Toward a model of academic support in transnational education in China: Under the strategic goal of sustainability

Abstract

Academic support is an important part of quality education provision in higher education institutions (HEIs). Although many researches discuss about the different approaches and their effectiveness of academic support in retaining students and meeting their diversified needs, there is not so much literature written on the academic support in transnational education (TNE) under the strategic goal of sustainability. Based on an integrated analysis of a Chinese-Finnish TNE program, this paper uses mixed methods with qualitative and quantitative approaches in a case study to analyze what academic support should be provided to students, how and when it should be provided. Findings show that students need academic support in the aspects of employment-related issues and courses learning most. And Fu Dao Yuan is suggested to be the links between students and academic support mechanisms. The paper also proposes a longitudinal model of academic support to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which can be a reference model adopted in other TNE in the Chinese context.

Keywords:

• TNE
• academic support
• higher education
• China
• sustainability

PUBLIC INTEREST STATEMENT

The emphasizing significance of internationalization in higher education institutions in China has propagated an increasing number of Chinese-foreign cooperation in running schools (CFCRS), yet the identical disciplines and similar talent training models with non-CFCRS programs have constantly weakened the students’ social competitiveness, and consequently result in the cancellation of several less-innovative programs. As practitioners of a transnational education program, it is suggested that the core competitiveness of the program lies in the enhancement of students’ Sustainable Development Ability. This paper seeks to establish multi-platform academic support system to support the students’ multi-dimensional development in academic learning, cross-cultural communication and career pursuits throughout their campus life.

1. Introduction

Since the 2030 Agenda was declared in the United Nations Sustainable Development Summit in 2015, which defined 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the role of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) has becoming more and more important in promoting the lifelong learning, achieving high-quality education, providing equal opportunities, etc., to prepare the talents for the future challenging society (De La Torre et al., 2022; United Nations, 2015). The achievement of the strategic goal of sustainability requires the Higher Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) to be incorporated into all facets of education, which aims at developing sustainability competencies of the students (Cebrián et al., 2020). Numerous researches have studied the sustainability in formal teaching of higher institutions, such as teaching-and-learning (Taylor et al., 2021; Wilhelm et al., 2019), program design and management (Lambrechts et al., 2013; Miñano Rubio et al., 2019), and curriculum (Qu et al., 2020). However, the academic support under the strategic goal of sustainability, which involves the informal aspect of university education, still remains a blank.

Maintaining academic standards and enhancing quality of learning opportunities are two questions in transnational education (TNE; Sharp, 2017), which concerns the two important quality facets of higher education (HE) provisions: teachers’ teaching and students’ learning. With more and more focus being put on students’ learning experience, transition to HE, and learning quality under “student-oriented” education philosophy (Bai & Wang, 2022), academic support is considered to be an important means to achieve high-quality education provision in higher education institutions (HEIs; Cahill et al., 2014; Dancer et al., 2015; Morosanu et al., 2010; Noyens et al., 2020; Sharp, 2017; Walsh et al., 2009), which conforms to the SDG4 about equitable education: “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” (United Nations, 2015, p. 17).

From the aspect of personal and social learning, the purpose of HE in the twenty-first century is not simply to foster the ability of students to learn knowledge, to foster their sustainability competences to adapt to changes, to work in the multidisciplinary workplaces, and to be engaged in the society. That is to say, students need to acquire the core qualities to succeed in the changing world during their learning experience in HE (QAA Scotland, 2010). Apart from providing the necessary assistance to students in their study, academic support has another important function, i.e. providing the environment in which students can interact with when they meet with the changing environment. Therefore, it should not only be provided to those students who are “at risk”, but also to all student in HEIs, which shows the equity of learning opportunities.

With higher education stepping into the stage of popularization from the stage of mass education, China’s HE faces the challenge of diversification. As Wu (2020) states, the gross enrollment rate of HE in China has increased from 40.0% in 2015 to 51.6% in 2019, with the total number of students reaching 40.02 million. The popularization stage of HE in China has four characteristics: diversification, quality of learning, personalization and modernization. How to satisfy the diversified needs of students and to support them in achieving their academic performance and foster their sustainability competences to adapt to changes during their learning experience have become the hot issues at the operational level of all HEIs. In China, the academic support, which exists side by side with the formal teaching, is usually administrated by a sector called Students’ Affairs Office at HEIs and there are a group of students affairs staff called Fu Dao Yuan in Chinese dealing with the academic support issues within this sector. Based on an integrated analysis of a Chinese-Finnish TNE program, this paper uses mixed methods with qualitative and quantitative approaches in a case study (Creswell & Tashakkori, 2007) to analyze such questions as what difficulties students face during their learning experience, what academic support should be provided to them, what the mechanisms of the academic support are and when the academic support should be provided so that SDG4 can be achieved under the strategic goal of sustainability.

