Latinas/os succeeding in academia: the effect of mentors and multiethnic coursework

Academia often devalues diverse identities, cultures, and languages through emphasis placed on academic values. To ascertain how established and new Latina/o academics achieved success in academia, the author conducted interviews with ten Latina/o academics; they noted mentoring and multiethnic coursework as influential in their success as academics. The author suggests mentoring practices and multiethnic courses should be receptive and sensitive to the complexities and varieties of cultural and linguistic identities, thereby identifying a balance between recognizing diverse language and cultural practices in academia while avoiding generalizations and assumptions about ethnic groups. The author offers implications for practice and research.     

Finding common ground: enhancing interaction between domestic and international students in higher education

A feature of Australian Higher Education over the last 10 years has been the increased numbers of international students. This feature has been perceived to have great potential for enhanced learning for all students – both international and domestic. Yet, student surveys and research clearly indicate that there is very little interaction occurring between domestic and international students. This article reports on a study that investigated the extent to which university teaching can promote interaction between students from diverse cultural and linguistic background. Using an innovative video-analysis methodology, the research found that academics engage in a variety of activities to encourage interaction between student groups. In order to assist academics in planning interaction, one of the main findings of the study was the development of ‘The Interaction for Learning Framework (ILF)’, that identifies key dimensions for curriculum design that can be used by academics to inform ways that they can enhance interaction between diverse student groups within teaching and learning contexts.     

A holistic approach to international students, institutional habitus and academic literacies in an Irish third level institution

This qualitative study examines the interplay between academic staff and international students with regard to developing academic literacies at university. Higher education has traditionally responded to increasing student diversity with the expectation that students will conform to institutional norms or habitus. In this context international students arrive with cultural capital which may not fit such norms, and would benefit from developing their academic literacy, as indeed would home students given an increasingly diverse student body in Irish higher education. Findings reveal a gap between academics expectations and international students’ capabilities. Academic staff remained within the remit of the research in contrast to the 22 international students who were interviewed. They did not separate the totality of their campus experience from academic literacy practices. These ranged from uncertainty around writing in another language to a mismatch between diversity management in class and students’ own expectations. International students found difficulty to making friends on campus which could benefit their integration into the academic literacy practices of their respective disciplines. Findings point towards a whole institution response to student diversity which transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries.     

Transdisciplinary qualitative paradigm in applied linguistics: autoethnography,participatory action research and minority language teaching and learning*

The paper emphasizes the crucial importance of transdisciplinary approach to qualitative research methodology in teaching and learning contexts involving highly stigmatized minority languages. Autoethnography and participatory action research are herein employed as constructive, critical, qualitative methodological procedures relevant to transdisciplinary research on minority languages in applied linguistics. An international project on teaching and learning Romani, QUALIROM, is used as a case study in order to emphasize the fact that mere theoretical knowledge and professional expertise are important but not sufficient for successful implementation and sustainability of outcomes in this field of linguistic research. The analysis suggests that socially engaged minority language learning and teaching projects should be understood as transdisciplinary, collaborative activities that transcend academic boundaries, and in which research participants create a number of interactive contexts within project-oriented communities of practice aimed at reshaping dominant social relations and practices.     

Curricula and pedagogic potentials when educating diverse students in higher education: students’ Funds of Knowledge as a bridge to disciplinary learning

With the massification of higher education in a knowledge-driven economy, Western universities have struggled to keep pace with the cultural, linguistic, educational and economic diversity of university students and the complex realities of their lifeworlds. This has generated systemic inequities for diverse or ‘non-traditional’ students, and left academics with pedagogic uncertainty. This paper reports on action research that examined curricular and pedagogic practices that made elite academic codes explicit, and utilised students’ Funds of Knowledge as assets for disciplinary learning, in an Australian university. The action research confirmed the potential of creating bridges between the cultural practices and literacies of diverse students and the acquisition of disciplinary knowledge, facilitating their negotiation of multiple literacies and the successful participation of all students. Institutional arrangements – governed by economic, cultural and socio-political conditions – that enabled and constrained these potentials were highlighted, suggesting areas for negotiation for the pedagogies’ ongoing and wider use.     

Dilemmas of identity,language and culture in higher education in China

A vast array of cultural traditions and languages can be found among China's 55 legally recognized minority nationalities. Mother tongue education has been the norm for several of the large minority groups (namely, Koreans, Kazaks, Mongolians, Tibetans, and Uyghurs) for most of the time since 1949. This article, which is based on empirical data, reports a study of a group of academics with a Uyghur background at Xinjiang University. The findings indicate that language issues have had a great impact on the professional and personal identities of these academics. The language of their formal school education, either Chinese, the official language, or their mother tongue, has not only had an effect on their perceptions of language learning, but has also created ethnic and cultural divisions among people of the same origins. The authors explore the implications of these identity, language and culture dilemmas for minority academics in China.     

