in isolation, they are to be found in partnership.
00:12:23
Speaker
And so those kind of approaches have to be kind of global in outlook because the challenges we're going to face in the next years are global in scale. um You know, for me, and it goes back to something Martha said, you know, there is the connection as well now in the kind of common currency of the language to the sense that we have, you know, a lot of international students and even the government's 2019, the UK government, that is, 2019,
00:12:49
Speaker
um ah international education strategy had a very very firm economic focus so there are a range of different ways of of thinking about internationalization um and I think probably looking at them together is quite important.
00:13:03
Speaker
Yeah definitely and and I think you're right there's so many different drivers and and that the the the world has become so much smaller um and we do need to think about these in in that much more holistic approach but actually having some kind of definition around it is is always helpful just to to try and understand where it is and what we need to try and pin our hat on.
00:13:21
Speaker
Jaya, what about from your experience? um Yeah, I was going to echo what everyone else has said about the the the many ways to define internationalization.
00:13:32
Speaker
And the one thing I find helpful whenever I try to define something is to think about what it's not. um And so I realized when I think about internationalization, not...
00:13:46
Speaker
it's not ah for one thing, it's not just ah or should not be just a philosophy, nor just a policy or or even just a process, but it's the people.
00:14:00
Speaker
ah The people become the motivation for international internationalization and the people become the means to make it happen. ah So when you think about the motivation ah to equip learners to contribute within an international and intercultural and global society,
00:14:18
Speaker
You think about the means, ah it is the people that internationalizes the institution or the curriculum. It is the people that contribute to the diversity and create the connections and so on. so So one thing, it's the people.
00:14:34
Speaker
It's not just ah about teaching, but holistically it affects the institution in terms of research, in terms of the service to society as well.
00:14:45
Speaker
And I'd also like to say that it's not just or should not be just ah a global West or a global North agenda that only benefits a select group of people or maintains a lopsided domination of a specific demographic.
00:15:02
Speaker
There has to be reciprocity. ah It's a vital element of internationalization with benefits to all regardless of geography, regardless of socioeconomic status.
00:15:15
Speaker
And it takes genuine respect of different cultures, of different values without seeking to impose a specific worldview. So I find it useful for myself at least to kind of define it along what it's not and then focus on what it is.
00:15:32
Speaker
Yeah, thank you. No, I just wanted to pick up on a couple of things that Jaya and Claudia had said about it. We seem to be in a period of kind of, don't know, evolution, revolution, probably evolution, moving away from seeing from a UK perspective anyway, seeing it some kind of um cash cow a means of overcoming kind of financial difficulties.
00:15:53
Speaker
to being more a relationship between um partners and more more of ah that kind of partnership working. And there does seem to be ah um increasing desire um amongst institutions in what what might be loosely termed the global south. I know these terms are highly problematic, but But, you know, more of a more of a wish, not not just to be seen as, so you know, so as a as a purchaser of something from from the the global north, as it were, and actually, you know, to be proper partners, to even, you know, perhaps be, if we want to talk about exporting things, to it maybe exporting, you know, their offer, if you like, to other parts of the world, and also, know,
00:16:38
Speaker
much more collaboration within certain parts of the world as well that that don't involve you know the UK, Australia, America, Canada and so on and so forth.
Mobility and Global Engagement
00:16:49
Speaker
Claudia, did you want to come in? Yeah, because this idea of collaboration that you were mentioning, and I think you were mentioning it more you know across the globe. but But I think ah we can look closer ah to home, well, to our home where we are not...
00:17:07
Speaker
not everybody is here, but where I am, and at least in Europe, because you have seen with the Erasmus, we have 50 years of the Erasmus program, which was incredibly influential in ah moving people around in a collaborative way.
00:17:24
Speaker
But also now the idea of the European universities is very much about that. So the coalition of universities their shared education offers, shared students and so on.
00:17:36
Speaker
But it's not just about the students, it's about the staff as well. Because ah there's a lot of staff exchange within Europe through Erasmus as well. And so i think it's, you know, obviously it's never always always plain sailing, but it seems to me that is a good case. and And, you know, we can learn from from that from the integration of the European higher education area. And I know that in Asia and in Latin America, there's been similar similar initiatives so that you collaborate across borders in in higher education.
00:18:18
Speaker
so Thank you, Claudia. I wonder if if partnership is is one of the themes that's emerging or or or um a drive towards greater partnership is one of the one of the themes within internationalisation of higher education at Ramadar. I wonder what other themes or or trends colleagues have have noticed that that they're in at their institutions.
00:18:42
Speaker
um Martha, is there anything in particular that you've noted at Heriot-Watt that seems to be emerging? Yeah, a couple of things, actually. um ah but Just picking up on the the conversation that we've been having, I think that emergence of educational hubs,
00:18:59
Speaker
The idea that you are going to be um talking about internationalization as inward mobility to the UK seems quite a narrow view now. So it's actually thinking about imports, for example, of Dubai, of Malaysia as a hub for regional internationalization. So that ah rather than coming into the UK, you'll be going to to uk ah know ah to to universities that have links to the UK that may have regional hubs, campuses.
00:19:29
Speaker
So that's a ah trend that we're seeing. And the the sort of thriving nature of our Dubai campus is is kind of totally tantamount to that. ah But also in terms of the the level of student experience. Our students are expecting to be engaging with international ah issues, with global challenges, with sustainability, and they're expecting to see that not just in the curriculum, but in that wider student experience.
00:19:55
Speaker
So that's something that we really need to take seriously. We're thinking not just about what we teach, but how we teach it and create that sense of a global community and a global classroom that that students are really going to thrive in.
00:20:08
Speaker
Thanks, Marcel. um Jaya, how about you? any Any trends, any themes emerging in for Nottingham in Malaysia? Yeah, ah so we are in a um an interesting position here in Malaysia.
00:20:25
Speaker
The country as a whole came up with an education blueprint that aimed to have 250,000 international students by this year in And um I mean, whether we meet it or not, we see how serious the government is to push internationalization.
00:20:47
Speaker
And so we are beneficiaries of such policies. And so in in the University of Nottingham, Malaysia, we are responding by doing things like ah revising our curriculum, making sure that it is a global curriculum,
00:21:02
Speaker
ah not just to meet trends, but also to help students to address global challenges, of course, such as making sure that we embed SDGs and so on.
00:21:14
Speaker
We're making sure that the curriculum is flexible. um So we have examples in our ah School of Education with its postgraduate programmes. So that the the new flexible curriculum allows students to tailor their studies, select modules that align with interests and goals. And and so it widens the net a little bit more and helps make the programme more global.