It consists of five parts. The first part is an introduction. The second part provides the related literature on academic support in HE, the factors influencing students’ academic performance, the academic support approaches/strategies used in different HEIs, and the current situation of academic support in China’s HEIs. The third part is a case analysis of a Chinese-Finnish TNE program by using mixed methods with qualitative and quantitative approaches in a case study. The fourth part proposes a longitudinal model of academic support in the Chinese-Finnish TNE program. And the last part is the conclusion.

2. Literature review

2.1. Background of the study

For most of countries with open access to HE, academic support is especially important because it can affect student’s transition in the HEIs, which will in turn influence retention rate (Noyens et al., 2020). Positive academic support is regarded as the means to encourage learning, decrease dropout rate, and improve the academic performance, etc. (Ning & Downing, 2012). Students’ transition to HE, however, is not a natural process when they leave their familiar homes and meet with such difficulties as new learning environment, heavier study loads, and more demanding study skills (Noyens et al., 2020). In the context of popularization education, HEIs need to adopt the “student-oriented” philosophy and focus on the student-centered learning and teaching (Cahill et al., 2014). Therefore, effective academic support services need to be provided to students so that their diversified and personalized needs can be satisfied (Schumacher & Ifenthaler, 2018) and make them engaged in the learning experience in HE.

In countries with strict formal selection process of HE, like China, the main motivation of academic support is to promote all-round development of students and the equal opportunities to learn. As stated in Opinions of the Ministry of Education on Accelerating the Construction of High-level Undergraduate Education and Comprehensively Improving the Ability of Talent Training, HEIs should focus on promoting students’ all-round development, and on both “teaching well” and “learning well” to stimulate students’ interest and potential in learning (MOE, 2018) so that every student is motivated to learn. In this sense, two important facets of high-quality HE provisions arises: high-quality academic standards and high-quality learning opportunities. However, it is reported that the academic support in HEIs has not received enough attention in China. The overall satisfaction of students with academic support is not high, and the implementation effect of academic support is not satisfactory (Shang & Zhang, 2019). China’s academic support is still on its way of development.

2.2. Factors contributing to students’ academic performance

Students’ successful academic performance, no matter in terms of good grades, low dropout rate, high graduation rate or high employment rate, is always the focus of the HE (Kahu & Nelson, 2018) because it is related to the question of high-quality HE provision. For HEIs, it is important to understand the factors that contribute to students’ academic performance the fostering of sustainability competences so as to provide appropriate support services (Walsh et al., 2009). A lot of literature is devoted to unveiling the various factors or processes to achieve success in students’ learning experience in HE (Edwards & Donnison, 2011; Kahu & Nelson, 2018; Noyens et al., 2020). There are some pre-entry characteristics, such as gender, origin background, scio-economic status, that will influence students’ academic performance in HEIs (Ding & He, 2020; Rodríguez et al., 2017).

Students’ engagement in their study and involvement in their institutions are thought to be the positive processes that will lead not only to the students’ acquisition of skills and knowledge, but also to the achievement of academic success and personal growth (Cahul, 2013; Thomas, 2002). Such engagement or involvement can promote students’ persistence which is the key to retaining them in HEIs (Edwards & Donnison, 2011). There is also the conclusion that those students tend to perform academically better when they get more adjusted to the HEIs (Rodríguez et al., 2017). This adjustment may occur when students perceive a sense of fit between the previous learning environment and the new environment in HEIs (Noyens et al., 2020). Therefore, the first year’s experience of students is particularly important because it is the crucial period of transition to HE for students.

