Posted on by J.Gulston · 7 Comments

W1- Introduction and Responses

Good Morning, my name is Jonelle Gulston. This is my 5th semester in the HEA program and I plan on finishing up at the end of this year. Currently I am an academic advisor for the ASAP program at KBCC, I have been with the program for 5 years. I majored in History as an undergrad at Brooklyn College and then continued there for my Masters; I majored in Political Science with a focus on International Relations. I completed that program in 2010. I am currently interested in moving on from KBCC to broaden my work experience but staying involved with student/academic affairs on some level. I look forward to working and meeting everyone this semester.

 

During my last semester as an undergrad, I was able to study abroad, I attended the University of Westminster in London.  I still talk about how much impact studying abroad had on me. The University of Oxford’s report on “International Trends in Higher Education, 2015” touches on the current trends in higher education associated with  studying abroad.  Something that struck me as interesting in the reading was that the governments of Germany and Russia are actively involved with pursing way to increase international experiences for students but in the United States a private, not-for-profit organization is spearheading our country’s push to double the number of students studying abroad. The IIE is working with the government for help with their initiative but it isn’t a major priority for our government it seems.

This can be seen as a connection with the Madeleine Green article, based on the results of the survey conducted it is clear that higher education institutions in America are not the best in the world in terms of policies related to internationalization. According to the survey, universities in America do not mention internationalization in their mission statements or strategic plans. As we know strategic plans for a college, show what areas the institutions plans to focus on in the upcoming years. If higher education institutions do not start to include new ways to incorporate internationalization policies then they will continue to fall behind other parts of the world. I would have liked to for the article to explain the importance of internationalization for higher education institutions. An explanation would have connected everything a little better.  According to the survey conducted by the IAU European countries have solid strategies sand policies in place in regards to internationalization and I wonder if that is due to the how involved the countries are with each other i.e. the European Union.

The article by Philip Altbach and Hans De Wit, touches on  how the countries in Europe have been connected through higher education. The authors point out that academic cooperation between countries will always been need especially with the increase in political and military tension. Having higher education institutions be a vehicle of continued contact between countries that may not be align politically is clearly important, but it shouldn’t be used as a way to push political agendas.

 

Posted on by a.johnson1 · 6 Comments

W1: Introduction and Reflection on Readings

Hello Everyone, My name is Adia Johnson and I am in my last semester in the MS-Ed HEA program. I went to Daemen College for my undergraduate degree where I majored in Psychology and minored in Theatre. I currently work for an investment company. I am interested in working in Student Life working with student groups and organizations.
I was really excited about enrolling for this course for my last semester here at Baruch. Throughout my undergraduate college experience, study abroad was appealing but I didn’t have the resources to travel out of the country for a semester. I always knew students that were fortunate enough to partake in the opportunity would return with an open mind and an advantage. The reading for this week happened to be a good introduction for internationalization and presented a broad overview of its history, purpose, and growth/setbacks. The adoption of Internationalization, unsurprisingly, occurred after war. Typically after wars or conflict, people attempt to find a peaceful attempt at co-existing to avoid future confrontation. The United Nations is an organization that strives to stimulate peace and mutual understanding, and serve as a beacon for global security and development.
Although keeping open communication is beneficial, Albatch and De Wit (2015) suggest recent and future global conflicts revolving around religion and nationalism can hinder the advances of internationalization within higher education. However, I do not believe the advancements will falter. Students with international experience develop soft-skills that employers desire, such as openness to new challenges, adaptability, problem-solving, and the ability to communicate in another language. Based on the readings, an increasing number of students are expected to study abroad. In turn, colleges and universities are making solid decisions to incorporate internationalization into their strategic plans and are restructuring their infrastructure to include necessary tools to successfully accommodate foreign students. In keeping with the University of Oxford (2015), Russian universities require foreign students to complete Russian language and literature before enrolling in a degree program. Students are also given the opportunity to win a scholarship and would be expected to stay and work for an organization for 3 years after graduation. This plan seems really rewarding for students since the main purpose for obtaining a degree is to get a job and the scholarship guarantees free tuition and a future job.
It was mentioned that higher education institutions in The U.S.A. lack the internationalization in their strategic plans. I suppose this is part of the reason why there has been a decline in the number of international students applying to American colleges and universities. However there is another factor that may explain why there has been a decrease: lack of incentives. Other countries are offering international students more resources during their education and employment within their chosen career paths, USA simply cannot compete with that. Sure, we can offer students the same scholarship plan, but we are not economically stable enough to provide those resources. Our unemployment rate, for postsecondary degree holders, is still fairly high and if we cannot provide our current citizens with jobs, how can we offer jobs to an influx of international students. Redden (2015) touched on using tenured faculty to aid in reaching internalization goals. In my student services course, I learned that faculty need to demonstrate a level of competency in teaching, research, and service. It would be fairly easy to incorporate the international -focused criteria within the service spectrum. I understand that some institutions do not have the financial means of supporting faculty to travel internationally and make this requirement part of the tenure path. However, if an institution decides it wants to have international students studying at their school, they need put it into their strategic plan and provide incentives to both faculty and students.

