Global Competencies Research Articles

Transnational governing for the pedagogical ideals of K-12 international education: contrasting PISA and IB

ABSTRACT In 2018, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) added to their PISA regime the assessment of “global competence”. Given this novel, data-driven approach to governing the internationalisation of K-12 education, this study compares this recent intervention to a longer-standing mode of governing for the pedagogical ideals of international education – the approach of the International Baccalaureate (IB) across its 50-year lifetime. It employs a comparative, critical discursive analysis of how these two influential transnational organisations advance the pedagogical ideals of international education in neoliberal times. It illuminates the history and development of the IB’s soft governing for “international mindedness” and the OECD’s more recent approach to governing for “global competence” via PISA. As an entity without state authority, the IB has used a regime of centralised examinations for curricular control and quality assurance in the international schools where it was first adopted. However, IB has never attempted to use formal assessment as a direct technique of governing for international mindedness. Arguably, its liberal-humanist foundations and the need for “malleability” of IB across its many sites of adoption has mitigated from taking a too direct approach to its idealist ambitions. Whereas OECD’s testing for “global competence” is more ambitious and problematic. Despite the OECD’s use of liberal and social-justice vocabulary, its human capital development orientation remains active in its neoliberal conception of global competence. Contrasting these two transnational modalities of governing for the pedagogical ideals of international education, offers insights into the trends and prospects of internationalisation of K-12 education.

Teaching patient-centred communication skills during clinical procedural skill training - a preliminary pre-post study comparing international and local medical students

BackgroundInternational medical students are frequently confronted with intercultural, psychosocial, and language barriers and often receive lower marks in written, oral, and clinical-practical examinations than fellow local students. Training communication competence in procedural skills, such as blood sampling, is further challenge in this particular group of medical students. This pre-post comparative intervention study aimed to investigate the effects of training communication skills during the performance of procedural skills (taking blood samples from a silicone model) in international and local students as part of their clinical practical medical training.MethodsStudy participants performed blood sampling on an arm prosthesis model (part-task trainer) before and after the communication skills training, focusing on accompanying communication with a simulation patient sitting next to the arm model. The pre- and post-evaluation video was assessed by two independent evaluators using a binary checklist, the Integrated Procedural Performance Instrument (IPPI) and global assessments of clinical professionalism in terms of procedural and communication performance. Linear models with mixed effects were used. Group differences regarding global competence levels were analysed with χ2-tests.ResultsInternational medical students did not perform as well as their local counterparts in the pre- and post-examinations. Both groups improved their performance significantly, whereby the international students improved more than their local counterparts in terms of their communication performance, assessed via binary checklist. Clinical professionalism evaluated via global assessments of procedural and communication performance highlights the intervention’s impact insofar as no international student was assessed as clinically not competent after the training.ConclusionsOur results suggest that already a low-dose intervention can lead to improved communication skills in medical students performing procedural tasks and significantly increase their confidence in patient interaction.

Becoming Globally Competent Through Inter-School Reciprocal Learning Partnerships: An Inquiry Into Canadian and Chinese Teachers’ Narratives

This study explores how a Canada–China Sister School Network provides school-based professional learning opportunities for in-service teachers to grow their knowledge and capacity to educate for global competence and citizenship (GCC). In particular, it presents the story of a Canadian teacher and a Chinese teacher who had found ways of educating for GCC through carrying out intercultural and international reciprocal learning in a researcher-supported inter-school reciprocal learning partnership. By inquiring into the Canadian and Chinese teachers’ growth narratives, this study highlights four lessons teachers, educators/researchers, and policy makers may learn from the two teachers. It concludes by highlighting the potential of a relationship-oriented, open-ended, and non-hierarchical international school network in supporting teachers to become more globally competent, foregrounding reciprocal learning and collaboration among school practitioners and researchers.

Modeling a General English Course Integrating Global Citizenship and Global Competence

This study aims to develop a general English course model that cultivates global citizenship and global competence, employing the backward design by Wiggins and McTighe. In order to situate the model in a historical context and thereby help us see its continuity to and distinctiveness from the existing methodologies, this study first explained how various historical teaching methodologies in the field of ESL/EFL were developed and adopted in a way that integrated the needs of the changing world of the past. Then various global citizenship education(GCED) models as an educational response to the multiple crises of the 21<sup>st</sup> century were reviewed along with the significance of respective GCED models for the proposed general English course model. Considering that lifelong learning is crucial in the age of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, this model identifies the critical reading of media articles as a habit that prospective global citizens need to develop over the course of their lives. Thus the model includes core learning experiences for learners to engage in critical reading of media articles and figure out what it is like, so that they can keep practicing it over their lifetime. The kinds of global citizenship education featured in the proposed model are also explained. Following the backward design, the desired results are identified as (1) understanding globalization and global citizens, (2) understanding global competence, (3) understanding technology, and (4) understanding English communication. The assessment evidence is also identified and presented along with learning experiences and instructions developed in accordance with the desired results and assessment evidence.