Changing academies: exploring international PhD students' perspectives on ‘host’ and ‘home’ universities

As students move between universities on different continents, they are expected to adjust rapidly to the academic and cultural practices of their host university. Many of these students are higher educational professionals in their home country and on their return home they are faced with the challenge of how to fit back into – or whether to make changes in – their institution's established academic practices. I explored international PhD students' understanding of, and responses to, the perceived differences between academic cultures of host (UK) and home universities. Whereas some students regarded the changes made in how they conducted and wrote up educational research as temporary and strategic in order to pass the PhD course, others saw themselves as change agents. They were keen to transform academic practices once they returned home and were already actively working out politically and practically how to go about this. By reflecting on how educational research practices are changing and being influenced by the movement of academics between countries, I suggest how UK university departments can respond positively to the differing research practices in which international students engage in their home institutional contexts.     

Constructing academic identity in the changing Russian higher education context: preliminary perspectives

ABSTRACT

Currently, Russian academics are facing significant demands because of a new, urgent requirement to pursue their research in accordance with international standards. Until recently, these academics were used to working within a familiar community and communicating their research via the Russian language, but now, they are expected to move beyond that and function on a global level, which can challenge their academic identities. A qualitative study was carried out in a research-intensive Russian university. The aim was to explore academics’ experiences and perceptions of the dynamic changes in their academic work with a particular focus on the limitations and pressures they meet in their career path towards global research. The data were collected by means of reflective journals during a course on English for academic purposes. Thematic analysis was employed for data analysis. The results showed that global trends turned out to be unachievable for Russian academics due to the lack of specific knowledge, attributes and skills required to do research globally. This might be the first study from Russia contributing to the literature on academic identity construction. The article provides insights into the experiences and perceptions of Russian academics and offers a research agenda for further investigation to bridge identity shifts in academia. In terms of practical purposes, the results will be used as a source of preliminary data within a broader research project aimed at supporting Russian academics in their research in an international English-speaking academic context.     

More Than “Getting Us Through:” A Case Study in Cultural Capital Enrichment of Underrepresented Minority Undergraduates

Minority students continue to be underrepresented among those who seek graduate and professional degrees in the sciences. Much previous research has focused on academic preparation. Equally important, however, are the psychological–social barriers and lack of institutional support encountered by many minority students. We present a case study of a university-sponsored intervention program for minority science majors that addresses not only academics, but also socialization into the academic community, networking, and the ability to practice newfound skills and dispositions through undergraduate research. In examining this case, we suggest that concerted, formal efforts toward expanding habitus and thereby augmenting cultural and social capital may have positive effects for underrepresented minority (URM) college students’ academic and career prospects. Moreover, we argue that these differences complement the gains program participants make in academic preparedness, showing that attention to academics alone may be insufficient for addressing longstanding inequities in science career attainment among URM students.     

留学生跨文化适应中的压力与影响因素研究

留学生的跨文化教育适应是一个动态的发展过程,留学生因为各种不同因素的影响而经历各种跨文化适应压力。文章从留学生的跨文化适应阶段入手,从语言和学术适应、教育适应和社会文化等方面讨论留学生所面临的主要跨文化适应压力,从母语文化、自我效能、动机和社会距离等方面分析影响留学生跨文化社会适应的主要因素,以期为高校留学生跨文化适应培训带来启示。     

Impact of the ‘Grade Zero’ system on minority children in Lao PDR – A qualitative study of pre-primary schools in a rural province

ABSTRACT

In Lao People’s Democratic Republic, two streams exist in pre-primary education, the standard three-year and a one-year preparatory class called ‘Grade Zero system’. This research aims to investigate the introduction of the Grade 0 system, one-year pre-primary class, and its impact on ethnic minority children in rural villages of Lao PDR. The research methodology included qualitative research comprising interviews with villagers, school authorities, and an officer of the local education office and observations carried out at schools in rural villages. The results show Grade 0 has been introduced in accordance with the circumstances of attached primary schools; more specifically, small villages with incomplete schools offer Grade 0 because they can’t possess three years pre-primary education. Moreover, Grade 0 plays an important role in the acquisition of Lao language when entering primary school. For instance, the repetition rate greatly improved due to the adequate preparation period. Grade 0 is an effective system in bridging the gap in primary schools, especially for minority children whose linguistic and cultural background is different from majority. As pre-primary education has finally been considered important, more international study projects will be essential, such as contemplating the construction of schools, teacher trainings, and bilingual education.     