The transition theory indicates that there are some challenges for first-year students (Kahu & Nelson, 2018). For example, there is a lack of motivation when students leave secondary schools and enter HEIs (N. Wang, 2011). First-year students often do not know very well the expectation of them and the academic requirements because of the differences between the secondary schools and the HEIs (Thomas, 2002). Moreover, the first-year students do not possess the sufficient academic skills that are needed in the HEIs (Kahu & Nelson, 2018), which include time management, learning skills, self-monitoring, technology proficiency and research skills (Mah & Ifenthaler, 2017). This lack of preparation can not enable them to face the more demanding studying load and more studying responsibilities (Malm et al., 2012).

Peer learning and peer influence on students are also identified in the literature (Cheng, 2020; Dancer et al., 2015). The peer-assisted study sessions program has been increasingly used by Australian HEIs and proves to be the effective support to the students not only locally but also internationally (Dancer et al., 2015). The study of an agricultural university in China also shows that roommates and classmates have positive effects on the learning experience of students. Those students who have excellent academic performance can act as peer tutors, help their peers establish good habits of studying, and motivate studying interests (Cheng, 2020).

2.3. Academic support strategies/approaches

Academic support services differ among different countries and HEIs (Padgett et al., 2013). The literature on academic support strategies/approaches indicate that it is not only important to know what students need, but also how they get access to these support services and where from (Cahill et al., 2014; Morosanu et al., 2010). Based on a quantitative study of 935 students, Cahill et al. (2014) explore the students’ opinions on the effectiveness of academic support. The findings show the necessity of providing support to students and different types of strategies, mechanisms and technologies should be used to enhance the effectiveness such as group tutorials, blogs, email communication and online tutorials. Peer support is more favored by students, compared with personal tutor system, which may result from the accessibility and availability of staff. Similarly, in a survey of 248 students in the North West of England, accessibility is found to be the key factor determining whether students go to academic tutors for support. However, academic tutors and peers are still their preferred support mechanisms (Walsh et al., 2009).

The academic support seems to last from the point of admission to graduation (Cahill et al., 2014), but there exists some critical periods in the process of provision (Edwards & Donnison, 2011). When analyzing the measures to promote student’s academic success in Bavarian HEIs, Germany, Falk et al. (2019) summarize three stages of providing academic support: orientation stage, academic studying stage, and academic progression stage. The services in orientation stage include study information platform, self-evaluation, and trial study. The services in academic studying stage include academic support (personalized training program, preliminary program, transition programs etc.), non-academic support (academic competencies, social ability etc.), mentoring project, orientation semester which aims to help students with their new programs. The services in academic progression stage include academic grades monitoring, self-assessment, academic support (mentoring courses, extra courses, personalized support, etc.), non-academic support (exam skills, studying skills, etc.), tutor mentoring program, and career orientation etc.

Even during the first year of learning at HEIs, there are some critical periods of providing academic support. The academic support in the first year can be divided into three stages: pre-orientation, orientation, and post orientation (Edwards & Donnison, 2011). Some academic information shown to the first-year students before they enter the HEIs is reported to have significant impact on their academic performance (Bishop & White, 2008). For example, a program called “Making the most of your time at UWS” at the University of the West of Scotland, UK (2014–2017) is used to support the transition of the new students from high schools to HE. Senior students produce short films on topics such as “advice for new students”, “what’s to gain from getting more involved at uni”, and “what do you wish you had known when you started university” and put them on the social media for the first year students to get the first impression of the university and relieve their anxiety.

During the orientation stage, course handbooks and online information platform are identified as good approaches of academic support (Falk et al., 2019; QAA, 2008a; Xie, 2021). The Undergraduate Student Handbook occupies a crucially important position in academic support at Stanford University and can be regarded as “roadmap” for all students. The contents of the handbook include introduction of academic programs, some special academic projects and organizations, overseas study programs, academic requirements of each program, academic policies and regulations, detailed information on every course, information on minor degrees and honorary degrees, information on other degrees and research projects (Xie, 2021). The online learning materials are used by University of Edinburgh to adapt to the personalized learning needs of the first year students. The main contents of the online materials are electronic course notes, interactive self-test multiple choice questions, tutorial questions, hints, progressively revealed solutions and materials to support collaborative group work activities. Students’ feedback of the online platform is quite positive, commenting that it is one of the best things of the course (QAA, 2008a). Orientation approaches are usually used to meet the requirements of the new students: academic (e.g., different learning styles, assessment methods), geographic (e.g., new environment), administrative (e.g., different policies), and personal (e.g., more personal responsibilities, time management; QAA, 2005). For example, six Gateway to Learning workshops during the Orientation Week cover researching & reading, academic writing, lectures, tutorials & labs, assessment and “getting to know yourself”, which can be freely chosen by the students. These workshops showing a straight-forward approach to academic study are evaluated to be quite successful (University of Dundee, 2014).

