Globalisation,transnational academic mobility and the Chinese knowledge diaspora: an Australian case study

The master discourses of economic globalisation and the knowledge economy each cite knowledge diasporas as vital ‘trans-national human capital’. Based on a case study of a major Australian university, this article examines the potential to deploy China's large and highly-skilled diaspora in the service of Chinese and Australian scientific and technological development. It finds that at a time when much of the world is deeply mired in a global financial crisis, this treasured resource of highly-skilled intellectuals assumes even greater significance. Meanwhile, there are key challenges to be confronted to fully utilise China's overseas talent. It argues that the Chinese knowledge diaspora are a modern kind of cosmopolitan literati, and could contribute actively to higher education internationalisation in both Australia and China.     

Sticky care and conference travel: unpacking care as an explanatory factor for gendered academic immobility

Higher Education - While there is increasing awareness of the contributing effect of the academic mobility imperative on gendered inequalities in the academic profession at large, there is a...     

Stretching the academic harness: knowledge construction in the process of academic mobility in Chile

In this article, we analyse the impact of academic mobility on the construction of knowledge for Chilean scholars who have studied abroad. We conducted 41 semi-structured interviews with Chilean-born scholars in the social sciences and humanities, who accepted jobs at national research universities in Chile after receiving their doctorates abroad. Findings show that international academic mobility allowed these participants to question legitimised ways of doing knowledge, where they can stretch the academic harness that increasingly rules their knowledge construction. Our main argument is that knowledge construction process is neither linear nor unidimensional and it occurs as a rhizomatic process in a multidimensional space.     

Gender inequalities in transnational academic mobility and the ideal type of academic entrepreneur

Based on a study on academic career paths of PhD graduates in Switzerland, this paper is concerned with the individual and institutional factors that affect transnational academic mobility in the postdoctoral period. It will be argued that the institutionalisation of geographic mobility in academic career paths through research funding institutions and universities have gendering and stratifying effects. Complex formations related to gender, partnership, children, and dual-career constellations, as well as to social class and academic integration, are resulting in inequalities in the accumulation of international cultural and social capital.     

Do academic developers’ conceptions support an integrated academic practice? A comparative case study from Hong Kong and Singapore

ABSTRACT

Academic development (AD) is increasingly being oriented towards an integrated approach to academic practice (AP), given arguments for the importance of integrating research, learning, and teaching. Given the complex and evolving character of AD as a profession, it is important to understand the conceptions of AD held by academic developers, who can play a key role in supporting conditions for such integration. This comparative case study explores conceptions of AD and the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) held by academic developers at two universities in Hong Kong and Singapore, and examines the extent to which these conceptions support an integrated AP. The findings show that not all conceptions recognise the importance of integration; moreover, though in both cases aspects of integration come to the fore, there are gaps that militate against a fuller understanding of integrating teaching and research. The study has implications for future AD practice and raises questions about using SoTL as a means of fostering teaching and research integration.     

Nomadic political ontology and transnational academic mobility

ABSTRACT

Transnational academic mobility is often characterized in relation to terms such as ‘brain drain’, ‘brain gain’, or ‘brain circulation’ – terms that isolate researchers’ minds from their bodies, while saying nothing about their political identities as foreign nationals. In this paper, I explore the possibilities of a more ‘nomadic political ontology’, where the body is ‘multifunctional and complex, a transformer of flows and energies, affects, desires and imaginings’ (p. 25). In this sense, academic mobility is not only the outcome of national innovation and economic competitiveness strategies, but also sets the conditions for epistemic and ontological change at the level of the individual. In this paper, I explore a personal account of the nomadic political ontology of academic mobility to exemplify the interrelationships between nationalism, academic belonging and transnationalism. My experiences as a transnational subject affect the stability and scope of my work as a policy-oriented researcher who studies the academic profession and the internationalization of higher education. My positionality in relation to my research focus is likely not unique to the field of higher education studies or educational research more broadly, which permits a wider applicability of this exploration beyond personal narrative and a particular national context. This personal reflection, guided by nomadic theory and post-structural possibilities, offers a viewpoint of the academic profession beyond the standard mobility discourse.     

