Global Graduates Research Articles

Parameters of learning during clinical nursing study abroad: Focused analysis of phenomenological data using a change-transformative learning theory lens

AimsTo explore the nature and extent of learning attained as a result of unaccompanied-by-faculty clinical nursing study abroad experiences and to answer the research question ‘what is the nature and extent of learning during study abroad?’. BackgroundFollowing the Covid-19 restrictions, international placement opportunities for student nurses are now resuming. In light of this, it is an opportune time for nurse educators to reflect and consider the effectiveness of clinical study abroad placements as contexts of learning, especially in relation to attainment of desired learning outcomes such as personal and professional growth and the development of culturally competent global graduates. This is an important area to research as specific understanding in relation to the extent of learning and variations in learning between students is limited. Design:The study was situated within the interpretivist paradigm to elicit experiences of study abroad. Aligned to this, a hermeneutic phenomenological methodology was applied to ensure these experiences emerged from the subjective horizon of student nurses. Methods:Following ethical approval, two semi-structured interviews per student (post-return and follow-up) were conducted with student nurses who had undertaken a study abroad experience. Phenomenological hermeneutical data analysis for multiple context research was undertaken and a change-transformative learning theory lens was additionally employed to the analysis to differentiate between the extent of and variations in, learning attained. Twenty UK and European student nurses, who were registered onto a study abroad programme prior to the Covid-19 restrictions participated. Results:Variations between participants were identified in relation to the nature and extent of learning. Participants experienced personal and professional growth and they experienced transformation in relation to self as a person, learner and nurse. However, variations existed when considering the attributes of global graduateness and cultural competence development. Whilst participants changed by expanding their knowledge in relation to global and cultural issues, some participants also appear to have concurrently experienced a reinforcement of ethnocentric frames of reference. ConclusionsAnalysis revealed that study abroad offered opportunities for students to experience change and transformation. Whilst students demonstrated learning in both the domains of change and transformation, transformative learning in all identified outcome areas was not guaranteed. Whilst transformative learning was apparent when considering personal and professional growth, less extensive learning was demonstrated when considering development of the attributes of global graduateness and cultural competence. The paper therefore recognises the complex nature of study abroad experiences and recommends continued investigation in this field.

MAPPING OF SDGS IN THE ENGINEERING AND COMPUTER SCIENCE CURRICULUM AT UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MARA

Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are central players in the achievement of the SDGs. As many HEIs strive to embrace sustainability as one of the university's core values and increase the visibility of the institutions globally, there is a need to explore the embedded curriculum framework of SDGs into programs and courses offered at Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM). This study is to determine the percentage of SDGs elements that have been incorporated into the university curriculum. The methodology used includes data collection using the university online syllabus system for the science and engineering and technology fields, namely all the engineering fields, Civil, Mechanical, Electrical, and Chemical Engineering, and Computer Sciences, and analyzing the results for in-depth interpretation and dimension analysis. A total of 520 courses were analyzed. The results showed that three SDGs were not addressed by the curriculum. The highest percentage of courses were mapped to SDG9 (25%) followed by SDG4 (15%), SDG 11 and SDG12 at 12%. The SDGs elements were found to be highly incorporated in mechanical engineering compared to other disciplines. The finding helps the understanding of the baseline status of sustainability in the university curriculum and opportunities to improve. It is suggested that another review needs to be executed to include the three SDGs which were addressed in the current curriculum. When all SDGs are addressed, the outcomes of the curriculum will be global graduates who are knowledgeable and responsible in ensuring a harmonized and peaceful future.

Global communication skills: contextual factors fostering their development at internationalised higher education institutions

ABSTRACT Communication skills are highly sought after by employers, as industry reports repeatedly show. At the same time, those reports also reveal that many employers are dissatisfied with their newly hired graduates’ communication skills. In addition, increasing globalisation has led to the call for ‘global graduates’ who can function well in culturally diverse contexts. Considering both aspects, it is important, to explore which factors help foster students’ global communication skills. This paper investigates this issue, testing the impact of potential factors identified from previous literature. Data was collected from 2359 students in seven different institutions located in five different countries. A linear regression model was tested to identify those factors which most contribute to global communication skills development. Results show that motivation to improve communication skills and the experience of social and academic integration into the campus community made the most significant contribution to participants’ higher levels of global communication skills development. Besides, students who were presented with relevant opportunities and support from their respective institution and those engaged with foreign languages also demonstrated higher levels of global communication skills development. The paper concludes that for students to acquire the communication skills needed for working successfully in diverse contexts, and hence to become ‘global graduates’, it is essential that they venture out of their comfort zones and engage with the diverse campus community. At the same time, this engagement requires universities’ guidance and support to help maximise the learning gains from such intercultural encounters.