00:21:42
Speaker
So these are some of the things that we are doing here. Of course, ah we we do have our strategy that ah emphasizes that has a focus on people and partnerships.
00:21:55
Speaker
And so the strategic strategic plan of the university itself almost has has it bookended with a focus on people at the start of the strategy and then global engagement towards the end of the strategy. So all these things kind of ah drive the the agenda of internationalization from um how from where we are.
00:22:16
Speaker
Thanks, Joy. Chris, how about how about you? i think there are there are kind of three things that ah suppose I suppose I've I think are emerging and they've been mentioned already. you know One is the sense that students come to you rather than the education goes to the students.
00:22:34
Speaker
It's gonna be you know outmoded and outdated because you know Asia is half of the world's population for the next three generations. ah Affordability will mean that traveling to the inverted commas west won't be an option and actually delivering in the kinds of modes that Harriet Watt and others are delivering is gonna be important.
00:22:53
Speaker
ah have Having we said that, for students, quality is absolutely critical. you know Whatever nation you're looking at, for students, educational quality is is tantamount.
00:23:04
Speaker
So there's that. Secondly, of course, online, and we haven't talked a great deal about that yet, but that's an increasing ah trend, obviously. And thirdly, certainly something I'm noticing frequently in the UK anyway, but it's really, I think, emerged from the demands of a wider international student population.
00:23:23
Speaker
And that is the focus and necessity of employment and employability at the heart of the curriculum. That is absolutely critical. And working out what that means globally is something we've yet to do properly.
Trends in Education and Mobility
00:23:35
Speaker
You know, we can't track it yet, but it's something that, you know, I know you UKI, for example, are really keen to look at.
00:23:40
Speaker
Actually, i've ah I've just read a very recent publication of the OECD on internationalization, and this focuses on the OECD, but what ah what comes out very clearly is that internationalization, even movement of people, so not just distance learning, has continued to increase despite the COVID pandemic. So the last five years for which there's data, it was an increase of 18%.
00:24:15
Speaker
And of course, this in-person mobility, right, it increases ah with education level. So it's it's higher at master's level, it's even higher at the doctoral level.
00:24:30
Speaker
um and And the other thing that you see is that ah it's disproportionately concentrated on certain fields. ah namely the the so-called STEM fields. i'm not a big fan, but the sort of harder skills.
00:24:45
Speaker
and We can speculate about why that is. It might be because its ease you know it transfers more ah because if you study ah law or the professions, is it's more difficult to do it ah in a foreign language or in a foreign country. There are than professional barriers, but also links maybe to what Chris was saying about employability.
00:25:09
Speaker
So people are looking towards subjects with a quicker transition to the job market, more market-facing jobs. The other thing is that we have been talking about the English-speaking countries, right? The United States, Australia, Canada, the UK, which are known to have...
00:25:30
Speaker
and higher education almost as ah an export service. But in fact, if you look at the data, you have many other countries with double-digit international students. You know, Portugal, the Netherlands is a classic case because they've been teaching even at undergraduate level in English.
00:25:50
Speaker
But the Eastern Europeans, Slovak Republic, Latvia, Estonia, Turkey has been a hub now for the Middle East and and North Africa.
00:26:03
Speaker
And even in Latin America, from a very low base, it's increasing. ah So Chile, for instance, is attracting. So you see also it's becoming really multipolar.
00:26:14
Speaker
It's no longer concentrated on the English-speaking countries, ah which I found very interesting. you You can't see it in the volume numbers because when you talk about Portugal or the Netherlands, they're very small countries.
00:26:27
Speaker
But when you see it in percentual terms, so I find these quite interesting. And i actually, until I looked at the numbers, I was not aware of this. That's fascinating. Thank you.
00:26:40
Speaker
Chris, did you want to pick up on something? saw your hand come up briefly and then it went down again. Yeah, I mean, I can put it up here. It's just echoing really what Claudia was saying, you know, that if you if you take, and this is just UK-related transnational education, but that has doubled from 350,000 students to about 700,000 students in 10 years.
00:27:00
Speaker
And that shows that the emphasis is on partnership, you know, overseas rather than delivery here. So it is about mobility.
00:27:10
Speaker
Stuart? Yeah, I just wanted to come back to the employability one. It's been mentioned a couple of times, and as we know, global competencies are seen as valuable graduate attributes, in particular by employers.
00:27:25
Speaker
But I'm just keen to understand what colleagues would put on a a list of important global competencies. and and And I guess I'll ask you for your top one, and then if someone's already said it, you can...
00:27:37
Speaker
You can then go with your second one and it will just give us a ah flavor of what what's out there at the moment. um Jaya, can I come you first? For me, it would, well, I was debating between two. So ah since I'm the first one and you said one each, so like let me give you my first one.
00:27:54
Speaker
ah My first one would be intercultural communication. um And it's, I think when I say and intercultural communication, of course, the, the,
00:28:07
Speaker
the immediate thing you think of is the ability to communicate, right? so So, ability to communicate, ability to communicate effectively, ability to communicate effectively with people from different cultural backgrounds and so on.
00:28:20
Speaker
But it's not just about ah what you communicate or how you communicate. It's also about understanding um the perspective, the values of others as well.
00:28:33
Speaker
So in order to communicate, ah we often talk about how you need to be a good listener in order to be a good communicator. And so I think the important competency would be intercultural communication, both in the way and how, ah in in what and how you communicate, but also in the way you are sensitive and and a good listener, taking in the perspectives and values of others as well.
00:29:01
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, I think that awareness is is absolutely critical and something that's critical for all, for all not you know not just in terms of internationalising or internationalisation.
00:29:14
Speaker
Martha, let me come to you next.
00:29:17
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's that boundary but around employability, I think is really important. And being able to work or to be and to be able to learn be ah beyond boundaries.
00:29:29
Speaker
whether that's the borders of disciplines, whether it's between professions, um as well as across national borders. So getting that sense, the competencies in in being, as Jaya's highlighted, about being able to listen, about being able to be respectful, to be able to work, bringing together a breadth of experience, different knowledges to solve challenges.
00:29:52
Speaker
So I think it's not just about having the competencies, but being able to apply them in real world context is what's really going to be important for our students to be able to do, and indeed for our staff to be able to teach and to be able to work in those environments.
00:30:06
Speaker
Yeah, that that's um that authenticity is so critical um because it can be a very sterile environment if if they're not able to put that into practice. Claudia, from your experience, what competencies do you think are up there, notwithstanding the the ones we've had already?