References
Albatch, P. & De Wit, H. (2015, Summer). Internationalization and global tensions: Lessons from history.
International Higher Education; Number 81
University of Oxford (2015)
Redden, E. (2015, November 10). Internationalization and Tenure. Inside Higher Ed
Retrieved from: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/11/10/should-universities-include-internationally-focused-criteria-tenure-and-promotion

Posted on by s.ahuja1 · 3 Comments

W1- Sima S. Ahuja Introduction & Readings Reflections

Hello!  I am Sima Saran Ahuja and this is my fourth session in the MSED Higher Administration program.  I am General Counsel of the Metropolitan College of New York.   Coming from an immigrant family that came to this country to pursue higher education, I am interested in the history and current trends of international higher education.  More importantly, as a member of a college that is increasing international enrollment and very focused on growing these numbers, there are several aspects of the trends that impact my role.  Previously, I was in CUNY’s office of General Counsel and both my parents are long-time CUNY professors.  I am a graduate of Barnard College and the B.N. Cardozo School of Law.

As an introduction, the readings this week did a good job laying out the past, present and future of international higher education in terms of the international political and academic landscape.  It was also useful to get an understanding of the concept of internationalization which rooted the readings and I am sure will be a guiding principle in the weeks to come.  The readings seem to break down into three categories:  (i) Altbach who provides a brief history of higher education and explains the concept of internationalization; (ii) Green who addresses the US’s explicit role in the history and future trajectory; and (iii) Oxford University Press’s detailed and fascinating look at current trends in international higher education.  I am excited to explore these trends in-depth in this class.

In Altbach’s article, I was intrigued to review the history of international higher education prior to the 1970’s – a watershed moment for Asian students venturing abroad to pursue education and to note that the history and trends date back to WWI and carry real relevance to goals of international peace and solidarity signaled by the establishment of institutions such as the UN.  The final question posed by Altbach is an unsettling one – whether current global conflicts involving religious fundamentalism and nationalism will harm international higher education strides.  Statistics cited in Green’s article suggest that current conflicts in troubled regions are in fact where the largest segments of international students hail from – South Asia, China and Nigeria.  I look forward to exploring what Green’s statistics  reveal about the pessimism underlying Altbach’s premise that global conflict may curtail higher education international pursuits.  I agree that the internationalization of higher education may be at a critical crossroad.

The Oxford University Press review of international trends in higher education was instructive.  While the review was undertaken with Oxford in mind, I think the trends are relevant to other markets and institutions looking to break into the international higher education market or sustain growth in that area.  Given Green’s assertion that the US is lagging behind in internationalization, the Oxford discussion of trends seem particularly relevant and informative in understanding why and how to reverse the US trends.  I am curious to learn more about international branch campuses in non-traditional countries, particularly with respect to current viability and success rates, e.g. Johns Hopkins in Malaysia.  I am also eager to learn more about the concept and trends of widening access through innovations such as MOOCs (their apparent rise and decline) as well as internationalizing access to research and the potential impacts on quality of research and intellectual property rights.

Posted on by c.graziano · 5 Comments

W1 – Christie Graziano Intro & Blog Post

Hi Everyone! My name is Christie Graziano and I will be graduating from the MSEd program at Baruch in May, with one elective left to take this summer. I have worked at CUNY John Jay College for the past 3 years as Coordinator for the Office of Student Transition Programs, which handles new student orientation, weeks of welcome, parent and family programs, commencement and senior related activities, as well as a peer ambassador leadership program. I graduated with a B.A. in Communications and Marketing from Loyola University Maryland in 2009. During my junior year, I studied abroad in Amsterdam, Netherlands and this experience forever changed my life! I caught the travel bug and after working for a year in media buying, I applied for a working holiday visa in Australia and spent the year working and traveling Australia and parts of Southeast Asia. This experience as well as my experiences working as a work-study student is what prompted my interest in working in Higher Education and I hope to move into the field of international education after I have completed my master’s degree.

