This paper seeks to address the issue by examining two factors that potentially affect a listener’s perception of foreign accented speech: degree of familiarity (as acquired through a work or personal environment) and amount of ESL or linguistic training. Speech samples were recorded from 18 international students from Hispanic, Asian, and Middle-eastern backgrounds and across all proficiency levels as designated by their academic English program. Six native English speakers were also recorded to serve as a basis for comparison. Listeners were drawn from two pools: people with ESL and/or linguistic training (n=42) and laypersons with no such specialist training (n=36). After completing a background questionnaire to assess familiarity with foreign accented speech, each listener rated all 24 speech samples on the dimensions of comprehensibility, degree of accent, and communicative ability. Results indicate that participants with ESL/linguistic training rate foreign accented speech more positively on all three dimensions than laypersons with no such training. Additionally, degree of familiarity with foreign accented speech is positively correlated with how participants rated the accented speech samples. a number of highly significant interactions between these and other factors including sex of the speaker, proficiency level of the speaker, and L1 family of the speaker were found as well.

We live in a multicultural, globalised world, in which counsellors and psychotherapists are increasingly required to work across languages and cultures. Existing literature, however, focuses largely on the needs and experiences of foreign clients, often overlooking the other half of the therapeutic dyad. This thesis tackles the under-researched area of foreign practitioners who work in a host environment. Given the ongoing cultural enrichment of counsellor education in Britain and the demanding character of counselling training in general, this work focuses on one sub-group of this population, namely counsellors in training. To that end, this thesis explores foreign counselling trainees’ experiences of practising in a second language and culture. Underpinned by hermeneutic phenomenology, methodologically this project draws upon the principles of Smith, Flowers and Larkin’s (2009) Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). The investigation consists of two empirical studies based on semi-structured interviews with A) non-native speaking and B) native speaking, foreign trainees in their counselling placement. This research design aims to investigate the phenomenon of beginning intercultural counselling from a holistic perspective rather than compare the two groups’ experiences. Overall, findings reveal the numerous ways in which linguistic and cultural difference influence trainees’ experiences of beginning intercultural/interlinguistic practice. The experience of difference appears to mainly impact on trainees’ practitioner identity rather than their perception of practice. Despite the complexities participants encounter, their accounts expose self-efficacy, revealing a position of viewing ‘deficit’ as advantageous. Moreover, findings indicate that the more ‘tangible’ difference is, the more readily trainees acknowledge and discuss its presence in counselling practice. This is largely related to intersubjectivity and encounters with others during training and practice. At the same time, participants’ accounts demonstrate that ‘nativeness/non-nativeness’ is not purely a matter of linguistic mastery, but largely intertwined with familiarity with the host culture. To that end, this thesis proposes that counsellor education ought to address difference, and non-nativeness in particular, from a broader perspective, advance the support provided to foreign trainees and provide opportunities for discussion that will promote all trainees’ cultural awareness.

This study examines the effectiveness of traditional admissions criteria, including prior GPA, SAT, GRE, and TOEFL in predicting undergraduate and graduate academic success for American and international students at a large public university in the southwestern United States. Included are the admissions and enrollment data for 25,017 undergraduate American, 509 undergraduate international, 5,421 graduate American, and 1,733 graduate international students enrolled between 2005 to 2009.Person product-moment correlation, multiple regression, and user-determined stepwise regression were applied to the data. Results show high school GPA is the most predictive of first-year college GPA for both undergraduate American and international students. SAT has a medium correlation with first-year college GPA for American students and a large correlation for international students. High school GPA and SAT together explain one fourth of the variance in first-year college GPA for American students and over one half of the variance for international students. TOEFL has a medium correlation with first-year GPA for undergraduate international students but is not a significant predictor of first-year GPA when SAT is included in multiple regression. Unlike the results for undergraduate students, the traditional admissions criteria (undergraduate GPA and GRE) for graduate admissions explain a small portion of variance in first-year graduate GPA. Undergraduate GPA, GRE Verbal, and Quantitative together explain 6.3% of variance in first-year graduate GPA for American students and 3.1% for international students. The GRE Subject Tests are the best predictor of first-year graduate GPA for students who had taken the GRE Subject Tests. TOEFL has a small correlation with first-year graduate GPA for international students, and it is not a significant predictor of graduate GPA when GRE-Verbal is included. These findings have implications for undergraduate and graduate admissions, standardized admissions tests, university curriculum, and students' academic success.

