Global Experience: the development and preliminary evaluation of a programme designed to enhance students’ global engagement

Abstract

This paper reports on the development and preliminary evaluation of ‘Global Experience’, an innovative programme at the University of South Australia designed to broaden students’ intercultural engagement through a range of international experiential activities. The paper provides the rationale for the establishment of the programme including a summary of data from a feasibility study. A preliminary evaluation of the programme which has been operational since February 2008, is based on a range of data sets including the results of a survey of commencing students, a survey of the first graduates of the programme, plus results from the online Course Evaluation Instrument (CEI), Student Evaluation of Teaching for the academic component Global Experience Professional Development (GEPD) and qualitative feedback in journals written by students enrolled in GEPD. The data indicate that the Global Experience programme is fulfilling its objectives by responding to the recommendations of numerous researchers to operationalise programmes that encourage students to develop cross-cultural understanding, intercultural communication and international perspectives.

Keywords:

• international experience
• global competence
• experiential learning

Acknowledgement

The authors wish to thank Dr Brianne Hastie, University of South Australia, for her assistance with the statistical analysis of students’ grades and GPAs.

Notes

1. Pseudonyms are used for all students’ names.

2. This student has provided written permission for this comment to be used in this research.