The post-orientation stage proposed by Edwards and Donnison (2011) matches partly with the academic studying process proposed by Falk et al. (2019). Services in the literature during this stage can be summarized as the following categories: course support, non-course support, learning behaviors guidance, and career exploration, as shown in Table 1. Course support is related to the formal course learning. The supplemental instruction program used at Lund University, Sweden is the course-related support attached to compulsory courses which have high failure rate (Malm et al., 2012). And the transition courses and preparatory courses are provided to the students when they enter the university to help them get used to the rest of their studies (Falk et al., 2019). The learning skills and strategics development should be provided to students during all the process of studying at HEIs. Studying process monitoring (getting permitted by students) and the following analysis and feedback (Falk et al., 2019) will be quite helpful to those students who do not often reflect on their studies.

Table 1. Academic support services in academic studying process

	Academic support services
Course-related support	Course supplemental mentoring, preparatory course, transition course, personalized tutoring, resit support
Non-course related support	Learning skills development lectures, learning strategies training, research skills development, academic performance monitoring, studying process feedback, academic warning
Learning behaviors guidance	Attendance monitoring, exam preparation, procrastination workshop, time management training
Career exploration	Internship help, career development planning support, postgraduate study advising

Source: Edwards & Donnison (2011); Sun & Yu (2020); Falk et al. (2019); Noyens et al. (2020); University of Dundee (2014).

Taking exams is a critical point for all the students. The Exam Revision Toolkit is an online resource which aims to provide students with practical and detailed advice on how to revise for and sit exams more effectively, how to manage time, and how to take exams. It contains the following contents: organizing revision (timetabling revision, avoiding procrastination, etc.), learning preferences, building recall into the revision, effective use of past papers/sample questions, being reflective, exam types, exam strategy, staying positive, coping with exam stress and resit exams, etc. (University of Dundee, 2014).

The important issues in the last year of HEIs are graduation thesis writing, employment, and postgraduate application, apart from the normal learning courses. Queen Margaret University, UK (2014–2017) develops two approaches concerning these two issues, which are Employer Mentoring Program and Don’t Panic: A Psych/SocSci Student’s Guide to Surviving 4th Year respectively, with the former focusing on the links between the third- and fourth year students with mentors who are professionals in their field so as to help students in career planning and enhance their employability, and latter focusing on the guide to help students prepare for their graduation thesis with more confidence and less stress and unease. Postgraduate study advising is a very important support for those students who have the willingness to pursue the study, which is a part of career development support. The postgraduate study advising at Wisconsin la Crosse includes the information on postgraduate program selection, tutor selection, admission requirements, issues needing attention, study cost, financial assistance, employment, etc. (Sun & Yu, 2020).

Finally, two academic support mechanisms are stressed in the literature of academic support, i.e. peer support and tutor support (Dancer et al., 2015; Malm et al., 2012; Morosanu et al., 2010; QAA, 2005; Sun & Yu, 2020). Researches of peer learning show that formal peer support and informal peer support exist side by side in the students’ learning experience. Supplemental instruction (Malm et al., 2012), peer-assisted study sessions program (Dancer et al., 2015), student mentoring (QAA, 2008b), the Student Network (QAA, 2008b), student Liaison Officer (QAA, 2008c), and Buddy System (QAA, 2008a) are all formal approaches of peer support which are organized by the HEIs. Morosanu et al. (2010) find an informal type of peer support—“support from below”, which means that students use their own social network to solve their academic problems. The social network includes peers, flatmates, informal study groups etc.

Personal tutor system is widely used in the UK. QAA’s report on Responding to Students’ Needs (2005) list 10 points of successful tutor system: support from the central administration, plan the support strategy according to students’ needs, organize the receiving environment, monitor student attendance, create different choices for student engagement, communicate to students the realistic expectations, provide enough information, provide training to the tutors, develop a code of practice for tutors, and integrate the tutor system to general student experience, etc. These guidelines can be good references to other HEIs.