A Study on the Role of Expectations and Perceived Organizational Support practices in Repatriate Turnover

MNCs are increasingly sending expatriates to their foreign subsidiaries in order to acquire best resources, and to cater to unexplored markets. This requires the executives to develop their global competencies. Once the expatriate has developed skills, far enough to sustain in the overseas, it becomes a challenge to settle him/her back in the home country when the expatriate assignment is over. Research evidences show that, there is a high percentage of repatriate turnover i.e the repatriate leaving the parent organization, upon return from the foreign assignment, resulting in both direct and indirect losses to the parent company. The purpose of this paper is to look into the reasons for repatriation turnover. The proposed model links repatriate turnover intentions to key causing factors such as repatriate expectation upon return and repatriate perception of organizational support practices. Data was gathered from 115 repatriates working in the major oil and gas industry, which included both government and private sector companies. The results of the study conclusively established that unmet expectations of expatriate were a significant cause for turnover intention of repatriate, while ineffective repatriation practices of company was not.

The Case for Christian Global Citizenship Education

With rapid globalization, various forms of citizenship education, peace education, environment education and development education are clustering under the umbrella of what is known as “Global Citizenship Education” (GCED). However, this does not mean that there is consensus on approaches or curricula, due to inevitable differences between traditions, histories, worldviews, cultures and aims. As a result, for instance, some versions of GCED focus on neoliberalism aimed at fostering global competency for better economic opportunities for future generations, while other versions are focused on decolonizing the international system, establishing justice, or democratization. With the world experiencing a global pandemic that has laid bare the self-interest of many nations, this paper discusses the legitimacy and methodology of the Christian approach to GCED based on a review of the literature. Biblical values provide practical wisdom and leadership in each category of global citizenship education, including social justice, globalization, environmental issues, diversity issues, and conflict. However, in constructing a more comprehensive educational framework of global citizenship, faith communities are perceived to be disengaged and lacking leadership. This paper provides a rationale for a call to Christian communities to realize the Bible’s sufficiency and respond to the Cultural Mandate and the great commandment to love thy neighbor through active participation in GCED based on the spirit of shalom.

Interweaving local cultural knowledge with global competencies in one higher education course: an internationalisation perspective

ABSTRACT Developing curricula that responds to the demand for internationalisation in higher education institutions (HEIs) has been gaining wide attention around the world. Taiwan, a country that houses more than 100 HEIs, is a keen member in joining the bandwagon of academic internationalisation. This paper explores the learning process and perceived benefits, as narrated by students from one HEI course, directed at developing students’ local cultural knowledge and global competencies, such as English and technological proficiency, through the means of video-making. An added objective of the course was for students to enter their completed videos to the Bilingual Video Competition hosted by a national university in central Taiwan. Findings from the study demonstrated that through the course, students have not only gained a stronger foothold of their cultural identity and English and digital literacy skills, but the process of the project has also led them to become more agentic and to recognise the importance of team work and collaboration. Suggestions for future studies will be discussed.

Getting Undergraduates Ready for China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) Through an Overseas Experiential Learning Project

In this paper, we explain how an experiential learning course and study tour to Gansu Province (People’s Republic of China) enabled undergraduates at the Singapore Management University (SMU) to acquire 21st-century competencies and higher-order thinking skills by analyzing and evaluating specific aspects of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and China–Singapore (Chongqing) Connectivity Initiative — New International Land–Sea Trade Corridor (CCI-ILSTC) with emphasis on developing viable Go-To-Market (GTM) strategies aimed at selling Gansu produce in four Southeast Asian markets. We share how the course was designed to support the attainment of key learning goals and discuss how we turned pedagogical aspirations into concrete learning outcomes. We introduce key aspects of the so-called “SMU-XO” project that the students conducted in partnership with an industry partner, Pacific International Lines (PIL), and discuss how the project work helped learners to gain global competency by (i) examining critical issues related to BRI such as multi-modal infrastructure connectivity, (ii) appreciating the local perspectives of project stakeholders in Lanzhou and Shanghai and (iii) successfully interacting with people from different cultures, namely China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand.