A comparison of face-to-face and fully online problem-based learning: Student results and staff experiences, 2014-2020.

Problem-based learning (PBL) is a student-directed pedagogy that promotes critical thinking, self-directed learning and communication skills essential for health promotion students and practitioners. This paper reports on student results, student evaluation and staff experience of PBL in the face-to-face and fully online environment in an undergraduate health sciences unit in an Australian university. A single time-point study using quantitative and qualitative administrative student data (2014-2020) and narrative reflection from teaching academics (n=5) was undertaken. Descriptive, independent t test and bivariate analyses for student results data were conducted; an inductive approach was used to analyse qualitative data and create codes. Student sample (n=472) consisted face-to-face (n=358, 75.8%) and online (n=114, 24.2%) enrolments. Final Unit Mark was significantly higher for fully online students compared with face-to-face students in 2018 (P= .007) and 2019 (P= .001). Final Unit Achievement was significantly higher for fully online students compared with face-to-face students in 2018 (P= .017) and 2019 (P= .043). Three themes emerged: The PBL approach; Evolution of PBLs; Student skills and competencies. PBL allows students to learn through facilitated problem solving and strong collaborative skills. The face-to-face and fully online PBLs improved the student and academic staff experience, while supporting the development of critical thinking and self-directed research. Further, it supported students to develop their core health promotion competencies; and enhanced the online student learning experience. SO WHAT?: Vital for contemporary, global graduates, the fully online PBL approach allows students to build critical academic and professional skills utilising current information technology relevant for collaborative professional practice.

The profile of Latvian global graduates as ‘liquid migrants’

ABSTRACT This paper empirically examines whether former international students, i.e., global graduates, are more likely to be ‘liquid migrants’ than those who hold higher education degrees from home and the factors which enable or inhibit transnational mobility among global graduates. Based on an analysis of a subsample from a large-scale web survey of Latvian migrants, this paper finds that highly-skilled Latvian and global graduates represent two different groups of migrants. On the one hand Latvian graduates appear to migrate due to employment or family reasons and seek stability when doing so, corresponding more closely to the profile of sedentary migrants. Former international students from Latvia, on the other hand, are more likely to explore different destinations, even though most of them have lived in no more than two countries, excluding their country of origin. Global graduates who are older, male, hold a doctoral degree, are more recent emigrants, and live outside Europe and the US, are more likely to engage in a ‘liquid migration’ lifestyle. The empirical analysis and findings in this paper suggest alignment with the conceptualisation of ‘liquid migration.’

The design of eLearning resources for Ibec Global Graduates 2

The design of eLearning resources for Ibec Global Graduates 2

Developing global graduates: essentials and possibilities

Developing intercultural communication competence (ICC) is a pursuit that has captured the interest of researchers in several disciplines for a number of decades. The urgency and interest to produce graduates who are ready for the global marketplace has never been more prevalent amongst educators as it is today. This article outlines strategies for developing ICC based on prior research, and articulates a new framework for global graduates based on four understandings: understanding of self, understanding of others, understanding of self’s responsibility to others, and understanding of others’ contributions to self. Curriculum development and institutional investment considerations are discussed in relation to the proposed framework.

The virtual learning environment for Ibec Global Graduates 1

The virtual learning environment for Ibec Global Graduates 1

Internationalization, Student Engagement, and Global Graduates: A Comparative Study of Vietnamese and Australian Students’ Experience

The article provides comparative insights into Vietnamese and Australian students’ experience of internationalization of the curriculum. We explore how local arrangements for curriculum internationalization in Australia and Vietnam enable and/or constrain students’ individual agency in taking control of their knowledge and skills to become skilful and culturally sensitive professionals and citizens. The article is part of a 4-year empirical study that includes 15 semistructured interviews with academics and nine focus groups with 40 students in both countries. We use practice architecture theory to interpret whether and to what extent students can be the key actors in internationalizing the curriculum and the factors that nurture or restrict their participation in this process. The article provides important comparative perspectives on students’ experience of participating in curriculum internationalization in Vietnam as a developing country and an international education importer and Australia as a developed country and an education export provider.

Developing the global graduate: how first year university students’ narrate their experiences of culture

ABSTRACTDeveloping global graduates or global citizens is a goal often expressed in university mission statements. This study draws on Amadasi and Holliday's (2017) distinction of block narratives and thread narratives of culture and applies these to interviews with first year students. It shows that some ability to draw on thread narratives and therefore non-essentialist views of culture is in evidence from the start of students’ university careers. Universities need to implement policy and practice to foster the emergence of these abilities and thus enable students to acquire the attributes of a ‘global graduate’. This will also ensure that ‘internationalisation at home’ is not a value-free concept.

