Hi good morning everyone
My name is Daneille Grant this is my third semester in the HEA program here at Baruch. I graduated from SUNY College at Old Westbury with a BA in Psychology. It was during my undergraduate career that I discovered Higher Education/ Student Affairs as a profession. Thanks to my undergrad and a few mentors I was able to attend the NASPA conference for two years which helped me realize this was truly an area I wanted to work in. While taking my classes at Baruch I realized that I wanted to work with the Freshman Experience, focusing primarily on First Generation College Students, seeing that I am First Gen myself, I believe that I could use my background and the knowledge I have gained throughout undergraduate and graduate careers to foster a comfortable environment for other First Gen students. I currently work for CUNY Central in the Office of University Registrar as a Student Records Assistant. Upon the completion of my degree I hope to go on to more lucrative positions within Higher Ed.
The articles opened my eyes to internationalization within American institutes of higher education. With America boasting to the best in the world in terms of many things, including education, it is no surprise that people would want to attend schools on American soil for whatever reasoning. Often time people can come to the states having received degrees from reputable institutions in their country, but not be accepted her because the education is “not equivalent” to that offered in the states, forcing people to live below their means, people who were considered doctors lawyers in their home countries not allowed to practice here, having to start over.
In the Altbach article, international education is used to show globalization, this can be used to show progress of education, the access to study aboard, and having the option to attend college/university anywhere in the world, is proof of how far we as a people have come in the world. Study aboard serves to attract many students to a country, it can foster diversity, raise revenue, and is also promotion of the country and the host institution. Online classes might have thought to be beneficial in this accept, but as pointed out in the Oxford article, although Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) give a wider range for students who may not be able to physically or financially be able to do study aboard or leave their countries, a 2013 study revealed that students often times do not complete these online courses, there could be a wide range of reasons for this.
In the Green article, the use of the IAU survey shows exactly how America feels about internationalization. In the states, we have less of a focus on internationalization when compared to other nations globally, which could be correlated to the thought that “America is the leading nation in….” just about everything, supposedly. People within the US face difficulty completing college, it’s no surprise that people not born here would be faced with the same difficulties and that would threaten retention and graduation rates in a nation every college compete against each other to be “Number 1” these students may not be accepted with open arms.
America is a melting pot, and attract many immigrants to its shores for many reasons, education is a large part of life itself, America needs to reevaluate its stance on internationalization. Education on American soil is a multi-billion dollar industry, to calm you are the best in the world, but cannot or refusal to accommodate students globally is primitive.

This week’s article focused on four aspects that are key to internationalization on a higher education level. These four aspects are student mobility, scholar mobility, cross-border education and internationalization at home. Funding that is provided to create and manage higher education comes from federal government, state government, accrediting agencies and higher education institutions themselves. It is no surprise that funding is the root issue that can make or break a program.
A running theme throughout the article is federal funding in combination with a broad-spectrum of contributions, is a key aspect to the success of internationalization policies in U.S. With majority of funds going to higher education institutions within the U.S. it’s not surprising that there is very little money is left to support internationalization efforts that we currently have. Let alone to go about starting new ones. The charts on pages 37-38, show just how much money other countries spend on internationalization efforts, (Saudi Arabia annually funds $6 billion in their King Abdullah Foreign Scholarship Program), when compared to how much is spent annually within the U.S. the ACE reveals that the U.S. while internationalization efforts aren’t funding by our own government (directly), it is interesting to note that we do get funding from foreign governments. The ACE itself discusses how unfair this is. Foreign governments are funding our efforts, but we may or not have a relationship with them in regards to internationalization in the educational sense outside of funding.
With the development of new technologies and other advancements made in other countries, the U.S. federal government has started to support the mobility of scholars and research collaboration policies. Having the resources we already have on our home front, combined with the knowledge that other countries can provide our students will give our students an advantage when they venture out to the world, this is something the government has realized.
In terms of cross-border education, there is very little concentration, at this point, from the U.S. government. That’s not to say we do not have any efforts at all. This week’s article revealed to us that there is a cross-border education effort between the U.S. and the Indian government: the United States-India Educational Foundation (USIEF), which is funded by both countries. And in other my earlier posts I briefly discussed cross border efforts between the U.S. and the Middle East.
It is hard for the U.S. to come together collectively to focus on a process of internationalization. Within the U.S. there thousands of colleges and universities that are pretty much individually ran, with their own mission statements etc., and it is safe to say we here in America pride ourselves on having freedom in our educational efforts, so this poses an issue when it comes to possibly imposing internationalization on schools, no matter if it is for the betterment of the country.

The past three readings have mainly addressed the importance of moving towards internationalization policies and programs that replicate a global equity, quality, and accountability. However, this week’s reading focused on the United States of America developing a comprehensive internationalization policy that entails the interconnectedness of faculty development, mobility, research collaborations, internationalization at home, institutional partnerships, and other aspects. Currently, the state government, federal government, non-governmental agencies, accrediting agencies, and institutions have various programs in force to attain cultural understanding and awareness. However, there are a lot of overlapping ideals, approaches, and funding amongst them. According to the reading, there have be decreases in financing in all areas and this should encourage more interagency coordination and pooling their resources together. I respect the reading stating internationalization within in Higher Education should consider a holistic approach. In the Student Services course, we also discussed a need for higher education institutions following a holistic approach and develop interdepartmental relationships to make the experience more valuable for students, faculty, and staff.
During the reading I was a bit confused about one particular situation. There is a ‘global’ program inforce that only considers foreign students in Asian countries. When I think about the word global, it means encompassing everyone. However, this program is limited in its outreach. Supposedly, there is low mobility in American students partaking in study abroad adventure, and to remedy the problem, the USA brings in more foreign students from Asian countries. However, we don’t have the resources to provide a stable support system for the increase of these Asian students. Our internationalization at home programs mainly consists of teaching students Spanish and French as a foreign language. If most of the students are learning either Spanish or French, how will they be able to communicate with international students from Asian countries? Are the faculty and staff able to effectively communicate with these students as well? If we are spending more resources on educating students on proficiently speaking Spanish and/or French, wouldn’t it be a better idea to recruit international students from Latin American or certain European countries? I understand that the Obama Administration have been developing a policy that will increase study abroad amongst European and Latin American countries, but honestly, that should be a priority. Last week I read an article about Germany offering a free education to its citizens, as well as foreign students from America, China, and Britain. Courses that are offered in English allow Germans to communicate with native speakers and the foreign students are able to learn a new language as well. Germany is also one of the countries re-working its visa to make it easier for foreign students to go to school and work. America really needs to decide if the goal is to keep international students short term or long term.
Another issue that stood out to me had to deal with academic freedom. America wants scholars to have complete academic freedom when studying abroad. I understand that our institutions take pride in faculty having academic freedom, but isn’t the reason behind internationalization is to understand cultural differences? How can we demand American values to be upheld in other country that operates differently than our own? That’s insensitive.

Adia