Bourdieu’s Theory of Practice and the OECD PISA Global Competence Framework

Globalisation has become increasingly important in education, and national systems are no longer defined only by the nation-state. The role of intergovernmental organisations such as the OECD has also become increasingly important, particularly through the development of the PISA tests and the publication of international comparison tables. With a growing recognition of educating for an international and globalised future, the OECD assessed global competence for the first time in 2018, with results released in October 2020. The power that the OECD exerts over its member states, and indeed further, in the field of education through the global competence assessment demonstrates social reproduction. This article examines the OECD’s 2018 Global Competence Framework from a Bourdieusian perspective. An analysis is undertaken of the framework using Bourdieu’s thinking tools of habitus, field and capital, and the mechanisms of pedagogic authority, pedagogic action and pedagogic work, demonstrating an unconsciously agreed power differential between social groups. The OECD, as well as policy-makers at a national level, must consider such implications in anticipating future policy developments in order to enable systemic injustices to be overcome and educational equality to be achieved.

Cultural Intelligence of Foreign Language Lecturers: A Measurement towards Global Competence

This research measured the cultural quotient (CQ) of foreign language lecturers at Bina Nusantara University. Two major research strategies were applied in this research: (1) qualitative approach through the interview, and (2) quantitative approach through CQ scale measurement. Firstly, the CQ scale developed by Ang et al. was tested on ten lecturers. Modifications were made to some test items to suit the context of foreign language teaching. Through the questionnaire, the analysis shows the mean and standard deviation of the overall test at M = 5,19 and SD = 1,7. For each domain of the scale, the analysis indicates that M = 5,16 SD = 1,75 occurs for metacognitive domain, M = 4,4 and SD = 1,57 occurs for cognitive domain; M = 5,4 and SD = 1,6 occurs for motivational domain; and M = 5,5 and SD = 1,8 occurs for behavioral domain. Among ten lecturers, eight lecturers are considered to have high CQ, one lecturer to be medium CQ, and one lecturer to be low CQ. A further bivariate correlation analysis is then conducted to see the relationship between CQ lecturer’s background. The statistical data indicates no significant correlation found between CQ results and lecturer’s age (r = -0,575), time spent living abroad (r = -0,862), and time spent for teaching foreign language (r = -0,644). However, the further interview reveals that the experience of having relatives in a foreign country and living in a diverse cultural group shape lecturers’ paradigm in language teaching.

Toward a Curriculum for the Future: Synthesizing Education for Sustainable Development and Internationalization of the Curriculum

The need to solve the common global challenges at a systemic level in a collaborative, equitable, and culturally sensitive way naturally connects Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Internationalization of the Curriculum (IoC). The purpose of this article is to explore how ESD and IoC can strengthen each other and provide a more holistic student learning experience. The literature on ESD and IoC has been reviewed to identify the intersections in pedagogical approaches to curriculum design, delivery, and assessment. The review demonstrates how the ESD and IoC educational initiatives can be synthesized into a curriculum for the future, in which criticality plays a vital role. To illustrate this opportunity, the example of a curriculum innovation project at the International Business School Maastricht is provided. In this project, the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) model of Global Competence developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) has been applied as the conceptual underpinning for the design of a 2-year learning pathway Intercultural Business. The project highlights that to achieve their aims, ESD and IoC need to function as a joint defining lens for curriculum design and delivery. A collaborative and critical approach offers an opportunity to (re-)imagine the curriculum from the perspective of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) and reach beyond the institution by engaging in sustainable and inclusive social change in line with the civic mission of the institution. The implications for the continuing professional development of lecturers and the need for students’ co-ownership of the curriculum are discussed.

Doppelganger-Inspired Change Effect Model of Faculty Global Cultural Competency

Our student populations' diversity now includes more than just African Americans, Native Americans, Latinos. We are now more representative of a wider range of cultural backgrounds. This shift brings fresh challenges of educator unpreparedness to identify with the unique cultures of international students. The cultural dissonance that international students face compounds this challenge. The cultural unawareness and misconceptions may be generated from both educators and students. The DICE model is inspired by an extensive review of the literature and a qualitative case study methods application. It is a process of fostering global cultural empathy and preparedness of educators by linking such preparedness to evaluating negative attitudinal influences that may block people from changing their thinking, which in turn will negatively impact global empathy preparedness. This is a valid linkage given the influence culture has on attitudes and vice versa and is true in the context of developing global empathy.

