Internationalisation and the National Strategy for Higher Education
11/1/11 - The newly launched 'National Strategy for Higher Education to 2030', better known as the Hunt report, tackles Internationalisation issues in chapter 6. Easy to miss when more controversial recommendations have attracted the media spotlight for understandable reasons.
The full report is available as a PDF download.
Here's a flavour...
Benefits of Internationalisation
"The presence of overseas students gives an international flavour to a campus, and it creates a dynamic in which domestic and overseas students can learn from and stimulate one another and mutually enrich their learning experience. Irish students can benefit from exposure to other cultures, from the improved curricula resulting from greater interaction between Irish academics and their international peers, and from better opportunities to study abroad themselves." [p81]
Challenges
"Competition for the attraction of talented international students and the development of mutually beneficial partnerships with globally-ranked and respected institutions overseas is fierce. The optimistic projections of growth in global international student mobility, and consequent policies based primarily on mass recruitment of overseas students, are being reconsidered in many countries. Added to this, more and more countries are seeking to recruit international students; and countries that have traditionally sent large numbers of students abroad are now seeking to develop their own indigenous capacity."[p82]
Recommendations
"1) Higher education institutions should set out their international vision in an institutional strategy that:
- is related to their institutional mission and to wider national policy goals; and
- considers internationalisation and global engagement in the widest perspective.
2) Higher education institutions should put in place appropriate supports to promote the integration, safety, security and well-being of international students." [p85]