Jan BamfordLondon Metropolitan University

HEA 2011

Knight (2004) “Internationalization at the

national/sector/institutional levels is defined as the process of integrating an international, intercultural and/or global dimension into the purpose, functions or delivery of post-secondary education” (Knight 2004:11)

De Wit (2002:146) “Any teaching or learning activity in

which the students are in a different country ( the host country) to that in which the institutions providing the education is based ( the home country)”ie: national boundaries are crossed

Knight (2006) confusion of terms transnational, crossborder and borderless

Focus for study – students experience on a dual Masters delivered jointly between French and UK institution

Work in progress Quantitative data – questionnaire delivered over 3

years – issued to 174 students with 81 responses, 33.3% of respondents were French, the rest were international

Qualitative data – 8 staff interviews and 46 student interviews, 14 after one semester and the rest after two semesters

an examination of the “lived reality” (Gargano 2009) of the students on a transnational course

Transnational HE – this case involved two institutions in two countries France and the UK ( Europeanisation/regionalisation)

The French institution is a Business School – a Grande Ecole, it is small and located in a provincial French town with mostly French students

The UK school is a large metropolitan business school within a larger university, is state funded and a pre-1992 university. The Business School just under 2000 international students and 2119 EU students and an extremely diverse student population

For most students on the courses English is not their first language and they will have completed their undergraduate study in a country other than the UK

“Understanding a people’s culture exposes their normalness without reducing their particularity” (Geertz 1974:14)

The term involves therefore an inclusion of the attributes, beliefs, values, expectations and cultural practices of the individuals involved,

non-verbal communication practices would be included in this

‘For me it’s a kind of experience of working in an international environment because if I have this course, I will finish my education I am going to work in an international company, a big company and nowadays the staff in big companies they are all international and to know how to get on well with people from different cultural backgrounds’ (PB)

Calmand et al.(2009) Grandes Écoles provide better general

knowledge, transferable competences, attitudes and personal skills more valued by employers for the highly skilled professions.

They have small student staff ratios Far more homogenous student body

( Bourdieu 1989, Brezis & Crouzet 2006)

Matthews (2000) cultural supermarket thesis “All teaching and learning situations depend

on communication, but different learners may have grown up with different scripts regarding the importance of talking for learning. Who should talk, when one should talk and what should be spoken seemed to have intertwined with varying cultural scripts which are related to talking. These scripts can influence any teaching-learning situation, and imply different views on the meaning of such situations, as well as the role of the learner and teacher.” (Welikala and Watkins, 2008:6)

Types/category of response Latin approach/ Northern European/East

Asian to interview responses Homogenous group versus

heterogeneous group Group dynamics and work Personal growth Personalities Host culture reactions/engagement Stereotyping

I have to say I had two groups with only French and another group in communication with other foreigners, a German and I don't know from where she comes but whatever. With the French was like usual I used to be…my nature is to handle everything to split the work and stuff, so with French I am used to. But with the foreigners everybody everyone sticks to his habits, so of course the good thing is that according to the experience for example we come from business school, we are used to group projects but some of them had already worked in the communication field and some of them had already internships about that, on that. The positive aspect is sharing knowledge different knowledge. We had a better perception of the work but the problem was our different methods of working. For example German write a very…they go straight to the point. When we ask them to do something it’s that, that, that, they don’t develop. Us French Brrrrrr.. we speak, we speak details and stuff like that so it was a bit hard at that point. Finally we got on well and found a compromise but it was hard. By being like that I think and I talked to the person in question that we skip a lot of things, like going straight to the point is very good but after how about the references and the literature review. I think that it’s not negative it’s difficult, this is the difficult aspect of the group work with foreigners but besides it was more positive than negative. ( French student 38)

“I think that the fact that people don’t speak English for instance in the institutions, the city halls blah blah, sometimes French people have the tendency to expect from the other people to be like them. I don't know if that’s the problem with our French students but maybe sometimes they don’t understand different cultures and maybe they don’t want to understand differ. You see, I’m rapidly coming to the conclusion that we need to, what’s in cultures because maybe they are not really open minded. Maybe they have not travelled so much, maybe they are a bit young. “(MS)