00:30:25
Speaker
Yeah, well, I think even from my experience, I was an Erasmus student in France. Then I did my final year a project, for my engineering degree in German, and then my PhD in the UK.
00:30:38
Speaker
And it's not always easy. Looking back, you see the value of it, but often it's uncomfortable, right? Because you you leave your comfort zone. And it's not just linguistically, it's culturally.
00:30:52
Speaker
And so I think you also build some resilience in handling uncertainty and ambiguity and not knowing what to do because it's not your own home and your own culture.
00:31:05
Speaker
I think this is important because even if then you go back to your country and work in your country, yeah I mean, it's a tough world out there. Things are always changing, you know, and to have that adaptability, I think it builds some adaptability and resilience as well. um So I think this is ah this is some valuable competencies and for your personal life, but also in the labor market, right?
00:31:35
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that will resonate with many colleagues within the higher education sector at the moment but about that uncertainty and ambiguity and how we do need to be adaptable.
00:31:47
Speaker
would just add to, I really loved how you framed that, Claudio. It's that sense that about a lived experience. It's not just a competency or a skill that you can take off, but actually that real lived experience of but being able to to operate in those environments and to understand what it feels like to to be in ah in ah in an uncomfortable place, to be somewhere that you're not familiar with and to be able to to operate and um and work collaboratively in that space.
00:32:14
Speaker
think that's just such a powerful piece to to to flag about it's about the real world experience, not the competency or the skill as a checklist. Yeah, thank you, Martha. I think that is absolutely valid. and And also, you know,
00:32:29
Speaker
not wishing to go down many different routes, but the the support that's necessary for students that they're experiencing that as well and and in that that like ah whole ah student life cycle um and the mechanisms that need to go in around that. um Bringing it back to competencies, Chris, is there anything there that you feel is missing just off the top of your head?
00:32:49
Speaker
I mean, I don't think there is anything missing. I think that's covered all of it really well. You know, you you do have the technical competencies that you learn. But as you say, as others have said, it's about lived experience. um In a way, it's thinking of kind of internationalization or global education as a value.
00:33:04
Speaker
You know, is an ethical dimension to It's about understanding the position of the other. You know, and that's incredibly important, particularly as you move into the space of partnership working across countries. You know, people from very different backgrounds from very different countries, which is going to be the future of work. You know, that will be ah for sure. So they're the kind of skills that you you do want to emerge. But it's a values based thing as well, I think. think they um that point's a really interesting one, Chris, around the kind of...
00:33:31
Speaker
the ethics um of of of some of this around, particularly around kind of citizenship and what
Virtual Exchanges vs. Physical Mobility
00:33:37
Speaker
have you. And I just i just wondered whether we might kind of move on a little bit, pick up on something that that Martha said around lived experience.
00:33:46
Speaker
For most of our students, well, certainly most of my students didn't get that lived experience. you know But that doesn't mean they don't need to have a kind of international perspective on things. So how do we how do we do internationalization in place?
00:34:03
Speaker
you know so what about, what about i don't know what the percentages are, claude Claudia probably could tell me, um but as a proportion of students who actually go overseas and do the the physical mobility thing, um I suspect they are a minority.
00:34:18
Speaker
but But everyone has got to live in this in this kind of global world, as it were. So how do we how do we deliver internationalisation when students aren't going to be mobile? I don't know. Does anybody want to offer any observations from their own institutions? Chris, do you want to chip in?
00:34:37
Speaker
Yes. So, I mean, like lots of universities, we're looking at virtual internationalisation. um And the kind of other underlying cause of that is kind of environmental sustainability, of course, as well. But I mean, I have to say it is a bit problematic in my mind because I was one of the very lucky people who benefited from physical mobility, you know, in the same way that Claudia was talking about it. You know, i was incredibly lucky. And there's something about getting certainly um kids from some of the groups, low participation groups that have been a real focus of the universities that I've worked in overseas and engaging with overseas projects in order to build that kind of adaptability and resilience that we were talking about.
00:35:17
Speaker
But, you know, there are frameworks for doing it and, you know, doing it in partnership with other organisations, particularly other universities or other colleges, is is really is really important.
00:35:28
Speaker
Durban University of Technology have a really nice framework for kind of virtual mobility that covers, you know, that from kind of working, co-working on projects, co-developing modules, co-delivering modules, you know, all of the various kind of ranges of it.
00:35:43
Speaker
um But, you know, I haven't quite, I suppose, squared it in my own mind with as an equivalent to physical mobility. And, and you know, i'd I'd like I mean, one of the things id I would have liked to have done in my last university, but i wasn't able to it would have been, you know, take students en masse over to the Hull Ferry and take them over to, you know, partners in in mainland Europe, you know, from from where we were, particularly after Brexit. But we didn't quite get there. Martha, I can see you itching to come in.
00:36:13
Speaker
Yeah, I heard what we've we're kind of fortunate in that we've got our campus location. So that go global opportunities in a kind of ah safe learning environments, you go into familiar learning environment, but different cultural space um has offered those opportunities for students to go for a semester or for longer.
00:36:33
Speaker
And we've also started to introduce shorter mobility spaces so that people can go across but for shorter periods of time that might fit better. with their lives. But picking up on what Chris was saying about sustainability, you have to justify that. You have to make sure that that's a really rich learning experience, that people are are going to be be making that commitment ah personally and in terms of of global sustainability.
00:36:59
Speaker
So we've been looking about ah how you embed that within the curriculum. utilise those partnerships for, in our case, the Global Campus and Network, ah to be able to offer offer kind of a real global classroom experience. So students working together, having to negotiate and navigate time zones to be able to work with with part with others in group work with peers in Malaysia or Dubai or or Scotland, how you how you flex that.
00:37:30
Speaker
So making it real world relevant. back to what we've been talking about. This is what global working will be like for many students as they step into beyond their studies.
00:37:41
Speaker
So think about how you make that real world relevant and and make it a meaningful learning experience. That's where the exciting pedagogic challenges are at the moment. I also wanted to flag and maybe colleagues across the the group will have thoughts about how we bring online learners into that space as well, how we create opportunities to use campus hubs to bring online learners together and and have opportunities that are relevant for them.
00:38:08
Speaker
Again, I think that's a really interesting pedagogic and a practical challenge that we'll need to step through in in the coming years. Thank you for that, Martha. Jai, I just want to bring you in around internationalisation in place, as it were.
00:38:22
Speaker
Yeah, I find this question rather interesting because I am a beneficiary of internationalization at home. um So growing up, we couldn't afford ah for me to go overseas, ah and nor was I intelligent enough to secure competitive scholarships.
