高等教育国际化视野下教师出国访学收益研究

The Outcomes of Chinese Visiting Scholars' Experiences and Higher Education Internationalization in China

出国访学是我国高校教师国际化发展的重要途径。本文依据迪尔多夫的"跨文化能力发展模型",提出教师出国访学的过程模型,并采用质性研究方法,对曾赴加拿大大学教育学院访学并已归国的16名中国高校教师的访学收益进行研究。研究发现,访学教师取得了显著的内部和外部收益,表现在理念提升、教学和科研创新以及国际化交流合作等。这些收益不仅促进了教师国际化的可持续发展,还有利于我国高等教育国际化的全面提升。文章最后从个人、院校和国家三个层面对如何加强访学项目的支持和管理提出了建议。

Dispatching Chinese faculty members abroad as visiting scholars is an important approach to faculty inter-nationalization in China. In light of Deardorff＆#39;s Model of Intercultural Competence Development, this paper has con-ceptualized a Model of the Outcomes of Chinese Visiting Scholars＆#39; Experiences, which consists of attitudes as the start-ing point, overseas visiting experiences, and outcomes-both internal and external. On the basis of this conceptual framework, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 16 returned Chinese visiting scholars who had spent 6 or 12 months as a faculty of education at a Canadian university in the past decade, with a view to providing insights into the internationalization of Chinese faculty and higher education as well as the management of visiting scholar pro-grams. The findings have shown considerable internal and external outcomes of visiting scholars＆#39; oversea experiences in terms of changes in values, improvement in teaching and research practices, and enhancement of international aca-demic cooperation. Regarding the internal outcomes, in the cognitive domain, almost all interviewees commented that their specialty-related knowledge had been significantly enriched and expanded;and in the attitudinal and social do-mains, the overseas experiences helped the interviewees increase their professionalism, broaden their horizons about the Canadian culture and international issues, and enhance their critical thinking skills in the face of social and cultural differences. Some of the internalized cognitive and affective outcomes were translated into observable, external outcomes when visiting scholars returned home and had opportunities to implement changes. In research, most visiting scholars made adjustments in their research areas, orientation in research methods or paper writing styles. In teaching, many shared that they had added more materials to their courses and adjusted their teaching approach. In international co-operation, the overseas academic experience opened up a door for some visiting scholars to participate in international academic communities. These outcomes have not only fostered the internationalization of Chinese faculty but also up-graded the overall process of internationalization of higher education in China, thus generating significant social bene-fits for the sending Chinese institutions and the Chinese society at large. Also, some barriers have been identified, such as unrealistic planning prior to visiting abroad and inadequate English proficiency. Based on the findings, we have called for employing visiting scholar programs as a vehicle to promoting interna-tionalization of Chinese faculty and utilizing faculty internationalization as a bottom-up means to fostering interna-tionalization of higher education in China. We have also made recommendations to individual visiting scholars, send-ing Chinese universities and receiving oversea universities, as well as the management bodies for visiting scholar pro-grams so that the outcomes of Chinese faculty＆#39;s overseas experiences can be maximized.