Interested in actually experiencing other cultures abroad? The 4 part series of blogposts ‘Xperience new worlds’ helps you to identify what type of educational travel would suit you best, in relation to what you would like to get out of the experience in terms of personal development, cross-cultural competencies and professional competencies. This is part 2: The learning potential of different types of educational travel.
Characteristics of different educational travel experiences
Educational travel experiences vary in terms of objectives. Some are more oriented towards the development of professional competencies and some more to cross-cultural competencies and personal development. Furthermore, the learning of competencies is related to several contextual factors such as length, controlled experience, local interaction and cultural distance. Since different types of educational travel score differently on these factors (see table 1) it is likely that their learning potential differs too.
Table 1 contextual characteristics of educational travel programmes (based on Kaufman et al. 2011)
Learning potential of different educational travel experiences
Together with the help of research by Kaufman et al. (2011) and the empirical findings of my PhD research (van ‘t Klooster 2014), the potential for competency learning for four types of educational travel can be portrayed as follows, in table 2. The international internship holds the most potential, in particular with regard to cross-cultural competencies and personal development. Below I will elaborate on the learning effects for each competence. For insight in the competence framework and its definitions, I refer the reader to part 3.
Cross-cultural competencies
The international internship probably provides the greatest cross-cultural experience (Kaufman et al. 2011; Stronkhorst 2005; van den Hoven & Walenkamp 2013). Although the foreign company can be a multinational or local company, it is likely that in either case students interact frequently with local people during the day and have less opportunities to withdraw to the international student community. However, students report that some relationship skills are more difficult to acquire when travelling from high to low income countries and / or countries characterized by high power distance and collectivism, such as overcoming language differences and interaction with locals.
Professional competencies
For the ‘International business’ dimension it is believed that the international internship and International research project both score higher than the study abroad and the study tour. While the International research project is likely to be more complex than most internships in terms of international business skills involved, the greater length of the international internship provides students with the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the market and the organization they work for (Johnson 2005; Kaufman et al 2011). Reflection exercises could help to ensure that interns indeed take this opportunity to improve their understanding of international business related issues. Interns and International research project participants develop quantitative and functional knowledge mostly hands-on in a practical setting, whereas study abroad involves lectures, where these are taught on a more general and conceptual level (van den Hoven & Walenkamp 2013).
International research project students seem to significantly develop their intra and inter personal management competencies. By contrast, international interns are expected to only moderately develop these skills as their job tasks are often more administrative. Study abroad students improve these skills as well, albeit in an educational setting (Teichler & Janson 2007).
Personal development
For the independence dimension, the study tour is likely to yield the least results, because of the short duration of the trip and lack of individual challenge, since students mostly travel among students from their home country (Johnson 2005). The international internship is likely to yield the highest learning, given the longer duration of the experience, individual nature and the relatively high amount of unfamiliar situations due to ‘challenging’ interactions with local customs and value systems.
All types, except for the study tour, are likely to foster a strong sense of flexibility due to the significant number of unexpected circumstances that the students need to deal with. For the international research project this will be more due to the intense project schedule and intense team dynamics. For both the international internship and study abroad this is more due to longer duration and more encounters with different values and customs. For self-awareness, the same argumentation applies, but in addition I contend that the effect is greatest for international interns as they are likely to be confronted with the greatest cultural distance.
The international internship, study abroad and international research project are likely to score the same on the variable ‘awareness of the world’. For perceptual question skills, the longer experiences such as the international internship and study abroad are more likely to disturb current world views (Hansel 1988; McGuigan 1958).
Go to part 3: What competencies can you master by studying abroad?
Related books (which include all references)