00:38:41
Speaker
I don't believe it. So um i I was definitely... ah ah beneficiary of what occurred here in Malaysia as the education started to open up and ah international students started coming in and um I think about the work we do here in the University of Nottingham, Malaysia.
00:39:06
Speaker
oh One of it is internationalising the curriculum, right? And and just thinking of internationalising the curriculum, ah one important thing that we do here is to include the voices of international students in co-creating the curriculum.
00:39:25
Speaker
ah that kind of opens up the curriculum to new perspectives. And we found that very helpful. um The other thing I wanted to pick up on what has already been said ah regarding using ah the virtual path platform, ah connecting via internet,
00:39:42
Speaker
There's something I find find interesting, although we don't apply as it is called, but there there are different versions, I'm sure, across other institutions as well.
00:39:54
Speaker
ah ah The COIL, the Collaboration Online International Learning, And there's a study in 2023 that found ah how ah the COIL approach increased intercultural competence among U.S. students.
00:40:16
Speaker
And so ah methods like that can help. ah with internationalization at home, we've definitely done something online. We called it the hybrid international performing arts festival, ah where we had a performing arts festival across the creek um the three Nottingham campuses ah in the UK, China and Malaysia.
00:40:38
Speaker
We had Cantonese opera, we had a Spanish-Malaysian fusion of ah called the Alunan, a Spanish-Malaysian musical wave.
00:40:50
Speaker
And then we've also had ah Shakespeare, Demystified. ah So all that coming together across the three campuses, across the world, all thanks to the internet.
00:41:02
Speaker
That sounds great. Claudia, did you want to say anything about
00:41:07
Speaker
I second what Jair was saying. So I know I haven't done it myself, but I have colleagues that have partnered with the colleagues abroad to deliver ah classes together. And then they have groups.
00:41:23
Speaker
ah doing work, student groups that are mixed across different countries ah that work virtually. I think this was a a great benefit of the pandemic is that we normalize the usage of the the internet.
00:41:39
Speaker
and collaborate more. And as I've said, that is also part of the philosophy of the European Universities' Alliances. and Not everything is is ah in person. And you're quite right, Mark. this There's huge economic disparities in in-person student mobility.
00:42:00
Speaker
It's mostly about high and upper middle income countries students, but also those that go abroad that typically are on from the upper middle class. Yes. We found um your your point about the pandemic is well made. When I was at BCU, we were running a ah mobility, short duration mobility because all our students were professional training to be nurses and medics and one kind or another. And therefore going away for a semester was not an option.
00:42:29
Speaker
yeah So we developed kind of short duration stuff and the pandemic arrived and suddenly we couldn't send anybody anywhere. yes So we had to develop um virtual um placements or virtual visits, virtual relationships.
00:42:43
Speaker
And um not only did that then, you know, it was something we could continue once the pandemic was over. So we we could kind of broaden participation. But also we found there was a relationship between the virtual placements and the take up of actual mobility.
00:42:59
Speaker
And there was a spike. And those students who'd engaged in virtual internationalization were suddenly an awful lot more keen and willing to expose themselves to the uncertainties of actual mobility. was fascinating.
00:43:17
Speaker
That's good news. Stuart.
00:43:21
Speaker
Sorry, Chris. Come So I'm just going to ask colleagues, it's a potential trend, a negative trend, actually.
00:43:31
Speaker
One of the things I have noticed is that once kind of financial constraints hit universities, often those kind of opportunities for mobility are amongst the first things to go.
00:43:43
Speaker
But I wondered whether I've just been unlucky, you know, or whether it is a kind of trend that actually, know, how do we shift it from these being nice to haves to understanding that these are kind of essential part of the learning experience?
Sustaining Mobility Programs
00:43:56
Speaker
Because they are difficult to scale, you know, it is difficult to afford them at scale. And it is the scale of them that can have the big impact, you know, if we can get most of our students engaging with these kinds of things. so That's a really good question. Does anybody want to kind of come back on that one?
00:44:13
Speaker
I think we could also envisage extending this, not just in terms of the curriculum for the degree programme, but also ah sort of a transition period, the the internship or the the French call it the stage.
00:44:33
Speaker
and And so this could be also an opportunity. So you do your curriculum and often, as you were saying, Mark, it's not really feasible to go abroad.
00:44:44
Speaker
But then maybe you can go abroad ah you know immediately after finishing your degree program to do an internship. That can be more sustainable in the sense that you are working and then maybe organizations that are willing to pay or at at least help because you will be already doing some work.
00:45:04
Speaker
and So this is something that I've seen. Maybe it's easier in some fields than others again, ah but it's one possibility of extending this.
00:45:16
Speaker
Thank you. Martha, did you want to pick this up?
00:45:20
Speaker
Yeah, so there's two elements to it. One is about very intentional curriculum design and programme design that's making that that helps students build those competencies and into real world experiences as they step through their studies. I think that kind of building in the collaborate global ah into your your curriculum your curriculum design very intentionally um it is a really exciting area where we're seeing and that kind of very emerging and some really creative work in that space, but also thinking about what we do with the breadth of our partners, partnerships.
00:45:54
Speaker
So not just about going global to study, but working globally. And very much what Claudia is saying, that how do you utilise those networks that we're all forming now, those partnerships, so that the breadth of opportunities for students extends.
00:46:10
Speaker
So thinking about how you build in work global experiences as well as study global experiences will be really, really important for us to to collaboratively work on in the months and years ahead.
00:46:23
Speaker
Jaya, I can see you want to come in on this. Yeah, ah I was just reminded of a ah study. So were talking about Erasmus, right? So there's this, the Erasmus Impact Study.
00:46:34
Speaker
um I think that was published in 2014. And one of the things it says is that the era Erasmus effect could be extended to non-mobile participants. And so I understand about the the point about scalability.
00:46:47
Speaker
ah So you would expect that, you know, the more you can send on, mobility exchanges and so on, ah the better. But ah even if you can send a few, I think the ah that the knock-on effect will be better than nothing at all.
00:47:06
Speaker
The one thing i'd I'd kind of pick up on as well is if you do have international students on campus, then there are opportunities there. mean, my experience has sometimes been that that the international students and the home students don't always...
00:47:24
Speaker
mix And particularly the home students, you know, have have no real incentive, you know, often to to kind of mix with the international students. the The international students might have more of an incentive because they're quite keen to sort of break down barriers and feel more at home and what have you. But...
00:47:39
Speaker
And and it can there can also be kind of cultural difficulties. of Obviously, you know, in in the UK, you know, let's face it, there there is a drinking culture among students that can be a complete barrier for for for some international, well, some many home students as well.