2.4. Current academic support in Chinese HEIs

In order to complement with the requirements of adapting to the changing society under 2030 Agenda and the strategic goal of sustainability, HE in China needs to pursue its high-quality provisions. Thus, how to cope with the challenge of diversification and personalization from the individual’s aspect leads to the focus on academic support in China’s HE (Cai & Yu, 2019). On 21 January 2021, the Ministry of Education (MoE) of China issued the Implementation Plan for Undergraduate Education and Teaching Review and Evaluation in Regular Colleges and Universities (2021–2025; MOE, 2021), which guides the direction of Chinese HEIs’ undergraduate education for the next several years. Student development and support is one of the key secondary indicators in it, which confirms the importance of academic support in the HEIs.

Yuan (2020) groups the academic support approaches of 28 “Double First-class” universities in China into freshman orientation, learning counseling, top-notch students guidance and support for students with academic difficulties, etc. Cai and Yu (2019) study 10 Chinese universities and argue that their academic support approaches and strategies fall into three categories: subject curriculum metaphor support (curriculum planning, peer support on courses, learn how to learn, etc.), professional identification support (academic career planning, professional competency training, graduation thesis support, etc.), peak experience support (research exchange support, study abroad support, etc.). The academic support in these two studies can be summarized in Table 2.

Table 2. Academic support in Chinese HEIs

Period	Approaches	Mechanisms
First year	Orientation, studying skills, learning competencies	Individual advising, group mentoring, lectures, workshops, practising camp, peer support, teacher-student partnership, website, studying communication platform, studying group, individual mentoring
Studying process	Course choosing, top-notch students, academic career planning, internship, research projects guidance, learning skills, competency improvement, course mentoring, studying material provision, support for students with academic difficulties, difficult courses mentoring, academic performance survey and analysis, academic monitoring and assessment, resit mentoring, academic warning, competition guidance, professional competency and skill training
Last year	Studying abroad planning, postgraduate study planning, career planning, career advising, graduation thesis guidance

Source: Yuan (2020); Cai & Yu (2019).

The academic support in Chinese HEIs is still at its initial stage (Shang & Zhang, 2019). Most of the HEIs in China have not established the independently organized academic support center. Those academic organizations at some HEIs are either attached to Students’ Affairs Sector or to Academic Affairs Sector (Cai & Yu, 2019; Yuan, 2020) at Chinese HEIs. Students affairs staff who are called Fu Dao Yuan in Chinese play the role of providing the academic support to students (Yuan, 2020). However, these students affairs staff are not professional academic support personnel (D. Wang, 2014), and there are some differences between their own specialties and the students’ specialties, which will lead to the inadequacy of the support (Wang & Zeng, 2015). In order to provide effective support to students, Fu Dao Yuan should connect academic teachers, students, parents, peers together to (X. Wang, 2015) achieve an effective academic support provision.

2.5. Academic support at Chinese TNE HEIs

Transnational education (TNE) is the movement of academic programs and the HEIs across national borders, which involves the mobility of teaching staff, teaching materials and management models, etc. (Knight, 2016; McNamara & Knight, 2015). In China, TNE is called the Chinese-foreign cooperation in running schools (CFCRS), which is defined as “the activities of the cooperation between foreign and Chinese educational institutions in establishing educational institutions/programs inside of the territory of China to provide education service mainly to Chinese citizens” (State Council of China, 2003). The diversified students in Chinese TNE add to the complexity of academic support in that the recruitment standards of the TNE students are usually lower than the normal students. They have less motivation, lower learning competencies, and lower self-expectations (Yu & Xue, 2017). And these TNE students face more challenges, especially when they study the courses and get the degrees from other countries which involves learning in another language and in a cross-cultural learning environment. A recent exploratory study on 22 students from TNE programs between one Australian university and four Chinese universities suggests that from students’ perspective, it is essential to provide high-quality preparation curricula including general English training and disciplinary knowledge instruction (Bai & Wang, 2022). New York University Shanghai, a TNE university in China, provides the students with support services including both individual, one-on-one tutoring as well as group sessions on writing and speaking consultations, course-specific tutoring, academic skills coaching, academic skills workshops, global writing and speaking fellows, online tutoring support, etc. It has a special academic support which is called Orientation to Academic Integrity in which all freshmen participate in a four-part academic-integrity series, including a New Student Orientation Academic Integrity Workshop, an Online Plagiarism Tutorial & Quiz, a Citations & Source Integration Workshop, and the Ethics in Education Bowl (NYUSHANGHAI, 2021).