Recent studies have focused on international students’ needs and experiences in counseling training and supervision, however, there is a lack of research regarding effective approaches for supervising international students. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether international counseling supervisees' perceptions regarding the degree to which multicultural discussion occurred in their university supervision moderates the relationship among supervision related variables, including acculturation, counselor self-efficacy, supervisory working alliance, and role ambiguity in supervision. The research questions were: (a) Does the frequency of cultural discussions in university supervision, as perceived by international counseling supervisees, moderate the relationship between acculturation to the US and counseling self-efficacy among international counseling students in the US, (b) Does the frequency of cultural discussions in university supervision, as perceived by international counseling supervisees, moderate the relationship between supervisory working alliance and counseling self-efficacy among international counseling students in the US, and (c) Does the frequency of cultural discussions in university supervision, as perceived by international counseling supervisees, moderate the relationship between supervisory working alliance and counseling self-efficacy among international counseling students in the US. Three moderation analyses were utilized, using regression analysis, to answer each research question. The results from the analysis indicated no significant moderating affect of frequency of multicultural discussions among supervision related variables of interest. Interpretation of the results included possibility of a direct relationship among the variables, or other potential moderators as well as probability of false negative results (Type II Error). / School of Education; / Counselor Education and Supervision (ExCES) / PhD; / Dissertation;

Aim: The purpose of the study is to understand the different education systems between Zhuhai College of Jilin University and University of Gävle. So that we can figure out what attract Chinese business students to study in University of Gävle and what is valuable for these business students. Method: Data collected by using the interviews, literature review. Inductive approach is used to analyze the information. Case study approach is used to analyze the general and current situation of Chinese students choosing to study oversea.  Result & Conclusions: Combining the knowledge of literature reviews and interviews’ data, we listed the push factors and pull factors are affecting Chinese business student’s decision to study aboard. In the case, the push factors and pull factors have big impact on the business students of Zhuhai College of Jilin University to make a decision to study at University of Gävle. Suggestions for future research: Since the backgrounds of our interviewees are similar who are Chinese students and have study experiences in Sweden, and there might be some deviations for our qualitative analysis. Also, the numbers of interviewees are limited. Moreover, the interviews are only useful in an exploratory study such as ours and the richness of the finding can be enhanced in further study. Therefore, we think it will be better to maintains more interviewees in the research in this aspect which can be more critical on this kind of international students’ study. Contribution of the study: This paper not only introduce some organization theories and theories that can be widely used in education development, but also put forward some ideas that can be used in Zhuhai College of Jilin University in the future. This paper argues some aspects that Chinese education system can be improved in the future from students’ points of view. During the process of developing the education, students also play an important part, and they will directly reflect the condition of the schools.

The purpose of my study is to compare the academic experiences of international students with those of domestic students at the University of New Orleans (UNO). Specifically, I aimed the study towards determining international students’ perceptions and expectations of UNO, and assessing whether or not UNO’s ability to meet their expectations had an impact on student success or failure at UNO. To test this, I asked various international and domestic students to respond to a survey consisting of both open-ended and multiple choice questions. The open-ended questions were designed to capture the student experiences on expectations, academic atmosphere, and overall college life, all of which are likely to vary from one student to the other. The multiple choice questions were on student status, tenure, and other items that can easily be classified into distinct categories. I collected and analyzed the surveys over a period of four months to decide which variables in the international students’ experiences affect their academic career. In addition, I questioned if any of the stated variables aided in campus adjustment or helped meet the student expectations regarding school performance and goals. Results indicate that the majority of students, both domestic and international, feel their academic expectations are being met by what UNO has to offer. