Global Ambitions, Local Support. Understanding Faculty Influence on International Students' Career Development

During the previous decade, growth in the numbers of internationally mobile students included international high school students. Prior research on international students’ career development in higher education may not account for the unique context of younger international students in secondary schools. The current study investigated career influences for international secondary students, using the Systems Theory Framework ( Patton & McMahon, 2021 ). International students in senior years completed written, open-ended surveys and in-person interviews regarding their career aspirations, plans and key influences on their decision-making. International student coordinators and school staff also offered their perspectives about these influences. Results indicate the inter-related systemic influences of individuals, significant relationships, location and country contexts, the secondary school environment, and perceived characteristics of occupations and future career pathways. Implications for supporting international high school students in the school setting and future research directions are discussed.

This study investigates international students' participation in extracurricular activities (ECAs) that support career development at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), Hungary. Previous research highlights that ECAs also have benefits in enhancing employability and career readiness. However, international students in non-English-speaking countries face limited awareness of career services and restricted access to structured job placement programmes. This study addresses these gaps by examining students' engagement in career-focused ECAs, their awareness of career development resources, and their post-graduation career aspirations. Discoveries from the findings suggest low participation rates in internships, career counselling, and skill-building workshops despite their availability. Additionally, the study revealed that among the 74 participants, there was a lack of knowledge of existing career resources, which influences their employment prospects in Hungary and beyond. The study emphasises the need for targeted career support initiatives, enhanced university-industry collaboration, and improved communication strategies to integrate international students into the labour market.

Introduction

With the accelerating trends of globalization, neoliberalism, and education internationalization, an increasing number of international students choose to study in US community colleges. In order to understand these students' unique career development path, our chapter reviews the career expectations and aspirations of international students attending US community colleges, the common challenges during their career preparations, and provides an overview of on-campus career services provided by community colleges. Among other reasons that will be discussed, we found that international students value American higher education because it provides a high level of career training, more specialized degree options, and can lead to a degree that will make the student more competitive in the international job market when compared to receiving a degree in their home country. We noted several challenges faced by international students during their career preparations, including language and cultural barriers, lack of social capital, unfavorable immigration policies, and perceived employer biases. We also found that community college career services may be more helpful to international students if counselors familiarize themselves with a student's cultural norms and language ability, and are prepared to address common topics such as Immigration and Naturalization Service rules that affect an international student's employment in the United States. We then discuss the limitations of current research and provide future research directions. In the end, we present implications of the findings for community colleges to better support international students' career development needs.

International students account for a significant proportion of medical graduates Australia-wide, and most opting to remain in Australia for their first year of practice (Internship). Hence, understanding this particular demographic's perspectives is crucial for curriculum and workforce planning. Despite this, very few studies have addressed this demographic, and none have explored the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on international medical students specifically. A qualitative design was used to explore the perspectives of final-year international medical students at an Australian medical school as they prepared for transition to internship during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants engaged in a semi-structured interview about the pandemic's personal and professional implications. The data were analysed using inductive thematic analysis. Seven out of 34 final-year international medical students at the University of Adelaide participated. The main themes identified were that isolation was magnified, institutional support was lacking and that uncertainty was challenging. The pandemic did not deter participants from pursuing an Australian internship, as Australia was considered a desirable place for internship compared to their home countries. While the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the situation, many of the challenges identified by international students already existed. Issues such as social isolation, racial discrimination, financial hardship and lack of institutional support have been prevalent for decades. Insights from this study reveal a need to improve the medical school experience. Australian Universities have a responsibility to ensure fair treatment of international students by training faculty, implementing support programmes and ensuring an inclusive and culturally safe learning environment.

ABSTRACTHost and international students evolve side-by side within the expanding internationalization of higher education. This study takes the complementary perspective of analysing 1,900 host and international students’ experiences at a high-ranking research university in France. We analyse and compare the mobility, language practices and practices related to university life of these two populations interacting within a common higher education setting. Despite common needs of language skills for professional needs, our results demonstrate significant differences in their declared concerns and practices, suggesting that each population remains largely within their diverging ‘comfort zones’. We find a lack of social interaction between host and international students, producing a two-way deficit, where many host students miss an opportunity to benefit from practicing foreign languages and discovering new socio-cultural perspectives, while many international students miss an opportunity for local social and institutional support, known to reduce stress. We conclude with suggestions for adapting university policies to remedy this deficiency.