2.6. Current academic support in Finnish HEIs

In Finland, the academic support in HEIs is a highly developed trans-institutional system which could be classified into two main categories (Thuneberg et al., 2013). The first category is teaching arrangement support for teachers, including remedial teaching, special education, personalized curriculum, continuing education and phenomenon-based teaching. The second category is counseling and other support for students, including home-school communications, consultation services, languages assistance service, campus-based organizations support, etc.

Unlike traditional campus-based support, Finnish academic support emphasizes on collaborative cooperation between professional specialists of eclectic backgrounds, with a variety group of consultants ranging from university presidents, general teachers, special education teachers to psychologists, doctors, nurses, and social workers. Depending on the actual educational resources available and prospective investment, the academic support team may decide whether to expand the basic service to more systematic and professional student service organizations or not, which varies remarkably under different circumstances (Thuneberg et al., 2013). Known as the global pioneer of advanced education system, the academic supports in Finland provide refreshing inspirations to HEIs across the world.

3. Case study

3.1. The study

The site of the study is a Chinese TNE double degree program jointly established by University of Oulu, Finland and Nanjing Institute of Technology, China. The TNE program begun to recruit students in 2018, after getting the approval of MoE of China. Instead of paying attention to most high-level universities in China who already established relatively complete and mature academic support mechanisms and platforms for students in their TNE programs, the study focuses on students of the Chinese TNE double degree program in an ordinary undergraduate university, which shares much more similarities with other peer Chinese HEIs in areas of educational concept, students’ academic quality and operation mechanism.

The first stage of the study was conducted in January of 2021 which was a qualitative face-to-face interview with three FDYs whose main jobs are providing academic support to the students in the TNE program. The purpose of the interview is to understand the current academic support provided to students and their attitudes and expectations towards the effectiveness of the academic support in the TNE program. The participants were well informed of the purpose of the interview and voluntary to share their authentic opinions in a confidential manner. Abundant related questions designed by peers for the same variable have been carefully reviewed in advance to develop specific interview questions, as to comply with the actuality and characteristics of TNE in China. The interview questions are:

During the past 2 years, what academic support did you provide to your students and when did you provide the academic support?To what extent does the academic support help students?What academic support do you expect can improve the students’ academic performance apart from the one you have provided to the students?Do you think there are some critical points that students need academic support?What are they?

In the second stage of the study, a survey was conducted to get the quantitative data of the 281 students in the TNE program in March 2021. The recruited students were voluntary to participate in this study and free to withdraw anytime without any negative repercussions. In order to get the real ideas from the students, a semi-structured questionnaire with open-ended questions was developed, which comprised of all the academic support services that are found in the literature and the interviews with the three Fu Dao Yuan. It aims to collect the information on academic needs of students, which contains the questions on what difficulties students face during their learning, what academic support they prefer to get, who they favor to ask for help, what mechanisms of academic support they’d like to get, and when they need academic support. A pre-test based on the psychometric methodology was conducted to check the clarity of statements, accuracy of words and expressions, and the measurable connections between the questions and research purposes. To ensure the effectiveness and sufficiency of primary data, researchers used random sampling and simple sampling to further analyze the stability and reliability of the data before distributing the final questionnaire. When all the preparations were ready, students were asked to fill in the paper questionnaires when they had the class meetings and they were also guided when they filled in the questionnaire so that they can express their real thoughts. Throughout the process, the data were collected anonymously and well stored so as to prevent any threats to data privacy.

Altogether 281 copies of questionnaires were distributed to the students and 251 copies were collected and the return rate is 89.3%. In the 251 copies of questionnaire, 90, 91, and 70 copies come from the first-year students (35.9%), the second-year students (36.3%), and the third students (27.9%), respectively.

3.2. Data analysis and discussion

The Academic Planning and Guidance Center was founded in June 2020 to deal with the academic support issues in the Chinese-Finnish TNE program. The three students affairs staff (Fu Dao Yuan) interviewed all hold the opinion that it is good to establish the center so that the planned academic support can be provided to the students. According to them, the academic support services provided to the students are shown in Table 3.