Ecological Pushes and Pulls on Women Academics’ Pursuit of Research in China

Women academics reportedly exhibit lower research productivity than males. This study first quantitatively explored gender differences in research output based on a survey among 309 Chinese academics teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL). Qualitative data obtained through interviews with seven female respondents were analyzed from an ecological perspective. Results showed significant gender differences in domestic publication but no such differences in international publication. Women academics’ pursuit of research was influenced by many factors from and beyond the microsystems of workplace and family, and their coping strategies included soliciting help from seasoned colleagues, attending academic conferences, and joining online communities. The findings highlight the institutional supportive practices and familial environment that are equally important in promoting women academics’ professional development.     

Graduating as a ‘native speaker’: international students and English language proficiency in higher education

The current concern about low levels of English proficiency among international students who graduate from degree courses – that students’ English language skills are not being developed during their higher education experience – reflects negatively on the quality of Australian higher education and its graduates. More careful selection of students and increased use of English language testing are among the solutions put forward. These debates over English language proficiency tend to construct English language as a skill that can be applied in any context and ‘native‐speaker’‐levels of language ability as essential for employment. Within such a formulation international students can only ever be defined as in deficit. Drawing on socio‐cultural theories of language learning and academic literacy, alternative understandings of language proficiency in internationalized higher education are explored. Improved communication skills among graduates are likely to be achieved through a better understanding of issues beyond classroom instruction, such as barriers to social integration with native‐speakers, which reveal many international students unable to access adequate levels of language experience. Without wider perspectives on the debate over English language proficiency in higher education, the many benefits of having international students in higher education institutions are obscured by negative attitudes and unrealistic expectations.     

English language learners’ participation in the discourse of a multilingual science classroom

Recent science-education reforms have targeted students’ ability to ‘talk science’, especially in science classrooms. Prior research has shown that participation in scientific discourse in class is one of the most challenging scientific-literacy tasks, and particularly complex for English language learners (ELLs) at the upper elementary level. The present study explores this issue in a fourth-grade science classroom in the United States in which students from various linguistic and cultural backgrounds were studying together. Specifically, it analyzes the case of a focal Asian-background ELL who encountered challenges in her attempts to respond to the teacher’s questions and participate in the classroom academic discourse on earth science. Our analysis indicated that this ELL was unaware of the teacher’s expectations regarding the intertextual connections and academic language required to successfully accomplish science tasks. The ELL’s unexpected responses exposed a complex set of academic and social issues – notably, gaps between the teacher’s, students’, and ELL’s own expectations about language participation – that could have contributed to her supposed behavioural problems.     

Teaching social work students against the grain: negotiating the constraints and possibilities

Students who have followed routes to Western universities other than the ‘traditional’ one – that is, an uninterrupted path from school to university – face greater challenges to their democratic participation in higher education than their ‘traditional’ counterparts. Until recently, universities have predominantly expected students with diverse entry points to assimilate into existing curricula and academic modes of operating. Such expectation, when combined with reductionist managerial accountability, has largely marginalised non-traditional students. This paper reports on a project which aimed to reverse this marginalisation in an Australian Bachelor of Social Work degree. It is argued that students from diverse linguistic, cultural and educational backgrounds, having greater challenges in negotiating privileged academic and discipline literacies, are better served pedagogically by curriculum design that resonates with their lifeworlds and makes tacit assumptions in university literacies explicit. Using practitioner action research in a partnership between a social work and an academic language and learning academic, pedagogies that utilised students’ literacy practices as assets for learning were enacted over two research cycles. The possibilities and constraints that emerged to support student learning and more equitable participation were examined. The findings suggest that it is possible, even under current preoccupations with measurements and budget constraints, to signal key points of negotiation for pedagogic change to respond more inclusively and equitably to contemporary university students.     

Belarusian as an endangered language: can the mother tongue of an independent state be made to die?

While decline and/or extinction threaten an ever-increasing number of languages, most of these are minority tongues that struggle for survival against dominant languages. The present paper reports the case of Belarusian, a national and co-official language, which the great majority of the population of Belarus considers as its mother tongue, but which has become endangered due to sustained official policies discriminating against it, and the general apathy of the population. The paper places this complex and puzzling situation in the historical context of people long accustomed to changing cultural and linguistic elites, with a succession of rulers that paid little regard to the wishes or needs of the majority of the country’s inhabitants. Recent data are presented showing the rapid decline in the teaching of Belarusian language in schools and other public domains and the use of mixed dialects as the prevailing mode of communication, shifting through a Belarusian-Russian mix (trasianka) to Russian. The effort of a small national linguistic elite to sustain the use of standard Belarusian is examined against the concept of language as a core value of culture and Fishman’s framework for reversing language shift, in order to evaluate the prospects of maintaining Belarusian as an integral part of the linguistic heritage of Europe.     