Online international learning

Virtual mobility initiatives are one of the most flexible, versatile and inclusive approaches in the provision of international experience opportunities. Given that in most universities only a small fraction of students can benefit from forms of academic mobility that involve travelling abroad, Internet-based intercultural interactions prove to be instrumental in widening participation in international experience. This article focuses on the virtual mobility scheme of Coventry University (CU), known as Online International Learning (OIL). OIL projects involve online interactions between CU students and peers at non-UK universities, so they can work together on subject-specific learning tasks or activities while developing key attributes of global graduates, namely Intercultural Competence and Digital Skills. After discussing OIL within a wider Model for Progression in International Experience and outlining the role of virtual mobility in Internationalisation at Home initiatives, the article identifies core actors, types of interactions, policies, enablers, barriers, resource flows, technologies and other important considerations.

Introduction to the Thematic Section: Intercultural Learning

One outcome of the transformation and maturity of academic disciplines is the emergence of new perspectives and concepts that encourage us to question and challenge rather than continuously recirculate traditionally accepted knowledge Þ rmly entrenched in disciplinary ‘canons’. Many scholars in the Þ eld of intercultural communication are today forcefully resisting the simplistic categories and dichotomies of people and cultures offered before the turn of the century by theorists such as Edward Hall (e.g. 1990) and Geert Hofstede (e.g. 2001) in favour of nuanced and critically informed perspectives. The 18 th annual conference of the Nordic Network of Intercultural Communication (NIC) held at the University of Helsinki in 2011 focused on these divergent perspectives through the conference theme of ‘Theoretical Turbulence’. Although ‘turbulence’ suggests trouble and points to a generational battle between the old canon and emerging perspectives within the Þ eld of intercultural communication (Poutiainen 2014), ‘turbulence’ can also suggest potentials that unleash ambiguity and wonder. From an educational perspective, ‘turbulence’ and its related associations to movement, wonder and ambiguity, offers a potentially powerful point of departure for learning (Tange 2014). The American educational philosopher John Dewey had already written on the importance of ambiguity for learning processes: “Thinking begins in what may fairly enough be called a forked-road situation, a situation which is ambiguous, which presents a dilemma, which proposes alternatives” (1910, p. 11). If, according to Dewey, ambiguity leaves us in a ‘forked-road’ situation, then the themes of theoretical turbulence and the potential for turbulence to be a constructive force in refl ective learning offer several directions. The committee behind the 19 th annual conference of NIC that was held Aarhus University in 2012 were determined to follow a path highlighting the need to foreground intercultural pedagogies, diverse sites of learning, and the types and range of competences that have become necessary for students and professionals to acquire in order to engage as global citizens (Davies 2006) or as intercultural citizens (Jackson 2011). The theme of 2012 conference was ‘Internationalization at Home – Contact, Communication and Change’ and suggested how intercultural encounters inevitably cause us to think about who we are and how those perceptions place us in relation to others. Arguably, such refl ections can and indeed should be used to raise intercultural awareness and strengthen our capacity to navigate in an increasingly complex and interconnected world. Professor Helen Spencer-Oatey from Warwick University struck this chord when she outlined a framework for developing ‘Global Graduates’ (Spencer-Oatey 2012) in her keynote lecture. One of the implications of negotiating complexity is that the Þ eld of intercultural communication can no longer be primarily concerned with the identiÞ cation and categorization of ‘difference’, which has the tendency to drive people apart rather than bring them in closer proximity. Instead, the theme of intercultural learning rests on a more positive idea that international and multicultural organizations such as universities, NGOS and global Þ rms be used as diverse sites to establish learning communities where participants accept ambiguity as a source of potential learning rather than a cultural barrier to be overcome.

Wales woos global graduates

Wales woos global graduates

Global Graduates: Future Vision — A Young Graduates Programme

Global Graduates: Future Vision — A Young Graduates Programme

Internationalisation of Education: A Business Perspective

Australian schools and universities are increasingly becoming involved in earning revenue from foreign students. This process is strongly associated with the broader concept of ‘internationalisation of education’. To explore the implications of educational institutions, mainly universities, entering the commercial sphere, various models of internationalisation in the international business literature are examined. This approach shows that universities face a range of risks and opportunities. Paramount is the potential for universities, under competitive pressure, to aim to produce global graduates with little accommodation of local and national educational priorities.