REASSESSING CURRENT INTERIOR DESIGN EDUCATION IN EGYPT AS A TOOL TO ACHIEVING GLOBAL COMPETENCE

By the recent focus of the whole world to achieving the sustainable design goals (SD goals) as a part of a better world in 2030, Countries involved (Egypt being one) have already implemented their action plans in all disciplines toward achieving their common global vision. And here comes the question: What is the extent of upgrading that has taken place since then especially in the Egyptian Higher educational sector? And more specifically in interior design education in Egypt? Is interior design education going in the right direction rightfully corresponding the global vision toward global competence? .The research assumes an outdated interior design program in Egypt, unable to contribute to the global vision toward sustainability by lacking exposing important Design approaches that can contribute to that ( E.g : Sustainable design , Inclusive design) and artificial intelligence as the new tomorrow resulting in globally incompetent students as well. This research aims to re-evaluate the current interior design program applied and its extent of correspondence to global vision by using the analytical comparative method .and the results confirmed the research hypothesis where some recommendations will be brought up.

An assessment of pharmacy practice in Libya measured against international standards

Introduction: Practicing pharmacy in Libya is still limited to the dispensing roles. However, pharmacists have started to work proactively to advance modern practices by expanding their roles in different practice settings. Objective: This study aims to evaluate the status of pharmacy practice in Libya through self-assessing competencies of hospital and community pharmacists. Materials and Methods: This is a cross-sectional online survey study of community and hospital pharmacists. The survey questionnaire was based upon the “Global Competency Framework for Pharmacists̶ and the Joint FIP/WHO guidelines on good pharmacy practice. Results: A total of 199 responses were received with 93% response rate. 47.0% were community pharmacists, 39.4% worked both in hospital and community, and 13.6% practiced exclusively in hospitals. 10% of respondents graduated in 1980–1989; 15% graduated in 1990–1999. 30% graduated in 2000–2009, and 45% graduated in the past 8 years before the study (2010–2017). The overall pharmacy competency indicators were reportedly met consistently by 45.3% of respondents, usually by 25% of responders and only sometimes or rarely by 15.9% or 13.8% of respondents, respectively. Conclusions: Pharmacy practice in Libya is more population and system-focused than being professional and patient-focused. Significant amendments in pharmacy education curricula are required to include modern teaching methods, knowledge, skills, and competencies. Continuous professional development programs are also needed for established pharmacists to modernize pharmacy practice in the country.

STRATEGY TO INCREASE THE COMPETITIVENESS OF UKRAINIAN PRODUCERS IN THE WORLD MARKET

The article reveals the theoretical and practical aspects of the implementation of the competitive strategy of the enterprise in the foreign market in the context of globalization. Based on the research of domestic and foreign scientists, the basic strategies of increasing competitiveness were identified: leadership strategy based on low costs; individualization strategy; niche market concentration strategies; best value strategy; innovation strategy; focusing strategy. The foreign and domestic experience of formation of competitive strategy in the foreign market in modern conditions is investigated. It has been established that the competitiveness of the world's largest TNCs in recent years is increasingly associated with a sharp increase in internationalization of operations and the creation of global value chains based on a combination of own production and outsourcing. This model of production and logistics, based on the special global competencies of TNCs in the form of unique knowledge and know-how, intensive use of information and communication technologies, allowed TNCs to get rid of unprofitable operations and focus on the most profitable and promising areas. Successful TNCs such as Arrle, Google, Microsoft, IBM, Sony, Toyota Motor, BMW Samsung often use an innovative competitive strategy. Unlike foreign companies, domestic producers after signing a free trade agreement with the EU to become competitive in the European market increasingly began to use an integration strategy, which provides for horizontal integration with the acquisition or establishment of enterprises in the EU, which in turn reduces further the cost of customs duties, avoid export restrictions for farmers, and receive other benefits. The effectiveness of combining different competitive strategies to obtain significant benefits from activities in foreign markets has been proven.

A Comparative analysis of global competences within the framework of internationalized curricula

An agreement seems to exist that graduates must be equipped with competences required to act successfully and appropriately in a global context. Many authors have proposed lists of competences that could form part of such a graduate profile which must be taken into account when designing internationalized curricula. However, merely listing of a competence does not guarantee that students develop it to the level expected by society. The present article reports on a meta-study based on eight Tuning studies. This meta-study compared the findings across the eight Tuning studies in terms of the different stakeholder groups’ ratings of importance and achievement of 11 global competences – generic competences valued by over 71,000 graduates, employers, students and academics in more than 100 countries and across four continents (Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia). The contribution of the meta-study presented consists in offering a possibility to identify commonalities and differences among the perceptions of the four key stakeholder groups, not only across all the individual studies but also at the level of the four continents – something never accomplished until the present date. In addition, it will help identify the competences that might require particular attention of curriculum designers and teaching teams for students to develop these competences to the level perceived as optimal in different regions of the world. Future research questions are identified with the aim to enrich and validate or fine-tune these initial findings and compensate for the limitations related to the general timeline of the 8 individual Tuning studies that the meta-study built on.
 Received: 31 March 2021Accepted: 06 May 2021

Locating inclusion within the OECD’s assessment of global competence: An inclusive future through PISA 2018?