Global inequality in the academic system: effects of national and university symbolic capital on international academic mobility

The global academic system is hierarchically structured between a center, a semi-periphery and a periphery. We analyze to what extent the position of a country and a university within this hierarchy of scientific reputation shapes doctoral students’ chances of international mobility. We conducted an exploratory experimental study using fake applications of international doctoral students sent to German sociology professors, who were asked to serve as supervisors during a planned research visit. Our fake applicants come from the core and periphery of the global academic system: Yale, Pennsylvania State University, National University Singapore, and Vietnam National University Hanoi. The results show that applicants from both US institutions get more positive and more personal feedback than the other applicants. This points to the importance of national scientific reputation. Moreover, we can show that universities’ symbolic capital seems to be more important than the quality of a department.     

Emerging education hubs: the case of Singapore

In anticipation of a globalising post-Fordist political economy, countries and universities are increasingly pursuing strategic transnational education and research alliances. This article analyses the Global Schoolhouse, a key education policy platform that aims to transform Singapore into a knowledge and innovation hub by establishing networks and collaborations with foreign universities. Two Global Schoolhouse initiatives are examined—the alliance between Singapore and MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), and the institutional restructuring aimed at re-modelling the National University of Singapore into a ‘leading global university centred in Asia’. We outline some of the complexities and unanticipated outcomes which emerge when nations and their education institutions seek to globalise.     

Retaining a foothold on the slippery paths of academia: university women,indirect discrimination,and the academic marketplace

This paper examines indirect discrimination in Australian universities that tends to obstruct and delay women’s academic careers. The topic is defined and contextualised via a 1998 speech by the Australian Human Rights Commission’s Sex Discrimination Commissioner, juxtaposed with a brief contemporaneous exemplar. The paper discusses the prevalence of women among casual and fixed‐term academic workers, and the contrasting low numbers of women in senior academic positions. It is argued that the neo‐liberal ‘marketisation’ of higher education, which still prevails, has fostered a number of indirectly discriminatory practices and conditions that substantially disadvantage women. A selection of studies of the problem are critiqued. It is argued that a broad statistical methodology is inadequate due to its tendency to ‘homogenise’ the academy and its component individuals, in the process giving scope for unjustified optimism among university policy‐makers. A particulate approach is advocated, acknowledging the wide variation between and within universities, and the range of hidden difficulties individual women academics can face. It is concluded that despite apparent reforms over the past decade, the situation of women has improved little in practical terms.     

The geographic mobility of academic talent: Some evidence from sociology

The structure of geographic mobility from doctorate training to present employment is explored among sociologists. Disparate patterns of geographic movement are exhibited across regional cohorts of graduates. The geographic mobility system is also explored after controls are applied for extent of professional involvement and chronological age at receipt of the doctorate degree. A moderately strong correspondence between the academic quality of the Ph.D. region and that of the present job region is reported.     

The curriculum of climate change education: A case for Singapore

The inclusion of the climate change topic in the curriculum of school subjects in Singapore was pivotal, such that it positioned the discourse squarely in the structure of Singapore's education system. In an examination of the intersections and disjoints between state policies on climate change against the programmatic curriculum, results showed that there is no strong policy curriculum that mandates how climate change should be learned in Singapore, even though it is present in several school subjects. The topic is included in school subjects through the initiative of subject disciplinary specialists and middle managers of the education ministry. This exemplar has implications on how climate change education policy and practice can be shaped elsewhere.     