All three articles, in various different ways, focused on the important concept of Internationalization. Internationalization in the context of higher education is “the process of integrating an international, intercultural, or global dimension into the purpose, functions or delivery of postsecondary education.” This concept is something that I have heard discussed in many meetings on my campus, as well as in my colleges 5-year strategic plan. In addition, I notice it is a growing topic of higher education articles and has been discussed in my various classes at Baruch. Altbach’s article emphasized the importance of reflecting on our world history and examining how we have succeeded and more importantly failed at this concept in the past due to governmental influences and nationalism, which trumped any efforts of significant international higher education partnerships that would build connections and create peace internationally. A perfect example of this was during World War II, after significant efforts towards internationalization had been made post World War I, yet the nationalism efforts that created Nazi Germany were widely supported by German universities. What sparked my interest the most about this article was the question as to whether current global conflicts will influence or harm the progress we have made since the 1980s to foster these relationships and make large strides in international education? I do feel that the conflicts happening in the world will and have already influenced internationalization as a whole and continued collaboration between certain countries is made impossible due to internal and external conflicts.

Green’s article focused more on the who is leading the way in the internationalization of higher education and the United States is not among one of these leaders. This article did not surprise me at all, as I have felt we were way behind when compared with other countries since I studied abroad in 2008. Students I had studied with all spoke more than one language, studying in another country seemed to be a natural part of their postsecondary education experience, and the diversity of students from various countries at the university I attended was in stark contrast to my campus at home. What I did find interesting was that the US had the highest percentage (15%) of institutions that had no internationalization strategy when compared to all responding institutions, which had 7.5% with no strategy in place. I think one point that I notice in most of my observations about recruiting more international students for US institutions is the financial benefit because international students are not eligible for financial aid; therefore, they pay full sticker price for tuition, which increases revenue for institutions. While this is a great benefit, I do not feel this is the reason for searching to internationalize ones campus. This makes me wonder if that is one of the reasons the U.S. lags behind other nations in regards to their internationalization strategy. Oxford’s article points out that “the presence of international students is not a core part of the student body for the world’s leading universities” (p. 5). I think this is a piece that the majority of U.S. institutions are missing. However, according to this article, it contradicts Green’s article by saying that the United States is still the most popular country for international students, while Green points out that only Latin America and the Caribbean rank North America as their top regional priority. Oxford does point out however, that US and UK markets are declining as other countries become more popular for international study.

Posted on by Victoria Tsang · 4 Comments

W1 – Introduction and Blog Post

Hi, I’m Victoria Tsang. I am currently in my second semester of the MSED program. I am a full-time student with a graduate research assistantship with Professor Michael Williams and an internship with the Baruch Honors Office. I graduated in 2014 as a Macaulay Honors Scholar at Baruch College with a BA in Graphic Communication and a minor in Interdisciplinary Studies of New York City. I have studied abroad twice during my undergraduate career. The first time was at the City University of Hong Kong for a semester and the second time was at the Florence campus of the Lorenze de’ Medici Institute for a winter intersession. Following graduation, I worked for 10 months in Hong Kong at the Hong Kong Institute of Education (which might soon be renamed as the Education University of Hong Kong) as an International Tutor. My experience abroad has influenced my interest in international higher education.

During my final year of undergrad, I did some research on what opportunities were available for me to go abroad to work or study, which is why I was not surprised when I read Altbach and de Wit’s essay about how politics and economic development had influenced the trajectory and purpose of international higher education cooperation throughout history. Many of the programs I looked at always mentioned the chance to be an ambassador of the U.S. and helping to strengthen the ties between America and the host country. It was also interesting to read Green’s essay and compare it to what I learned in my Intro to U.S. Higher Education and Student Services class from last semester. Again, I was not really surprised to learn that though the U.S. higher education system boasts being the best, internationalization is not always that important on the agenda of many institutions in the U.S. In my previous courses, I learned that while there maybe an influx of international students, there was not always the proper support services to fully serve those students. And in terms of sending our own students abroad, funding the study abroad office was not always on the institution’s agenda or budget. Also from experience studying and working in Hong Kong, in a country were there is a low number of institutions to serving an ever growing population of students, the practice of sending their local students abroad is not surprising since the demand is much higher than supply.

As for Oxford’s International Trends in Higher Education 2015 report, it was interesting to read about what other countries are actually doing to promote internationalization in comparison to the U.S. The partnerships forged between countries as explained in the report support Altbach and de Wit’s assertion that politics and economic development is the driving force of international higher education cooperation. The appeal of an international experience to potential employers in other countries is very much in line with how study abroad programs attract students in the U.S. to study or research abroad. This was a heavily pushed statement that I encountered when I was researching opportunities to go abroad. And I was fascinated to learn that, like in the U.S., MOOCs have taken a decline in popularity internationally and that there is a push to have more open access worldwide to research and other scholarly materials through the internet. Some of the trends in the report, like expansion programs and partnerships between different countries, will most likely continue but are also very susceptible to any political changes in either country in the partnership, because education is typically greatly tied to politics and the composition of those in the governing body. All three readings had a wealth of information and I am looking forward to what the future readings will bring for the course.