Coming to America: Challenges for Faculty Coming to United States' Universities

Abstract

‘Coming to America’ is a journey filled with obstacles for some new faculty from abroad. This paper reports the findings of surveys conducted with foreign-born faculty and their students in order to explore the key issues these faculty face at US institutions. They identify substantial concerns about cultural differences, including relations with students, feelings of loneliness and the difficult process of obtaining permanent residency rights. The paper concludes with recommendations of strategies that could ease the transition into US academe for foreign-born faculty in the future. These include improving mentoring, networking and training opportunities for foreign-born faculty and providing more information and training for chairs so that they are better able to help foreign-born colleagues.

Keywords:

• Foreign-born faculty
• US education system
• cultural differences

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Janice Monk for encouraging her ideas and Kenneth Foote, Janice Monk, Rebecca Theobald and Heike Alberts for providing advice and suggestions on the improvement of this paper to its final draft. She would like to thank Plymouth State University for giving her her first opportunity to work in the United States which gave her that essential ‘foot in the door’. Finally she acknowledges the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) for making the process of work visa and Green Card application so easy!