Lifelong learning,income inequality and social mobility in Singapore

Singapore has been assigned the role of a ‘model’ nation state primarily for two reasons: its rapid rate of economic growth and its outstanding performance on cross-national tests of educational achievement, such as PISA. This has resulted in advocates of reform citing it as illustrating ‘best practices’, especially in the field of education, and it has more generally been viewed as demonstrating the benefits of economic globalization. This paper analyses from a comparative perspective the more problematic and relatively unexplored third dimension of being a model ‘global’ nation, namely its impact on income inequality and the quality of citizens’ life. We focus on the role of the system of lifelong learning which was designed generally to upgrade the skills of the workforce and specifically to provide low-paid/skilled workers with opportunities to improve incomes and enhance their socio-economic mobility. We demonstrate that despite the remarkable economic growth at a national level and the significant expansion of lifelong learning provision, productivity rates have not improved, income inequality has increased, social mobility has declined and the ‘quality of life’ is, in comparative terms, poor.     

Vulnerability,gender and resistance in transnational academic mobility

Focusing on Tanzanian and Mozambican PhD students funded by Swedish development aid, this article investigates how everyday academic work life is gendered in Sweden and in the students’ home academic departments. In particular, it focuses on the role of ‘important others’, such as international donors, universities, colleagues and family, in enhancing or alleviating vulnerability and how this shifts across spatial contexts. Integral to this is exploring how obstacles are managed and negotiated by PhD students, and how they articulate capability and therefore resist a position as a victim. The results indicate the glonacality of vulnerability as something that stretches over institutional and national boundaries, and how vulnerability can be (re)produced at local university level despite the good intentions of donors and universities operating ata global level. In addition,a translocational and intersectional perspective highlights how situations of vulnerability are gendered and radicalised differently in different academic contexts.

     

Transnational academic mobility,knowledge, and identity capital

This article begins with the contemporary context of transnational academic mobility, and sketches a typology of mobile academics according to their self-identification. UK examples are offered as the main case study here. The article will then explore the relations of mobile academics and their embodied and encultured knowledge. It employs a concept of ‘transnational identity capital’ to discuss the position of transnational mobile academic intellectuals as a ‘stranger’ as inspired by Simmel's sociology of space.     

Creating entrepreneurial networks: academic entrepreneurship, mobility and collaboration during PhD education

Network-building activities of PhD students are an important area of study in furthering our understanding of academic entrepreneurship. This paper focuses on PhD students’ participation in network-building activities defined as mobility and collaboration, as well as own interest in and perceived grade of support for commercialisation from various levels of the university hierarchy. The results of a large-scale survey (of 1,126 PhD students at Link?ping University, Sweden, 41% response rate) presented here show that the majority of PhD students are engaged in collaborations with external organisations, though quite few (one quarter) have spent a part of their PhD education outside their home university. PhD students from all faculties are on average interested in commercialisation and in favour of it. However, PhD students from the faculty of Health Sciences state that it is difficult for them to combine research and commercialisation. Furthermore, interest in commercialisation of research results is relatively lowest amongst those PhD students who are undertaking mobility placements at other universities, thus pointing to an experienced incompatibility of research and academic entrepreneurship.     

Effects of instructions for on-task behavior and academic behavior: Two case studies

The effects of daily teacher instructions to “work hard” for the on-task behavior of two special education students during a math period were examined in a multiple-baseline design. The results indicated that teacher instructions could increase such behavior. Generalization to work output (the rate of correct math problems) was observed. Follow-up data revealed that the effects of the instructional procedure were of lasting duration. It was suggested that instructions could be an effective, inexpensive, easy to implement, and socially acceptable classroom intervention procedure.     

School engagement and parental involvement: the case of cross-border students in Singapore

The primary purpose of this paper is to examine the mutual relationship between school engagement of cross-border students (CBS) from Malaysia in Singapore and parental involvement in education. Focus-group interviews were conducted with school personnel, CBS and their non-local counterparts to provide a comprehensive understanding of the situation. The cross-border student group comprises diverse ethnicity and most of them are highly competitive and successful in engaging in the whole educational selection process from the beginning to their exit point. This paper argues that education for the CBS represents both a unique socio-cultural phenomenon in the two Asian societies and a manifestation of a widely shared pragmatic value of educational returns. The findings reveal that the nature of CBS engagement with schools is characterized by voluntary assimilation and is rewarded by the meritocratic system of Singapore.