Introduction
The Learning & Teaching Festival provided an opportunity for our transnational education (TNE) partners in southeast Asia and Europe to share their experiences of delivering our programmes of study during the Covid-19 pandemic. Our TNE partners operate in diverse locations such as Vietnam, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Zambia, Greece, and the Netherlands.
Over the years we have invited and encouraged our partners to actively participate in this event as we welcome the opportunity to understand and learn from our partnerships to support better and engage with our students and staff overseas. This blog summarises some of these discussions presented by our TNE partners.
Three common themes emerged from the session: connectivity, cultural barriers, and curricula across borders.
Theme 1: Connectivity
From the various presentations, partners highlighted a series of consistent themes centred around connectivity and how we should engage staff and students across our programmes so that the University identity is evident irrespective of the location of study. Students and staff sometimes feel a disconnection to the University and want a clearer identity beyond our online resources such as the library and Moodle.
Mr Siddiq and Ms Kasturi (LSBF Singapore) discussed difficult challenges with students stuck overseas and feeling disconnected to both LSBF and University of Greenwich. Institutional identity is challenged resulting in parents questioning and doubting the final qualification due to students being unable to travel to Singapore, undertaking home study and online exams.
Dr Lam (FPT University, Vietnam) made the point that staff and students at FPT did not see UK lecturers and there was a lack of engagement as our “network is not obvious”. TNE students want the UK brand and qualification but have limited exposure to the UK culture. Students at FPT have local lecturers and are studying in a Vietnamese environment so question how they can build relationships with the UK to enhance their learning and cultural experiences on a UK degree.
Colleagues from LSBF highlighted that, students overseas are not necessarily “tech savvy” and the experience has been stressful to manage for staff due to the “reduced interaction and reduced support to students online”.
Ms Stella Lau (CEO SEGi Colleges, Malaysia) questioned the current model and future effectiveness of online learning with “faceless students” and their lack of engagement with online teaching. It is clearly evident from the TNE partners that, students continue to face challenges and Asia is on a different timeframe compared to the UK in terms of vaccinations and a return to normal classroom studies.
Theme 2: Cultural barriers
Cultural barriers — Secondly, there are cultural barriers to teaching and learning particularly as many students come from very different educational backgrounds and many programmes are top-up final year entry. Students therefore do not have the same level of academic preparedness compared to our on-campus students and we should explore how to bridge these gaps with our TNE partners.
Dr Lam highlighted some barriers to learning and teaching due to different educational systems and cultural differences in classroom pedagogy. Students have not developed the key research skills, critical thinking and problem-solving attributes entering level 6 of the programme and these challenges are compounded through online learning. TNE students learn more effectively in a more teacher focused environment and online learning has impacted both staff and students.
Prof Duyen (Academy of Finance, Vietnam) highlighted students’ unfamiliarity with self-study, over-reliance on the teacher and the negative impact of online learning. Ms Stella mentioned “weak connectivity, a steep learning curve and students having limited access to support resulting in mental health issues”.
Theme 3: Curricula across borders
Finally, our TNE partnerships are mainly franchise operations, but these can lead to problems associated to the relevance of curricula across borders. Our programmes delivered overseas are standardised models but how relevant are these in terms of localisation and the employability needs of our TNE students?
Ms Stella Lau described a “redesign of the student experience model” that encapsulates how as TNE partners we should consider new and flexible programmes, hybrid systems and global mobility opportunities for students overseas. The TNE students’ perception of quality is closely aligned to the teacher focused classroom-based instruction; this has been challenged during the pandemic and online delivery.
Prof Duyen requested increased cooperation between the UK and Vietnam and to build on the opportunities of students studying part of their final year at the Greenwich campus. Global mobility and opportunities to undertake studies at different partners and the UK campus is increasingly attractive to TNE students in Asia.
Dr Lam made an interesting observation that “partners do not have any involvement in curriculum design”. As franchise partnerships University of Greenwich are responsible for the teaching and learning materials and TNE partners are encouraged to contextualise for their local requirements. However, should we explore what curriculum enhancement opportunities exist in a more collaborative and co-constructive environment?
Summary and Recommendations
Curriculum relevance is challenged internationally, and we should explore how to embrace our partnerships and cross-cultural experiences to enrich, enhance our curriculum beyond simple case studies. The current curriculum as transmitted to TNE partners often presents cross-cultural challenges in teaching, learning and assessments. Our existing positive relationship with TNE partners offers opportunities to invite their expertise to internationalise further our curriculum, to address joint pedagogical concerns, and incorporate more global and real-life perspectives into the classroom.
What more can we do to connect our international students and their identity to the University? Some of the cultural barriers can be addressed through a more inclusive curriculum and develop our programmes in conjunction with the TNE partners. Since the Learning and Teaching Festival we have already started plans to include a TNE partner with module development, connect students in the UK and Vietnam via a-synchronous tools and module leaders recording welcome videos to overseas students. A TNE Alumni network in SE Asia is also planned to connect all University of Greenwich students in SE Asia, enabling opportunities for mentoring, coaching and employability. We should welcome initiatives to work alongside our TNE partners to strengthen further and develop our partnerships and programmes for the future.
Blog Authors
Dr Raj Dass
Principal Lecturer
Department of Human Resources and Organisational Behaviour
Greenwich Business School
Dr Peter Vlachos
Principal Lecturer
Department of Marketing, Events and Tourism
Greenwich Business School
Mr Nick Hand
Director of International Affairs (Business School)
Department of Accounting and Finance
Greenwich Business School