Description
Scholarly literature on the international classroom frequently emphasizes the importance of making implicit beliefs and norms explicit in order to equalize all students’ ability to succeed. If students come from many different cultural, linguistic, and academic backgrounds, they may have different assumptions about core academic competencies and procedures.
However, this literature less often considers the impact of a diverse faculty on student success. What if faculty members come from very different cultural and institutional backgrounds? How may disciplinary diversity undermine the notion of stable implicit norms taught by faculty members? Faculty members from varying cultural contexts may not share the same underlying norms, values, procedures, and educational standards. Likewise, faculty members may differ in educational and disciplinary backgrounds. In an international, inter- or multidisciplinary program, students may struggle to recognize a coherent vision of shared academic values in faculty instruction to understand and rely upon throughout their degree trajectory.
Higher education in the Netherlands has been rapidly internationalizing, adding English programs at both the BA and MA level. This study evaluates the impact of divergent experiences and academic norms among faculty members teaching students in the interdisciplinary English-track of the Media and Culture Studies BA at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. Through interviews with faculty, this study assesses explicit and implicit pedagogical norms taught to students within an international, interdisciplinary bachelor program. The program provides a useful case study as it integrates traditional humanities, digital humanities, and social sciences approaches taught by an interdisciplinary, culturally diverse faculty to an international student community.
| Period | 20 Apr 2023 |
|---|---|
| Event title | Interdisciplinary Learning and Teaching Conference: Interdisciplinary Experiences: Transforming Perspectives |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Chelmsford, United KingdomShow on map |
| Degree of Recognition | International |
Keywords
- international classroom
- diversity
- interdisciplinarity
- faculty