The growing community of international counseling students in the United States has been a vital force in the internationalization of counseling psychology and the diversification of counseling practices. However, their intersectional identity of being both an international student and a counseling student is also associated with a variety of unique challenges in training and career development. This Special Issue includes five articles that address a conceptual model on international students’ social justice identity development, experiences of clinical training and clinical supervision, career barriers and coping efficacy, and experiences of counseling psychology faculty from international backgrounds. Each of these articles discusses challenges faced by international counseling psychology students and provides implications that can be used to facilitate the professional development of international counseling psychology students.

This three-wave longitudinal study examined the reciprocal relationships among perceived parental support, career exploration, and career aspiration trajectories in adolescents, with a focus on collectivist cultural context. The research aimed to clarify how these variables dynamically influence one another during high school and whether gender differences exist in their developmental patterns. Participants included 3233 Chinese high school students (50% male, 50% female; Mage = 15.11 years) from Shandong and Henan provinces. Data were collected across three waves (2018-2020) using validated scales: the Career-Related Parental Support Scale, Vocational Exploration Questionnaire, and Career Aspiration Questionnaire. Latent growth curve modeling (LGCM) was employed to analyze developmental trajectories and bidirectional effects, while gender differences were tested via structural equation modeling. Results revealed significant upward trends in parental support and career exploration, while career aspirations remained relatively stable across the three waves. Higher initial parental support predicted elevated initial levels (β = 0.529-0.964, p < 0.01) and accelerated growth in career exploration and aspirations. Reciprocally, adolescents' career exploration positively predicted subsequent parental support development (β = 0.430-1.204, p < 0.05). Gender differences were nonsignificant except for a minor disparity in initial career exploration favoring males (β = -0.049, p < 0.01). The findings underscore bidirectional dynamics between parental support and adolescents' career development, emphasizing early parental engagement as pivotal for fostering career preparedness. Despite cultural expectations, gender differences were minimal, suggesting evolving egalitarian norms. Limitations include geographically restricted sampling and reliance on self-reports. This study advocates for family-based interventions to strengthen career guidance and highlights the importance of open parent-adolescent communication in educational systems.

ABSTRACTGuided by social cognitive career theory, the current study aims to examine the effect of international students’ personal factors on their career decision self‐efficacy (CDSE) in a postsecondary educational context. We also examine the moderating effect of their cultural adjustment on the relationships between their personal factors and CDSE. Data were collected from international undergraduate and graduate students at a large public university in the United States. Structural equation modeling was adopted to test the hypotheses based on analysis from 341 responses. The results indicated that international students’ positive psychological capital positively influences their CDSE. Their cultural adjustment also moderates the effects of psychological capital on CDSE. The results identified critical factors that influence the career development of postsecondary international students, which may help administrators and career counselors understand the unique issues that international students face in their career development and make informed decisions about strategic priorities and interventions.

This study examined the extent to which two dimensions of cultural adjustment difficulties (i.e., acculturative distress and intercultural competence concerns) predicted two specific career development outcomes (i.e., career aspirations and career outcome expectations) in a sample of 261 international college students from Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Although no significant differences among the participants were found by region of origin and gender, multivariate multiple regression analyses indicated that higher levels of acculturative distress were predictive of lower levels of career outcome expectations among these international students. Furthermore, findings revealed that greater intercultural competence concerns were predictive of lower career aspirations and lower career outcome expectations. Implications of the findings for career counseling with African, Asian, and Latin American international students are discussed.

South African universities have evidenced exponential increases in the numbers of doctoral students, bringing pressure to bear upon traditional supervisory practice. With the literature on the challenges experienced by international postgraduate students at South African universities being very limited, it was anticipated that the challenges experienced by international postgraduate students abroad could be drawn upon to inform supervisory practice. The aim of this paper was to perform a systematic literature review of the challenges experienced by international postgraduate students at universities in other parts of the world. The objective of the study was, firstly, to consolidate the empirical evidence and, secondly, to develop a framework to inform supervisory practice at South African universities. A systematic literature review was undertaken to identify relevant empirical studies relating to the challenges experienced by international postgraduate students. The search was executed by deploying keywords in selected databases. Twenty-one articles were identified and analysed using thematic analysis. The review evidenced that the key challenges that characterise international postgraduate students revolve around linguistic ability, cultural dissonance, academic expectations and isolation. While some studies found a positive relationship between supervisor multicultural competence and supervision satisfaction, supervisors find that both local and international students are equally challenged in academic writing. Some studies conclude that there is no difference in the supervision practice employed for international and local postgraduate students with many supervisors believing that international postgraduate students would be able to find their way through institutional and non-institutional support networks. A framework for the supervision of international postgraduate supervision has been suggested.

