The international classroom is presumably a far more effective learning environment for the acquisition of intercultural competence when students receive adequate training to make the most of their intercultural encounters. This paper provides a summary of the intercultural training taught to first-year students of an international programme in The Hague University of Applied Sciences. The purpose of the paper is to investigate how the students respond to this intercultural training as well as what signs of intercultural awareness they show after completing the course. The findings were obtained via qualitative methods such as semi-structured interviews, observations and student homework assignments. Overall, students evaluate the training positively. Furthermore, students show some awareness of the necessary ingredients for effective intercultural communication in the international classroom as well as of the challenging nature of this communication due to cultural diversity. Finally, this paper provides recommendations from the facilitators on stimulating intercultural learning in the international classroom.
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Ignite: International skills inside and outside the classroom
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Internationalisation has become an “institutional imperative” for many institutions of higher education. Two propositions are that internationalisation would help students develop competencies needed in todays globalised world, and increase the employability of students. This piece summarises findings from the HBO-Monitor (a survey amongst alumni of Dutch universities of applied sciences) to substantiate the aforementioned propositions. The analysis suggests that internationalisation measures such as a foreign experience are conducive to the acquisition of international competencies. By contrast, little support derives from the HBO dataset concerning the link between internationalisation (or the thereby acquired competencies) and an increase in employability. However, a good number of alumni confirm that international competencies are needed in their current jobs. Based on this project, the Research Group International Cooperation will set up a longitudinal study on internationalisation at THUAS and its impacts.
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Phd Thesis Higher professional education aims to prepare graduates for the complexity of professional practices. The development of conceptual understanding is important to deal adequately with this complexity, especially in an unstructured professional domain such as international business. The aim of this dissertation is to investigate the concept conceptual understanding in this professional domain, how it can be measured, what it looks like, how it changes, and in what ways it differs between students. The dissertation comprises five empirical studies for which data collection took place at a university of applied sciences in the Netherlands.
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The present study aims to investigate if – and if so, how – the intercultural training programme ‘Preparation for Foreign Learning Experience’ (PREFLEX) has a positive effect on the development of the intercultural competence of students at THUAS in international groups (i.e. school for International Business and Management Studies, IBMS) and students in intercultural groups (i.e. school for Commercial Economy, CE). In addition, the study aims to advance the design of the programme further. Accordingly, the study addresses the following central research question: In what way do the intercultural classroom and the international classroom contribute to the development of intercultural competences in first-year students at THUAS, and to what extent does preparation and guidance, by means of the PREFLEX training module, effectively enhance this development?
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This study explores if multiple alterations of the classrooms' indoor environmental conditions, which lead to environmental conditions meeting quality class A of Dutch guidelines, result in a positive effect on students' perceptions and performance. A field study, with a between-group experimental design, was conducted during the academic course in 2020–2021. First, the reverberation time (RT) was lowered in the intervention condition to 0.4 s (control condition 0.6 s). Next, the horizontal illuminance (HI) level was raised in the intervention condition to 750 lx (control condition 500 lx). Finally, the indoor air quality (IAQ) in both conditions was improved by increasing the ventilation rate, resulting in a reduction of carbon dioxide concentrations, as a proxy for IAQ, from ~1100 to <800 ppm. During seven campaigns, students' perceptions of indoor environmental quality, health, emotional status, cognitive performance, and quality of learning were measured at the end of each lecture using questionnaires. Furthermore, students' objective cognitive responses were measured with psychometric tests of neurobehavioural functions. Students' short-term academic performance was evaluated with a content-related test. From 201 students, 527 responses were collected. The results showed that the reduction of the RT positively influenced students' perceived cognitive performance. A reduced RT in combination with raised HI improved students' perceptions of the lighting environment, internal responses, and quality of learning. However, this experimental condition negatively influenced students' ability to solve problems, while students' content-related test scores were not influenced. This shows that although quality class A conditions for RT and HI improved students' perceptions, it did not influence their short-term academic performance. Furthermore, the benefits of reduced RT in combination with raised HI were not observed in improved IAQ conditions. Whether the sequential order of the experimental conditions is relevant in inducing these effects and/or whether improving two parameters is already beneficial, is unknown.
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Good practice contribution to the article "Leveraging Technology and the International Classroom for Cross-Cultural Learning" by Jane Edwards and Hanneke Teekens.
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In this study we measured the effect of COIL on intercultural competence development using a quasi-experimental design. Our sample consisted of 108 undergraduate students from two universities, one located in the Netherlands (NL) and one in the United States (US). Students’ self-reported intercultural competence was measured using a pre-post survey which included the Cultural Intelligence Scale (CQS) and Multicultural Personality Questionnaire (MPQ). Qualitative data were collected to complement our quantitative findings and to give a deeper insight into the student experience. The data showed a significantly bigger increase in intercultural competence for the US experimental group compared to the US control group, supporting our hypothesis that COIL develops intercultural competence. This difference was not observed for the NL students, possibly due to the NL control group being exposed to other international input during the course.
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In this study it was hypothesized that collaborative learning in international higher education contributes to the development of intercultural competence. Two hundred and fifty-two students of an international business and management study programme of a Dutch university participated in two surveys on collaboration in a group learning activity and one survey on their development of intercultural competence. Additionally, three groups of four to six students took part in focus group interviews. The results indicated that when students perceive that the group process improves, the quality of the collaboration in terms of verbal interaction and equal contribution will also improve. Furthermore, the results revealed that a higher perceived quality of the collaboration relates to an increasing development of intercultural competence. The findings are discussed and related to implications for the use of group learning activities in international higher education. https://doi.org/10.1177/1028315319826226
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Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) is often framed as an example of a broader practice known as Virtual Exchange (VE). The term Virtual Exchange has increasingly been used as an attempt to unify a fragmented field of Higher Education practice and is often used interchangeably with the term COIL. However, the design of COIL, with its strong focus on collaborative and intercultural learning, is often very different to other VE initiatives. Labelling all VE initiatives, including COIL, generally as VE, can lead to both educators and researchers having difficulty identifying and distinguishing COIL. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to provide a critical review of VE and define COIL and its key characteristics. This article also describes how theory can inform practice and explains why continued interchangeable use of the term COIL with the umbrella term Virtual Exchange is unhelpful for future research and practice.
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