In 2018, Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) introduced an assessment of global competence to equip young people with the skills, knowledge, attitudes and values to create “an inclusive and sustainable world” (OECD, 2018 : 1). Throughout this article, we take the OECD seriously at their claims around inclusion. We look critically at the global competence framework to ask what PISA means by inclusion and trouble the idea that inclusion can function effectively within a global standardized assessment. We put Bernstein’s ( 2000 ) notion of recontextualization to work to demonstrate how inclusion takes on new meaning as it moves between each iteration of the global competence framework. We show how this recontextualization re-orientates inclusion from a social justice imperative toward supporting young people’s inclusion into a globalized market economy.

Global citizenship education through curriculum-as-relations.

The Covid-19 pandemic was a reminder of the importance of increasing connectivity amidst the accelerated rate of changes and disruptive events of our era. The need and the rationale for global citizenship education (GCED) were ever more emphasized by many educational organizations, including UNESCO. This article reviews the GCED discourses conceptualizing global competence as instrumental action and a binary view of global-local relations. In turn, the article proposes the idea of curriculum-as-relations for GCED. Curriculum-as-relations conceptualizes competence as situated praxis and focuses on providing authentic critical-translocal learning. Authentic critical-translocal learning through the strategy of comparison offers an alternative view of global-local relations as “articulated moments created by situated praxis”. This new understanding of global-local relations may help different stakeholders to imagine GCED curricula beyond a Tylerian instrumentalist, ends-means orientation of curriculum.

Global competences and 21st century higher education – And why they matter

This paper brings issues around forecasting and change to the fore to stimulate a conversation around three related questions: How do we understand the challenges of this global era? What might be the role of higher education in re/shaping this future? What competences might students need and how should be go about developing these?

The role of industry and academia partnership in improving project management curriculum and competencies

PurposeAlthough project management (PM) continues to rise in popularity, there is still a significant PM talent deficit, leading to more challenged or failing projects. To lower the PM talent deficit and mitigate the higher project failure rates, academic institutions have been developing PM curriculums aimed at inculcating a repertoire of competencies to the potential project managers. In developing an ideal well-rounded PM curriculum, academic institutions occasionally engage the input of industry partners and governing entities. The study aims to (1) compare the competencies in one of the leading industry competency model and framework (PMI Talent Triangle) to the competencies in the PM course syllabi learning outcomes, (2) determine the extent to which these two sets of PM competencies are aligned and (3) and explore avenues for improvements.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses a purposeful sampling method to gather PM course syllabi. The PM competencies data are gleaned from the syllabi using the content analysis method. Thereafter, QSR NVivo qualitative statistical software is used to summarize and analyze the competency data from the learning outcomes.FindingsThe results reveal that most of the PM competencies in the course syllabi fall under the technical PM domain. Specifically, the top three competency elements in each domain are technical PM domain (PM skills, tools and techniques, schedule management and cost estimation/budget), leadership domain (team-building, verbal/written communication and problem-solving) and strategic and business management domain (strategic planning, analysis and alignment, benefits management and realization, customer relationship and satisfaction).Research limitations/implicationsThe study investigates the alignment of the PM course competencies with competency domains in the PMI Talent Triangle, a global competence model that is well aligned with other global competence models such as the APM Competence Framework, the ICB4 Individual Competence Baseline and the PROMA3.Practical implicationsThe results from this study provide guidelines useful in informing PM curricula re/design, as well as the inculcation of knowledge, skills, tools, techniques and behaviors needed for effective PM.Social implicationsThe PM curriculum can be improved by partnering with PM industry leaders who can serve as advisors to the academy on industry needs, direction and emerging innovations that can inform PM learning outcomes, PM curricular design and the development of quality PM talent. The academy and the industry are encouraged to actively strive for mutual partnerships where PM professionals and academicians serve on each other's advisory boards. Also, the academy can partner with the industry professionals by developing curriculum resources such as case studies that bring the real-life PM applications to the classroom.Originality/valueThis study is motivated by the call for research studies that provide a holistic picture of the desired PM competencies and an exploration and definition of the educational needs in the PM curriculum.