The population of international students in South Korea is growing. During the career development phase, international students face unique challenges related to their bicultural identity and acculturation experiences. The present study examined the role of bicultural self-efficacy on mediating the relationship between acculturation and career decision-making self-efficacy for international students in South Korea. Responses from 120 international students in South Korea were analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results showed that bicultural self-efficacy fully mediated the relationship between acculturation to mainstream culture and career decision-making self-efficacy but did not mediate the relationship between acculturation to heritage culture and career decision-making self-efficacy. The implications for effective educational intervention for international college students’ career development were discussed based on the results.

Internships, mentoring, and collaborative projects are three forms of developmental interactions that students can use to acquire knowledge, gain advice, and get support to guide them through the transition to postcollege life. The current research used data from undergraduate senior business majors and a cohort of alumni 3 to 5 years after graduation to examine the short-term and early career outcomes of such developmental experiences. The results suggest that, compared with not having developmental interaction experiences, (a) being mentored leads to more psychosocial support in the short-term and more career development, business knowledge, and psychosocial support once a student has graduated and is working for 3 to 5 years; (b) engaging in a collaborative student project leads to more career development, business knowledge, and psychosocial support; and (c) doing an internship results in more career development support, more job satisfaction, more career satisfaction, more organizational commitment, and faster promotion rates. These findings suggest that making multiple developmental interactions part of a management education curriculum can help students better prepare for the working world.

Every year a growing number of international students move abroad, predominantly to western countries, to pursue university education. They are motivated by various factors both in their home country as well in the prospective host countries and universities. Many of these reasons can be generally characterized in term of push-pull factors, impelling students to leave home and incentivizing them to pursue university education in other countries. However, upon arrival, international students may encounter a myriad of challenges over the course of their university studies. A substantial body of research has documented international student challenges but few studies have focused on their experiences in the Canadian context. The current descriptive survey study focuses on international students’ experiences – challenges, personal and institutional supports – during studies at a Canadian university, as well as their suggestions for what additional supports they think would be helpful. An online survey (n = 712) examined international students challenges within a number of domains: language, financial, academic, environmental and cultural, and personal-social. The majority of the international students reported financial, personal-social challenges. Covid-19 presented additional challenges for most international students. Student employment of various coping strategies (e.g. staying in touch with family) and institutional supports (e.g. international students centre) were also examined. Finally, summarizing the suggestions of student respondents a number of recommendations are made regarding how to improve supports for international students. Study limitations and suggestions for future research are discussed.

The number of international students has grown at universities in the US. According to the Open Door Report (2020) published by the Institute of International Education, there were 1,075,496 international students in the US. In 2010, there were 723,277 international students in the US, According to the Open Door Report (2010). Many universities are looking to increase the numbers even more as a part of their internationalization efforts. US universities have been providing institutional support for international students' success. However, little effort has been made in improving the support of first-year international students. As the increased speed of international students in the US has slowed down because of the global students' recruiting competition, recruiting first-year international students' academic and social success becomes more important than ever before. This study is conducted based on the realization that there is a specific need for investigation on the institutional support for first-year international students. The study aimed to understand the actual experience of the first-year international students and how they describe the institutional support they received in their first year in the US. The study was guided by Russell and Petrie's model of academic adjustment and used Interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) for engaging first-year international students. The guiding question of the study was; What do first-year international students at a mid-sized public university in the South say about the support they receive from their university during their first year? Findings concluded that: Institutions need to (A) build a platform that provides programs and learning opportunities to engage both first-year international students and first-year American students and integrate them into learning opportunities, (B) offer engaging opportunities for the campus community, and (C) provide robust institutional support for academic success. Also, findings show that (D) Providing the institutional support which suits every first-year international student is a challenge, and (E) institutions need to make an effort to study what first-year international students think about current institutional support. --Author's abstract