00:47:54
Speaker
So there can be difficulties in in in that regard. But I do i do think, um i hate to use the term resource, but but those students are a resource if if we if we think about it um in terms of broadening our home students perspectives and giving them some insight to you know the way you do things uh you know uh harry is not the way it's done all over the world and and it might be a good thing for you to realize and appreciate that um chris ah just before we move on it looked like you wanted to kind of add something i suppose it was just so you know
00:48:31
Speaker
We have the Turing scheme now rather than the kind of Erasmus scheme, of course. And, um you know, whilst I was certainly not a fan of exiting the European Union, um the opportunity of the Turing scheme has been to make partnerships outside of Europe as well. And and that's been that has been great benefit. And now we can do and it can support shorter mobility.
00:48:51
Speaker
But you know we we will probably all know that historically the students who have gone and undertaken mobility have been students who have been better off and it's those students from low participation backgrounds who have needed some support to do it and you know incentivizing that as a system i think is really important so whilst i absolutely agree that you know it's better for some if we can't get all of the students out. But we've got to remember that the students who might benefit the most from mobility experiences are the ones perhaps who can afford it the least.
00:49:23
Speaker
And I go back to your point earlier as well, Chris, that when when times are hard financially, then, you know, finding the resources to kind of supplement that kind of that kind of programme.
00:49:35
Speaker
I won't say cover it completely, but but to to try and at least, you know, buoy it up slightly. it's hard It's hard to find those resources when when institutions are struggling to pay the bills. Although would be tri interesting to know whether there are any universities who hypothecate funding from it's in their international activities to support...
00:49:55
Speaker
proportionally um internationalization activities and mobility activities. That is really good, that is an interesting question. I have no idea. Yeah, I have no idea.
00:50:08
Speaker
Hopefully I'll be able to come to you in a few years and say that. Excellent. Stuart, did you want to it move us on? Yeah, it's probably time to move on a little bit there. It was fabulous conversation. There's so much to pick up on. um You know, just touching on the unintended consequences of the the pandemic, which actually some of which can be a positive. So that drive to online.
00:50:30
Speaker
But also just really wanted to touch upon the the fact around um engagement with employers and the the opportunity to have placements, even if it's post um completion of studies.
00:50:41
Speaker
um Because we know that has such a positive effect. And it was making me think that the the one thing that I would like to change, if possible, was how we work much closer with employers, um not necessarily just aligned with the subject matter, but also in those different areas where where just having that level of degree-ness is what's required to to work.
Motivations for Internationalization
00:51:00
Speaker
um And so I guess the question to to put back to our guests is if there's one thing you could change about internationalization and the approach to it within HE, um what what would it be from your perspective? What's the one thing you would like to to to see done differently, I guess?
00:51:15
Speaker
um I'll open the floor. Who would like to go first? i can I can say something. And indeed in a way, it's also linked to to the to to the employers.
00:51:27
Speaker
I think I would like to change more the what Mark was saying, not just seeing...
00:51:38
Speaker
international students as a resource, they are, for the natives, but also the other way around. So I've seen some interesting experiences in the Netherlands with pairing international students with native students and more emphasis on learning the local language. Because now we have English, like Latin was in the Middle Ages as the lingua franca, and that's all fine.
00:52:05
Speaker
But for you to have a truly and ah benefit from there from gaining those competencies that we mentioned earlier on, it would be important also to focus on the local language, the local culture.
00:52:20
Speaker
And for instance, that may allow for some low-income students to work in a local bar, in a local pub, make some money on the side. and And so you are more integrated into the culture.
00:52:35
Speaker
And that you know historically and geographically, monolingualism was at the the was an exception. Throughout history, people have spoken different languages and in many geographies, people speak different languages. So it's something that I think I i would like to see more, a better integration of international students into the local.
00:53:02
Speaker
Thank you, Claudia. Mark? No, I was just, I'm sorry. I was watching a comedy programme last night. and it was There was a character in it. He said, I speak four languages and they're all English.
00:53:18
Speaker
Sorry. No, you. Jaya, what would you like to see? yeah If there's one thing you could change differently about how internationalisation is approached? Yeah. For me, when I thought of this, I wasn't sure if it was being naive, but I would like to see change in the motivation for internationalization.
00:53:38
Speaker
um the The primary drivers seem to be institutional prestige, global rankings. it seems to be i mean We talked about money, no doubt you know it is what keeps the institution going, but revenue generation seems to be the driver.
00:53:53
Speaker
ah So what I'd like to see is the motivation changing from all that to genuine intercultural exchange. um And the focus on, as Claudia said, the integration, the focus on accessibility, as we talked about, reciprocity,
00:54:10
Speaker
ah the the um i guess you know fostering inclusive campuses, um at the end of the day those inclusive campuses would proactively encourage engagement between both the international as well as the local students.
00:54:29
Speaker
um So, yeah, so I think just in a nutshell, would like to see the motivation change.
00:54:38
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's really valid. You know, weve've we've got to have these open conversations and and encourage people to to to to look at this and in such a, just such a frank way, to be honest, you know, and if it is getting people to be motivated, that that's that's something which is around cultural change as much as anything. But it is something that we we can do and something that we do need to consider.
00:55:01
Speaker
um Chris, let me come to you. Yeah, I'd echo what um but was just said there in part, you know, and I mentioned earlier the international education strategy. That's purely an economic strategy.
00:55:14
Speaker
And what it really misses is the sense that there's value to education beyond that. So I echo that. But I suppose for me, um and this is probably just because of my background and my interests, but what I'd like to see is that kind of broader connection between education.
00:55:28
Speaker
um university civic or local missions, regional missions and their global activities and not see them as intention but as in harmony. you know, Martha's on the call, but Harriet Watt for example has kind of local place-based plans for each of its campuses overseas, well I think that's really impressive.
00:55:48
Speaker
So understanding the role of global education but with in its in that place as well and its connection and so for me it's about you know connecting Ulster up to the to the world and the world to Ulster you know in some ways for the work that I'm doing in Northern Ireland at the moment.
00:56:04
Speaker
Yeah thank you Chris and Martha. Yeah I'd be no surprise I think that focus on community and belonging creating seeing internationalization through a lens of welcoming whether it's welcoming the world to a location or or the or vice versa, I think is really important.
00:56:24
Speaker
But I would also stress that just given the current kind of political headwinds and financial headwinds, it just becomes even more important that if we're going to try to stay true to our values, if we're going to stay true to to appreciating
Staff Development for Internationalization
00:56:39
Speaker
um the diversity that our international students bring, building international communities as part as as really foundational to what we do as universities.