Table 3. Current academic support provided to students

Period of time	Academic support services
Pre-entry to the university	English learning materials, brochure of the university
Orientation week	Visit of the campus, students’ handbook, English studying lecture, innovation introduction lecture, major introduction lecture, academic career management handbook, introduction of regulations at university
Semester studying stage	Peer mentoring to students with studying difficulties, supplemental mentoring of difficult courses, academic career planning lecture, English learning plan, research project mentoring, leadership training lecture
Academic year progression stage	Specialized competency training workshop, English learning workshop, difficult course workshop
Last year	Postgraduate application workshop, study abroad workshop

Source: Created by the author.

Students’ handbook and academic career management handbook are the most effective academic support services, according to one of the interviewees. The former comes from the host university of the TNE program, which contains all the regulations and policies on students’ learning at the university. The latter is compiled by the TNE program, which contains the information on the curriculum, the tasks and activities that will be organized in different academic year, and some particular regulations in the TNE program etc.

The students list the difficulties that they face during their learning experience in the questionnaire as follows: lack of studying interests and motivation, inefficient learning skills, lack of in-depth learning methods and guidance, lack of in-depth academic exchange and research channels, not being able to handle some difficult courses, lack of enough information on some professional courses, being greatly influenced by classmates around, lack of self-control ability, not knowing how to plan the university learning, being distracted by other factors and not involved in studying etc.

According to the statistics (Table 4), the top five academic support that students need include professional course tutoring, postgraduate study, English, courses taught by XXXX teachers, and employment guidance. It can be seen from these findings that most of the students need the employment-related support as the postgraduate study recruitment rate is included in the figure of employment rate in China. Students face great challenges in their professional courses learning, especially the ones taught by Finnish teachers. And part of the reason they have difficulty in these courses is their English level, which is the common weakness that TNE students have in China (Gao & Wu, 2020). Another critical reason is the limited knowledge on western academic system and lack of training on critical thinking, which is generally considered as a major challenge for Chinese students when they start the professional courses taught by western scholars (Bai & Wang, 2022).

Table 4. The top academic support needs by students

Academic support needs	Percentage
Professional course tutoring	83.7
Postgraduate study	79.9
English	71.3
Courses taught by XXXX teachers	69.3
Employment guidance	63.3

Source: Created by the author.

Interestingly, the two academic support that students need least in the survey are self-assessment and feedback (5.2%), and academic grades monitoring during the learning process (9.6%), which is opposite to the academic support that is provided to the Bavarian HEIs, Germany (Falk et al., 2019). The reason why students do not want to get these two academic support may be that they are afraid of losing their faces and being looked down upon if other students know their weaknesses in learning (Deng, 2012).

The mechanisms of getting academic support preferred by students are shown in Figure 1. Learning group is students’ most favorite mechanism and students would like to get the support from their peers, either classmates or seniors. Online platform is another useful mechanism for students to get academic support, due to the reason that students are sometimes more willing to learn by themselves from the Internet. Students also like to talk to the students affairs staff (Fu Dao Yuan) individually about their difficulty in learning and get the one-to-one academic tutoring in some hard courses, which corresponds to the findings previously mentioned that students are afraid of being looked down upon by others (Deng, 2012).

Figure 1. Academic support mechanisms preferred by students.

As shown in Figure 2, when asked whom they favor to ask for help when they meet with academic difficulties and get academic support, students show strong tendency on getting support from students affairs staff (Fu Dao Yuan), professional course teachers, peers (at the same grade), learning by themselves, and peers (seniors).

Figure 2. Preferred people of getting academic support by students.

As for the periods that students need academic support, about 71% of students think they need academic support during the whole university lives. 68.1% of students think they need academic support during the academic progression stage, that is, during the breaks from the first year to the second year, from the second year to the third year, and from the third year to the fourth year, especially the summer vacation. About 36.2% of students think that the period before exams or resit exams are the important period that they need academic support. This finding corresponds to the previously discussed literature that there are some critical periods of time that students need academic support (Edwards & Donnison, 2011).

4. A proposed model of academic support in TNE program

From the interview and the survey, it can be noticed that there are obvious gaps between the academic support needs and the current academic support services within the TNE program, which indicates the necessity to establish a model of academic support for the students at the operational level. Therefore, a longitudinal model of academic support of the TNE program is proposed here (as shown in Figure 3), which concerns such aspects as what academic support should be provided to the students and when the academic support is provided.