School desegregation in Hong Kong: non-Chinese linguistic minority students' challenges to learning Chinese in mainstream schools

The enactment of the revised School Places Allocation Systems at the compulsory stage in 2004 had the aim of desegregating Hong Kong's non-Chinese linguistic minority (NCLM) students by including them into ethnic Chinese-dominated mainstream primary and secondary schools. Because of the presumed cause-consequence relationship between “desegregated” school participation and academic achievement, in specific second language Chinese (CSL) acquisition, the challenges that such students face in participating in mainstream education and learning Chinese, no doubt, deserve to be examined. This qualitative study conducted in-depth interviews with 18 secondary students of South Asian/Southeast Asian minority backgrounds enrolled in mainstream schools. Drawing on both cultural and institutional paradigms of explanation for educational achievement, we argue that the reasons inhibiting the minority students' academic involvement are not simply their linguistic challenges but also the institutional constraints in the mainstream education system unique to this population. This study calls for a shift in school desegregation arrangement from one focusing narrowly on physical desegregation to a more comprehensive set of policies that embrace the institutional factors including teacher expectation, resource availability, and bilingual support, crucial to reduce racial differences in achievement.     

Content and Language Integrated Learning and the inclusion of immigrant minority language students: A research review

This article addresses the inclusion of immigrant minority language students in Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) bilingual education programmes. It reviews results of research on (1) the reasons, beliefs and attitudes underlying immigrant minority language parents’ and students’ choice for CLIL programmes; (2) these students’ proficiency in the languages of instruction and their academic achievement; and (3) the effects of first language typology on their second and third language proficiency. The author explores conditions and reasons for the effectiveness of CLIL pedagogy, as well as the comparative suitability of CLIL programmes for immigrant minority language students. The review shows that CLIL programmes provide a means to acquire important linguistic, economic and symbolic capital in order to effect upward social mobility. Findings demonstrate that immigrant minority language students enrolled in CLIL programmes are able to develop equal or superior levels of proficiency in both languages of instruction compared to majority language students; with previous development of first language literacy positively impacting academic language development. CLIL programmes are found to offer immigrant minority language students educational opportunities and effective pedagogical support which existing mainstream monolingual and minority bilingual education programmes may not always be able to provide. In light of these findings, the author discusses shortcomings in current educational policy. The article concludes with recommendations for further research.

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What Constitutes Quality in Minority Education? A Multiple Embedded Case Study of Stakeholder Perspectives on Minority Linguistic and Cultural Content in School-Based Curriculum in Sunan Yughur Autonomous County,Gansu

While quality in education has long been a significant issue, definitions of quality are often taken for granted rather than argued for, allowing the possibility that the criteria used by researchers and planners to judge quality may differ from local stakeholders’ perspectives, particularly regarding the place within quality education of the knowledge, culture and language of non-dominant groups. However, there is an accumulating convergence of research that calls for assessments of quality in education of non-dominant linguistic and cultural groups that engage local stakeholders’ understandings. This paper presents a recent study that attempts to do this, investigating the perspectives of students, parents, teachers, and administrators in Sunan Yughur Autonomous County, a multiethnic, multilingual district in rural Gansu, inhabited by several nationalities. Over one hundred participants in three schools were asked what was important for children to learn in school; including what aspects of local (minority) knowledge, culture and language should be taught as part of school-based curriculum. The study found three educational visions in local schools: regular urban education; Chinese-medium, multicultural education; and bilingual, multicultural education. The study also found that stakeholders support the latter vision, which reflects society’s actual cultural and linguistic pluralism, as well as much research on quality education for non-dominant groups. The paper concludes with a call for a comparative approach, both domestic and international, towards the investigation of quality education of non-dominant groups in China.     

Inconsistencies in DIF Detection for Sub-Groups in Heterogeneous Language Groups

Diversity and heterogeneity among language groups have been well documented. Yet most fairness research that focuses on measurement comparability considers linguistic minority students such as English language learners (ELLs) or Francophone students living in minority contexts in Canada as a single group. Our focus in this research is to examine the degree to which measurement comparability, as indicated by differential item functioning (DIF), is consistent for sub-groups among linguistic minority Francophone students in Canada. The findings suggest that the linguistic minority Francophone students who speak French at home and those who do not speak French at home should not be grouped together for investigating measurement comparability or for examining performance gaps. We identified a great degree of differences in DIF identification with a consistency of 7–10% in DIF identification in the separate analyses for the two groups. The findings highlight methodological problems with investigating fairness for diverse linguistic groups that are treated as a single group.