00:56:50
Speaker
it becomes even more important that we flag this, not just as a um the the value of these communities and making that something that we we actually probably have to bring to the fore in our conversation and and really be committed to it as we we step through kind of quite turbulent times globally.
00:57:10
Speaker
um So this becomes a value proposition. not just the financial proposition. Yeah, it's absolutely critical. Mark, i can see you'd like to come in. Yeah, I think one ah one change I'd like um like to propose is around the support for staff, staff development, staff training, staff preparation.
00:57:27
Speaker
um And I just wondered whether colleagues had any thoughts about what training and development staff might need um to do this, because just as many of our students will not have had international experiences,
00:57:43
Speaker
Many of our staff will not have had international experiences other than perhaps going you know to to Spain for a fortnight. So what help and support might they need? Chris, do you want to coat john nu start?
00:57:55
Speaker
Yeah, so one of the things that we're wrestling with, and and it's been mentioned throughout, actually, is and part of it's resource driven you know part of it's about sustainability but part of it's about you know really good pedagogy and and how we can encourage staff to co-develop co-create to get students from multiple locations working on projects together whether they're part of the curriculum or extracurricular in the way that Claudia was talking about activities So you know these things are quite easy to do, and but they tend to fall on the enthusiasts.
00:58:30
Speaker
So how do we kind of hardwire these things in and how do we support staff in what is quite a hard thing to do, which is, you know, even during the pandemic when we had the equivalent of one classroom online, you know, but navigating that for multiple locations.
00:58:47
Speaker
And so I think some development around that would be really, really helpful. And I think, you know, different places are in a different stages of the of a journey as well. You know, at Sheffield Hallam we had 5,000 international students at Ulster there's about 1,000 1,200 and and the multi-campus experience in Ulster where we have Derry-Londonderry we have Coleraine is very very different from Belfast so making sure that staff feel part of the kind of journey and understand the value of internationalization in the broader sense too I think really important.
00:59:18
Speaker
Thanks Martha I saw your hand go up there.
00:59:22
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's it's also about the for staff is about helping them see the value of working as teaching teams and particularly as global teaching teams and what that brings in terms of the fresh knowledge, fresh enthusiasms that you bring as part of ah a teaching team as opposed to a sole academic delivering a course.
00:59:45
Speaker
I think that's fundamental ah to to some of that kind sense of bringing diverse views, diverse knowledges, ah diverse enthusiasms into the teaching team.
00:59:56
Speaker
But of course, to make that happen, many of the global and the digital competencies that we want our students to gain, we need our staff to develop as well. So that's where things like that co-creation of the curriculum becomes a really meaningful, real space when you talk about creating real world learning. You have to bring your students and your staff together in those discussions.
01:00:21
Speaker
And so selling that both in terms of the it's inspiring it's exciting, but actually also offers efficiencies and support for staff, and I think it's really important that we we focus on that as well, this isn't all just about new extra things you have to do, but actually bringing people together into interdisciplinary courses to think about um creating larger courses that you can bring different cohorts together into.
01:00:47
Speaker
offer some efficiencies and and support for staff as well. So we need to keep those those two things in balance when we're looking at supporting staff to work and and teach globally.
01:00:59
Speaker
Thank you. Jai, did you have any thoughts around support and development for staff? I was going to firstly pick up on what Mata said about getting colleagues to see the value.
01:01:10
Speaker
And I was thinking that it would be important to to to embed it or to to find a way to integrate it into the recognition and career progression. ah If you integrate internationalization into promotion criteria or reward and recognition programs, ah that might help add value to the colleague who's going to you know incorporate ah internationalized internationalization into the classroom and so on.
01:01:39
Speaker
So that would be one way to add value to it. Then i was thinking ah other um I guess, competencies that colleagues ah would can acquire through training or workshops and things like that would be things like intercultural compet competencies like you I would like to see, for example, in onboarding sessions, you know people going through cultural awareness ah topics and ah things like inclusive teaching for diverse classrooms.
01:02:12
Speaker
um And and you know even, I would say, you know it may be pushing it, but and ah helping colleagues to improve proficiency in languages relevant to the student demographics that they are they in.
01:02:28
Speaker
um Yeah, so so those are some examples that come to mind. Thank you. Martha? i would I would like to just come in and give a shout out for the work that Jaya and and other colleagues do in terms of and the fellowship networks, because I think that it's not just about creating the networks within your organisation, but for the staff development, the staff support,
01:02:54
Speaker
that you get from from those networks, so the senior fellowship network, the ACN senior fellowship network colleagues at Harriet Watt in Malaysia have an opportunity to then share how with other colleagues in Malaysia what it feels like to be part of global teaching teams and then enhance our sector practice through that.
01:03:13
Speaker
I think those kind of networks are really important collaboration beyond our institutions is so vital in some of of these conversations. I think it's a really good point, Martha, around the power of kind of communities of practice in whatever way, shape or form they are. I'm i'm i'm conscious, mike ah one of my nephews is is doing his doctorate at the moment and and his professors, they're all linked in and connected with colleagues all over the world.
01:03:38
Speaker
You know, he's being inducted into an international environment as a result of his kind of research. um Now, you know, we will have people within course teams who've got a contact here or a contact there.
01:03:51
Speaker
You know, there's no reason why younger, less experienced members of staff couldn't and shouldn't be kind of mentored or or you know partnered up with them on the pieces of work that would help kind of induct them into into this kind of wider global environment. You know you could you can build it into you know academic work planning and you know ah targeting, targeting you know target target setting for the for the year ahead and all sorts of things. It doesn't have to be a formal right, today we're going to run a day on intercultural competencies, valuable though that is.
01:04:24
Speaker
um you know You know what happens when you do that, you know, the people who need it least turn up the most. um
01:04:32
Speaker
I'm sorry, my cynicism's coming through now. I'm gonna i'm gonna but i'm going to shut up. Stuart, I'm sure there was something you wanted to ask.
Assessing Internationalization Effectiveness
01:04:39
Speaker
i was thinking you're beginning to sound a lot more lot lot more like me, Mark, ah an optimist with experience. Yeah.
01:04:45
Speaker
I was just thinking really but both around the professional recognition um and I will give a brief shout out to our our previous episode, which was very much around looking at professional recognition and student success.
01:04:57
Speaker
um But actually that that that professional recognition is potentially a metric to consider because something i you mentioned earlier, Chris, you know, around at times internationalization can be very much around income as opposed to the the civic mission.
01:05:13
Speaker
um So what kind of metrics and indicators should we be looking at in terms of effectiveness? And so, yeah, for me, was you just talking around the the senior fellowship network and the the importance of recognition, professional recognition, that that to me seems like a great indicator to use as opposed to to income.