Figure 3. A longitudinal model of academic support.

Several points should be focused in this longitudinal model. Firstly, English is the most important factor that will influence the academic performance in the TNE program and it is also the need identified in the survey. Most of the students think English is the obstacle to their studying. Therefore, the support on English should be planned carefully and start from the summer before students enter the university to the period they prepare their graduation thesis and apply for postgraduate study abroad.

Secondly, enough information should be provided to the students, not only on the communication of types of academic support services, but also on the services themselves. On-line information platform can be a useful service so that students can refer to without the limits of time and space as many students prefer to study by themselves according to the findings. Different forms of information can be shown in the website such as document, video, questionnaire, peer advise, etc.

Thirdly, the academic support in the TNE program should fill the big gap of learning skills and strategies between the secondary schools and the HEIs. Some of the students mention in the open question of the questionnaire that they spend nearly 2 years to be adjusted to the learning at the university and when they realize what university learning is, half of the university life has passed. Therefore, the learning skills and strategies training will not only be provided in the orientation week, but also during the whole study semesters in the form of non-course related support (as shown in Figure 3). Study process monitoring, assessment and feedback after getting the permission of students are also important in the students’ learning experience because students always do not realize what their problems are and where they should go. To the TNE program, it is easy to get and analyze the information on the students’ attendance, time spent on learning, assignments quality, grades of every exam, etc., either from the learning platform (Moodle) or from the academic department of the university. But undoubtedly the privacy of students should be strictly protected to avoid the frustration of the students.

Lastly, for TNE students, it is also necessary to provide the studying abroad support. According to the findings from the survey, some students want to pursue their study abroad because after experiencing the transnational education, they are more open to the studying in different countries. The study abroad support may include university choosing, switch of majors if necessary, application skills, interview skills, personal statement writing etc.

The mechanisms of the academic support, which concerns how the support should be provided, will be the combination of on-line platform, individual mentoring, peer support, group counselling, and lectures, depending on the needs from the students. The students affairs staff (Fu Dao Yuan) may act as the professional academic advisers after training, as well as the “agency” of academic support, as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4. Linking role of students affairs staff (Fu Dao Yuan).

Due to the limited resources, since there are not so many professional academic support tutors available, the students affairs staff (Fu Dao Yuan) can be the link between the students and the professional tutors (X. Wang, 2015). For example, if students need support in some difficult courses, they can first go to Fu Dao Yuan and make their needs understood. After that, Fu Dao Yuan can arrange either group supplemental mentoring side by side with formal teaching or individual mentoring held by teachers or peer students.

5. Conclusions

Under the 2030 Agenda and the strategic goal of sustainability, academic support adds to the value of equitable quality education in Chinese HEIs, especially in the context of TNE in which students come from different backgrounds. Based on an integrated analysis of a Chinese-Finnish TNE program, this paper uses mixed methods with qualitative and quantitative approaches in a case study to analyze what difficulties students face during their learning, what academic support should be provided to students, what the mechanisms of the academic support and when the academic support should be provided. The findings from the interviews with FDY and the students’ survey show that there are some gaps between the students’ academic needs and the current support services provided to them. Students face great difficulties in the aspects of employment-related issues and professional courses learning which exist from the pre-entry period to their graduation. Therefore, pre-entry, orientation week, study semesters, progression stage, and last year are regarded as the critical periods of providing the academic support to the students in the TNE program. And the mechanisms of the academic support, which concerns how the support should be provided, will be the combination of on-line platform, individual mentoring, peer support, group counselling, and lectures, depending on the needs from the students. At last, FDYs, a special group of staff in the TNE program, will act as the “agency”, linking the students and the mechanisms of academic support together.

Acknowledgements

We thank our participants for their generous contribution to this work.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jing Jiang

Jing Jiang is Director of International Office at Nanjing Institute of Technology, China with 15 years’ experience in transnational education of HEIs. In recent years, her research groups have presided over several research projects on TNE and published abundant papers on students support and development, from which they set up an Academic Planning and Guidance Center for students in a TNE program. Through individual interviews and extensive surveys on students and teachers of the TNE program, as well as analytical comparative study with peers, this research investigates the components of academic support and further establishes a longitudinal mechanism of academic support, hopefully to make some modest contributions to the issue of cultivating students’ Sustainable Development Ability based on educational equality.