Warm welcome
for
overseas
students
On the face of it, there are several reasons for overseas students NOT to come to the UK to study. Institutions in several European countries charge lower fees and offer attractive incentives to study, while many now offer courses taught entirely in English.
Nonetheless, the UK’s higher education (HE) and further education (FE) institutions are widely seen to offer a premium product. So, although most also charge a premium price, there are more than 100,000 people each year who are still willing to pay it.
The fees they bring with them are an increasingly important source of institutional revenue. To ensure that the UK can continue to compete for the most promising overseas candidates, colleges and universities should be checking that their internationalisation strategy is up to the mark. Jisc offers plenty of resources to help, from ways to identify and recruit the best students, to developing interesting and productive new collaborations, enriching the student experience and promoting geographical and virtual mobility through digital technology. And there is a growing body of best practice examples to learn from, such as the University of Oxford’s OpenSpires project, which has made more of its educational resources available as ‘open content’ via podcasts which are freely available for use and redistribution by third parties.
bit as much a barrier to success as working
with a physical disability.”
Alistair McNaught
Senior Advisor For Further Education, Jisc TechDis
What are universities doing for students?
For students newly arriving in an unfamiliar country, it is easy to feel confused and isolated. Cardiff, Northumbria and Bristol Universities have developed innovative social media strategies to build supportive communities for foreign students via Twitter and Facebook. Their international offices are providing practical information and a ready-made support network that starts to grow before the students arrive, and continues to develop throughout the period of study, and even beyond.
This approach is very popular – Cardiff’s International Office Twitter account has more than 6,000 followers, (nearly twice the number of international students currently studying at the university). Posts are deliberately frequent, and range from the highly practical (how to get from the airport to the campus, and set up a bank account) to the social (when the best parties are being held), and the whimsical (which local landmark has just been filmed for an upcoming episode of Dr Who).
And the continuing expansion of online content should also be seen as a valuable way to offer support to overseas learners, by making data and services available whenever and wherever they want it, whether they have come to the UK to study or are studying via distance learning courses or MOOCs. Moves to introduce e-Portfolios will also support international students throughout their study and into their working career, as well as creating additional opportunities to study online.
Jisc at work
Jisc has been supporting a raft of projects designed to explore how collaborative online tools can be used to foster closer working between different groups of individuals, whether they are working locally, or across the globe. Northumbria University’s Open ICT tools trial and the University of the Arts social networking trial demonstrate some of the ways in which digital technologies are opening up fresh opportunities that can be applied to international teaching, learning and research.
Recent inclusion work by Jisc TechDis to develop assistive technologies for disabled learners is being extended to help foreign students too.
TechDis’s 'Voices' is just one example. A new, free resource for use with text to speech tools, providing two clear, human-sounding, modern voices – Jack and Jess – enables anyone to listen to text while they multitask. They have particular resonance for those with sight impairment, dyslexia, or people for whom English is not their native tongue.
As TechDis senior advisor Alistair McNaught says: “Text to speech technologies offer real benefits to overseas students, because working in a second language is every bit as much a barrier to success as working with a physical disability.”
Working with spoken English in place of text helps overseas students get to grips with pronunciation, so they are able to understand and contribute more effectively in lectures and tutorials.
TechDis director Sal Cooke explains: “Even for those with a good grasp of English, subject-specific terminology is a whole different ball game. ‘Voices’ is great for helping people get up to speed with that.”
Jisc TechDis is collaborating on the further development of text to speech technologies with EIFL.net, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) supporting access to e-resources in developing countries. TechDis senior advisor Dr Simon Ball says that a stand-out example is a project at The University of Zimbabwe, which is developing text to speech and onscreen magnifiers, to support the country’s huge numbers of learners with sight impairments. Its work has found applications beyond the worlds of higher education and disability, within the government and defence services and it has recently been nominated for a United Nations award.
He said: “Those of us working in HE in this country can learn a lot from the Zimbabwean experience.
“There, where resources are fewer and the need for them is acute, people have been breaking down barriers and putting territoriality aside to make some huge strides. Think what we could do in the UK!”
“Are academically able, but physically disabled students
empowered to come here to study – and if not, how can we
harness technology to change that?”
Sal Cooke
Director of Jisc TechDis
And, as the inclusion agenda continues to exercise the minds of government ministers and institutional managers, Sal Cooke points to a further reason to strengthen the linkages between programmes to support disabled students, and ones to support learners from overseas. She says: “The UK is fortunate to attract a lot of foreign students – but are we getting the truly diverse group we should be aiming for? Are academically able, but physically disabled students empowered to come here to study – and if not, how can we harness technology to change that?”