01:05:28
Speaker
um But I know it's not always that simple. So, yeah, just just an open question really to colleagues, you know, what What indicators, what metrics should we be using when considering the effectiveness of internationalization?
01:05:39
Speaker
so It goes back to the to the previous point. I would like to link this metric to the staff support and development, because one of the things that I think is important is not just the mobility of students, but the mobility of academic and professional support staff.
01:05:57
Speaker
So, for instance, in ah Erasmus, there's also funding for that, it's not just for student mobility. And one thing that I like at my institution in me is that when a member of staff, be it one that teaches or one that is a professional support staff, is that when they come back, they organize and sort of a training session or a talk to disseminate their experience abroad.
01:06:25
Speaker
And often these experiences are short, right? Maximum a week, I would say, you know, well, not maximum, but i would say maybe on average is a couple of days or a week.
01:06:36
Speaker
but But often they're very transformative for people that have never left. and and and And so you could also use a metric, you know, how many of these people go and then how many people are involved in these disseminating activities and monitor that as an institution.
01:06:56
Speaker
Yeah. yeah Very important. Thank you. Chris? but I mean, I think for international students, I would like to see their outcomes measured in the way that in the UK domestic student outcomes are. So I think the experience that a lot of international students have is absolutely terrible.
01:07:13
Speaker
ah Frankly, at some universities, it's unacceptably poor. And i think you know things like the International Student Barometer should be compulsory. and So I think there are aspects of that. What I would like to see is work internationally on assessing the employability of graduates when they're international students um once they've once they've left.
01:07:38
Speaker
You know, we don't have some success in that in UK, but I would like to see that internationally. I don't know how we do that, but it's certainly something that regularly people talk about. We do measure number of student mobility, so we do staff mobility, so we know what percentage of our staff and students go out.
01:07:55
Speaker
But it's much more tricky to so kind of measure virtual mobility and and what you don't want to do is put such a heavy industry around it that it discourages it or diverts resource from it.
01:08:08
Speaker
So those are the kinds of things I think i I'd like to see um if it were possible but it is about getting that balance right between getting the infrastructure that allows you to get the data you know compared to actually supporting the activity.
01:08:22
Speaker
Yes of course. and Martha what what about yourself?
01:08:28
Speaker
Yeah, I would echo what Chris was saying about some of the metrics and and being um so kind of creative and in how we engage with those metrics, making sure we're disaggregating, making sure that we're getting the breadth of data. But there's two other things I wanted to flag. One was that it's important that we don't just focus on the international students, but find ways of measuring what the community as a whole gains, whether that's the university community and the local communities that we're part of.
01:08:56
Speaker
um Gain from that having a rich diverse um university community, what what how we harness that richness. For the benefit of our broad student community and the communities, our civic mission, our civic engagement so be good to think about how we get that. that ah to build that both as individual institutions, but also, I think we need some collaborative work across institutions to look at that at scale and to be able to tell that story out.
01:09:25
Speaker
politically and into the civic environment. i But I would also say that it's quite important that we focus on our alumni and getting in a sense of what they have gained um in terms of the the the international experiences that they've got and what they've taken back into their communities. think that'd be a very interesting piece to follow through on and look and explore it in more detail, that richness and the longitudinal impact of having an international student experience.
01:09:55
Speaker
Yeah, the the the importance of alumni really can't be underestimated, can it? And I think it is something that sometimes is is unfortunately overlooked. Jaya, anything you'd like to add?
01:10:06
Speaker
i was going to ah firstly echo what Mata said about the impact on the community. Going back to the definition of internationalization in the first place, ah I think we missed the point if we don't extend it ah beyond the higher education institution.
01:10:23
Speaker
ah the The impact should be felt ah in the community around it as well. And ah ah thinking of um you know that kind of impact, I guess, if there was a way to measure that, that would be great.
01:10:39
Speaker
um But I also have ah maybe one quantifiable obvious thing would be how many, in terms of inbound and outbound numbers, how many international students and staff are mobilized, ah going ah in and out.
01:10:55
Speaker
And then some that may not, quantifying it may be a little bit more tricky, things related to curriculum and teaching ah innovations. ah Simplest example would be um you know how much of the course content has been have been revised to integrate global perspectives, right?
01:11:15
Speaker
ah ah how How much of the course is incorporating international case studies, global challenges, and so on. So those kind of things might be a bit more tricky to quantify, but it would it would serve as good indicators as well.
Future of Internationalization and Role of AI
01:11:32
Speaker
Okay, well, one of the things that we were going to ask really you was around your predictions for the future and how you think the that the internationalisation landscape is going to evolve or or adapt over the next, say, two or three years or so.
01:11:50
Speaker
So, Claudia, do you do you have any predictions for us? I think internationalization is going to continue and I would imagine that we will have more people from Asian Africa because as we have said previously in this conversation, it has been more of a ah sort of more developed countries.
01:12:13
Speaker
But as the middle class is developed, and I think this is a ah good development, but I think we need to prepare for for different students from different origins.
01:12:26
Speaker
That's my guess. I'll say goodbye then. Bye-bye. Thank you. Thank you, Claudia. Bye, Claudia. Thank you so much. based on what happened with the with the pandemic, that's certainly been the case in the UK.
01:12:40
Speaker
There's been a huge shift in who's coming in terms of international students, who's coming and who's not. um Jaya, do you want to um go next in terms of your predictions?
01:12:51
Speaker
For me, AI could be a game changer. um And I think... ah whether it's internationalization or intercultural competence, especially ah with what I said earlier about intercultural communication.
01:13:08
Speaker
um AI could be used to break down language barriers. um It could be used to simulate conversational ah scenarios that students might encounter in a global context.
01:13:21
Speaker
AI could potentially help and enable students to know different perspectives and norms of other cultures. ah So i've i I see AI as ah as a game changer when it comes to internationalization.
01:13:38
Speaker
So in terms of, are you thinking in terms of using AI to kind of as a simulation, a provider of simulations almost to kind of prepare and equip students? Yes, that's right. Correct.
01:13:51
Speaker
and And help, you know, provide especially When we talk about internationalization at home, AI could provide you know the kind of scenarios that they may not necessarily face in the day-to-day communication.
01:14:02
Speaker
It could simulate those communications. Yeah, fascinating. i think I think the key thing for for me listening to that is i think what would be crucially important is that there would be some kind of human debrief at the end of all of that as well to help students make sense of it all.
