Andrews University�School of Education

​

​

​

A DISSERTATION PROPOSAL DEFENSE

Renaude Saint-Phard

MAY 28, 2015

​

Committee Members

• CHAIR: SYLVIA GONZALEZ, PH.D.
• METHODOLOGIST: JAY BRAND, PH.D.
• THIRD MEMBER: ROBSON MARINHO, PH.D.
• SUB-MEMBER: GUS GREGORUTTI, Ph.D.

DEVOTION

• Living in a foreign country.
• Different culture
• Different language
• Discrimination, isolation, loneliness, sickness.
• International students: curricular challenges and financial stress.
• Lev. 19:34- The stranger who dwells among you shall be to you as one born among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.

​

TOPIC

CULTURAL, LINGUISTIC, CURRICULAR AND FINANCIAL STORIES OF ANDREWS UNIVERSITY INTERNATIONAL UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS AND THEIR EXPERIENCES OF COPING DURING THE ACADEMIC YEAR 2014-2015: A NARRATIVE STUDY

​

STUDY MAIN POINTS

• This qualitative narrative study hopes to explore and understand the individual stories of international undergraduate students, and their experiences of resilience while confronting challenges.
• Although literature is replete with studies on international students’ challenges, research examining how international undergraduate students confront their experiences in terms of resilience remains scarce.
• This research study took an open-ended approach that did not necessarily require an exploration of resilience except as it surfaces spontaneously from my interviews with the participants.

​

​

IMPORTANCE OF STUDY

• �This study will give voice to IUS
• �It explored, and understood the cultural, linguistic, curricular, and financial stories, and experiences of IUS who use the concept of resilience to confront challenges.
• �This study hoped to understand the role that the concept of resilience plays in the lives of IUS and how it helps them overcome their challenges.
• �It also hoped to explore the role that personal, environmental and institutional factors play in the international undergraduate students’ experiences of resilience.
• ​

​

BENEFITS OF STUDY

• Valuable for professionals working in the fields of education, psychology and counseling to provide them with efficient support and assistance.
• Study will empower international students globally.
• Will add knowledge to the fields of higher education.
• It will enhance the understanding of IUS from a resilience perspective.

BENEFITS OF STUDY CT’D

• It will improve the services that education administration, counseling, and psychology providers deliver to IS.
• Recommendations from this study may be used for better preparation and support of future international undergraduate students on a global level.

​

Statement of the Problem

• Although a plethora of studies are conducted on international students, they do not give voice, explore or understand their cultural, linguistic, curricular, and financial narratives.
• �International students do not know how to confront their challenges and cope with them. It is essential to understand how they cope with their challenges for their adaptation, survival, empowerment, and for higher education institutions’ retention rates, resources, and services rendered to them.
• ​

Research Questions

�1) What are the cultural (personal, social and religious), linguistic, curricular, and financial stories of the challenges confronting international undergraduate students?

� 2) How do international undergraduate students cope with their cultural, linguistic, curricular and financial challenges?

​

Main Framework

​

• Two models provide the opportunity to understand the stories of the IUS and their experiences of resilience:
• The Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) bio-ecological model of human development theory.
• The Australian Resilience International Student Education (RISE) model.

​

�The Bronfenbrenner’s Bio-Ecological Theory

• Human development naturally possesses biopsychological changes.
• The ecological development: the scientific study of the progressive adjustment “between an active human being and the changing properties of the immediate settings.”
• Human development represents the fusion of a person with his or her surroundings.

��The Bronfenbrenner’s Bio-Ecological Theory, ct’d

• Five interrelated systems of human development.
• The microsystem consists of functions, doings and interpersonal relations that a human being encounters.
• The mesosystem represents connections between the microsystems.
• The exosystem symbolizes the implied outcome of a person’s development by the environmental systems.

The Bronfenbrenner’s Bio-Ecological Theory ct’d

• The macrosystem represents a specific culture’s community design.
• The chronosystem provides an extensive viewpoint to the systems method.
• The theoretical relationship among the systems in Bronfenfrenner’s bio-ecological model will help explore and understand the process of international undergraduate students’ cultural, linguistic, curricular and financial challenges, and experiences of resilience while adjusting in their host country .

​

​

The Australian Resilience Theory

• The RISE model uses helpful strategies to empower IS through mentoring, supervision and employment establishment.
• It includes four distinct elements to help IS navigate a different culture:
• The first element, ‘Getting Settled’ addresses factors such as culture shock, integration, and professional challenges.

​

The Australian Resilience Theory

• 2^nd element, ‘Learning,’ includes IS’ orientation, their thoughts process, and their strategies to study. - It also provides them with a new curriculum tailored according to their needs.
• 3^rd element, ‘Communicating,’ stresses the significance of IS’ linguistic issues.
• 4^th element, Coping,’ resembles resilience, referring to students’ reaction in face of adversity. It is described as ‘adaptive or endurance resilience.

​

The Australian Resilience Theory CT’D

• This model provides an underpinning for the employment place and the mentoring of international students, and ‘the contextualization of curriculum internationalization.
• It helped students see the world and the workplace through different lenses.
• And it impacted learning and work experiences, and improved strategies to meet IUS’ needs.

CHAPTER THREE HIGHLIGHTS

• �A qualitative narrative design
• �Five IUS males and females were interviewed from diverse ethnicities ranging in grade level from sophomore to junior who have confronted challenges and who have overcome them.
• �Data was primarily collected from semi-structured interviews, letters, field texts, journals, family stories, texts, emails, and photographs.
• �The stories were analyzed chronologically and themes or categories of information were identified.
• ​

Types of Narrative Research Designs

�From the various types of narrative research design (biography, autobiography, life history, oral history), the personal experience story narrative approach, which involves the collection of information on an individual in single or several episodes was used.

�This approach was chosen because it provided me with a theoretical lens as a guiding structure for advocacy.

​

Personal Experience Story Narrative

• In personal experience story narratives, the participants also became the audience, having the opportunity to examine the story, re-story, and create strategies for struggles (Beverley, 2000; Cresswell, 2012).
• Personal experience story narrative inquiry remains the most convincing instrument in stories for educational research (Clandinin & Connely, 2010).

​

​

​

​

​

Emerging Themes

�1) Religion / Spirituality / Relationship with God

� 2) Motivation, Self-determination

�3) Community Support.

​

Findings

�The 10 international undergraduate students have experienced cultural, financial hardships, curricular, culinary, visa, transportation, love, loneliness, health, betrayal, stress, culture shock, spiritual, social, physical, and emotional challenges.

�They remained resilient through their faith in God, motivation, self- determination, family ties and assistance, friends, the community, and university system.

​

BOOKS USED

• Killick, D. (2015). Developing the global student: Higher education in an era of globalization. Internationalization in higher education. Routledge: NY.
• Wildavski, B. (2010). The great brain race: How global universities are reshaping the world. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
• Zumeta, W., Breneman, D.W., Callan, P.M. & Finney, J.E. (2012). Financing American Higher Education in the Era of Globalization. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.

BOOKS USED

• Cresswell, J.W. (2012). Educational research: Planning, conducting, and evaluating quantitative and qualitative research, 4th ed. Pearson, Nebraska.
•  Guruz, K. (2010). Highway education and international student mobility in the global knowledge economy. Revised and Updated Second Ed. New York Press: Albany.

​