They said no, well that’s the French style, you expect that you are just going to copy down the words of your instructor. That was an epiphany for me because I kept thinking is this just a chintzy school? Or is it French education? And I didn’t know who to blame. (AR)

 

“One thing I love about London is that people don’t care how you dress, what you do, which is such a good thing ...in Paris, people look at you if you are dressed funny” ( A)

When you know the the other person. Its easier to speak with them, you know the kind of sentence they use...more the cultural, not barrier but differences, different approach of work, so sometimes it was oh, why is the procedure like that or like that. So you have to be open to different way to conduct work. ( J)

and I have a meeting with an Asian client, I now know how to address them, how to talk to them, what to wear, what not to wear. What’s an important topic, what’s unimportant topic. We exchanged in the programme, we had good tips of you should talk to this, you should talk about that. We were all talking like no this is not at all, you can never put on a sex commercial in the US, but in South America just put it there, they will love it. And we all know for example if I meet with someone, I think that I can talk about, I have topics to talk about with people from every continent. And I know that they are going to appreciate it and things that I can’t talk about. (M)

Americans wear flip-flops Italians talk a lot Working with French people- they are very goal-orientated

ant thorough British people like referencing and research etc Americans- very laid back in their work ethic, less research. They tend to just re-word, paraphrase and jazz up material we have been given rather than do their own research. Good with words and strong written & Verbal communication. Italians- very flaky when it comes to work approach

Germans are organised. The French culture was horrible. Everything was horrible. Every time we talked to our landlord, he was horrible. Every time we wanted to [inaudible] he was horrible. The French people were, to pay the electricity, that was horrible. I speak a little bit of French and I was talking to a person on the phone and I’m like, I’m trying to explain here that your webpage doesn’t work. We want to pay electricity, just tell us where we can do it on line. ‘on line’!

Importance of cultural scripts ( Welikala & Watkins 2008) – differing behaviours and norms of behaviour can affect peer interaction

Supports Pederson’s (2010) arguments for intercultural learning training as a part of the study abroad process in order to facilitate

Contextualisation and developing awareness are an important part of the learning process

The link between culture and learning must not be underplayed and should be given more consideration

Bourdieu,P.,(1989), La Noblesse D’Etat: Grandes Ecoles et esprit de corps, France, Les Edications de Minuit

Brezis & Croutzet (2006) The Role of Higher Education Institutions: Recruitment of Elites and Economic Growth , IN: Eidier, T.S., & Garcia-Penalosa, C, Institutions, Development and Economic Growth, Cambridge, USA, CES Info Seminar Series MIT Press,

Deardorff,D., (2006), Identification and Assessment of Intercultural Competence as a Student Outcome of Internationalization, Journal of Studies in International Education, Vol. 10, No. 3, 241-266

De Witt (2002), Internationalization of Higher Education in the United States of America and Europe, Wesport, USA, Greenwood Press

Knight (2004) ‘Internationalization Remodelled: Definitions, Rationales and Approaches, Journal of Studies in International Education Vol 8 No 1

Geertz,C.,(1973) The Interpretation of Cultures, Basic Books, New York Gargano, T., (2009), (Re)conceptualizing International Student Mobility: The

Potential of Transnational Social Fields, Journal of Studies in International Education, Vol. 13, No.3 331-346

Matthews,G. ,(2000) Global Culture/Individual Identity: Searching for home in the cultural supermarket, London, Routledge.

Pederson, P., ( 2010) ‘Assessing intercultural effectiveness outcomes in a year long study abroad programme’, Jounral of Intercultural Relations 34 70-80

Wekilala & Watkins (2008), Improving Intercultural Learning Experiences in Higher Education: Responding to Cultural scripts for Learning, London, Institute of Education, University of London.