01:14:18
Speaker
Because, you know, to make sure that the kind of the learning that they're taking away is the kind of learning we hope for. ah Martha, Martha, in terms of your predictions for the future.
01:14:31
Speaker
um I think it's going to be a time of turbulence and change. I think that we're certainly going to be ah shifts in where the centre of educational power is sitting.
01:14:42
Speaker
um So our hubs and where are the kind of centres of educational education. connection we are going to are going to shift and change. We're going to see great turbulence of how we do partnerships and the how we shape them. I think our ah kind of traditional models of TNE are going to be long gone and we need to be thinking about creative ways of collaborating and working in partnership.
01:15:05
Speaker
And I think we're going to see a real shift in the choices and the decisions that students are making about where they go, if they go, where they go and how they go to different places. So I think there's going be a sense of real change and turbulence ah politically and economically.
01:15:20
Speaker
And I would say that what will stay solid is our need to be clear on our values, why we think diverse learning communities matter. And we'll need to be very solid and very strong and very vocal in why we think those are are vital for our institutions.
01:15:39
Speaker
Thank you so much. Chris.
01:15:43
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I just echo what colleagues have said, really, you know, on the one hand, technology, AI, opportunities for supporting students, simulating activities for students will come to the fore, certainly with a level of rapidity already that we hadn't anticipated even two years ago. I think we're seeing those in the classroom.
01:16:04
Speaker
And on the other, you know partnership working is going to be increasingly important for various reasons. One, you've got to acknowledge the kind of the fact that the it challenges those old authoritarian notions of kind of colonial,
01:16:21
Speaker
effectively Big Ben beaming out time across the empire. you know we We have to do things in partnership now, and I think that's really important to recognise. But it also de-risks financially activities for UK universities, and and that's going to be increasingly important.
01:16:36
Speaker
um And it does mean, therefore, that a global perspective is even more even more important. Thank you, Chris. joke before you Before you sort of wrap things up, could I just add one thing around the metric? We kind of got cut off for time there, but i just wanted to chip in.
01:16:54
Speaker
I suppose what I'd like to say is is to kind of put in a plea for the qualitative data as well as the quantitative data, because I think that the risk is that we look for the quantitative evidence that this is having any kind of impact.
01:17:08
Speaker
And in so doing, we blind ourselves to a whole range of experiences that that it's impossible to capture with with a percentage or or a number. And, you know, those student voices, those staff voices, those community voices, you know, and you know employers or or others who are kind of you know benefiting from this. I mean, I know from my own experience at BCU, some of the voices that came back from the the people that our students have been working with or partnered with or whatever well were absolutely wonderful to to read, you know, humbling to read, quite frankly.
01:17:49
Speaker
um And yet, if all you do is go for a kind of, you know, a metric that is numerical, you miss all of that. Absolutely.
Practical Tips and Calls to Action
01:18:00
Speaker
Colleagues, I'm going to come around and ask you for your top tip. that one tangible takeaway you'd like our listeners to think about going forward um or indeed it may even be a call to action. Before I do I should explain to our listeners we've been working across three different time zones in this podcast um so sadly we've had to say goodbye to Claudia so there won't be a top tip from Claudia right now um but I will come around to our other guests and just ask for that one top tip.
01:18:28
Speaker
So Jai going to come to you first. Sure. um My top tip would be start small. and So simple things like setting up a virtual exchange with a colleague abroad,
01:18:41
Speaker
um incorporating an international case study, like I mentioned earlier, into your next lecture. And then the other thing I was going to say is be curious and not judgmental. So the if you want to start small, one way is to ask why.
01:18:55
Speaker
So why does a certain group of students dress or behave the way they do? Why do they observe a particular celebration or practice? So start small.
01:19:07
Speaker
Thank you. Chris?
01:19:11
Speaker
I mean, it's quite similar in as much as that if you are finding a bit of resistance to internationalization in your organization from ah individuals or groups, try and involve them as quickly as possible to take them on the journey, you know to to take them with you.
01:19:28
Speaker
Nothing kind of changes minds like even going overseas if you can and working together collaboratively in those kind of contexts. And if you can't do that, doing it virtually, but demonstrating to to colleagues who perhaps aren't quite there yet. the The kind of value of these things just does tend to work really quickly and it does focus minds and sharpen opinions quite readily.
01:19:50
Speaker
Thank you. Yes, absolutely. And Martha.
01:19:55
Speaker
I would say keep people and keep your commitment to being a welcoming learning community at the heart of all your decision making and your actions around internationalisation.
01:20:07
Speaker
um and then step that forward very practically. Make sure that learners feel that they matter, make sure that they feel welcomed when they join our institutions, ah make sure that they understand the value of being part of an international learning community.
01:20:22
Speaker
That's not just for international students, but for all of our students and for our staff. So to be really promoting that, promoting the value of it, and then living by those values in terms of how we run our institutions and how we support learning and teaching. Thank you. Lovely to ah come back to values there as well. Mark?
01:20:41
Speaker
Yeah, I just wondered if like if I could add one based on what Martha was saying earlier on about about all of this. And I think that what I'd want to say is the importance of kind of celebrating the value, the worth of this, so that it's not seen as another thing that I've got to think about on top of all the other things I've got to think about, but that people actually...
01:21:02
Speaker
um ah begin to sort of approach this from a point of view, actually, i think there might be something here for me that I can make a contribution to. And there's the old saying, isn't there? Nothing succeeds like success.
01:21:13
Speaker
So, you know, when we have a good result, we need we need to celebrate that. We need to broadcast that. We we cannot assume... that because, you know, we did a good thing, everyone knows we did a good thing.
01:21:24
Speaker
You have to tell people and you have to sort of sing it from the rooftops kind of thing. So that what I would say is, you know, celebrate your successes, create that culture of, you know, this isn't the problem. This is an opportunity.
01:21:36
Speaker
Thank you. Well, it leaves me to draw this episode to a close. So thank you to our guests, to Martha, to Chris, to Jaya and to Claudia for joining us today. To Mark, my co-host,
01:21:49
Speaker
On this episode, um all of your insights have been absolutely invaluable. So, you know, truly truly thank you for your your time. Before we go, i wish to remind our listeners that there is a wealth of resources on our website from the Framework for Internationalising Higher Education, the recent literature review conducted by colleagues from the University of Manchester, and indeed recently, Mark undertook two webinars with guests from across the globe talking to this theme, and those recordings are available too.
01:22:15
Speaker
Next month, we'll be discussing enterprise and entrepreneurship education, and much more can be begin to be unpacked from what promises to be an equally exciting episode. Until then, stay curious and do tell your colleagues and friends and be sure to hit that like follow button.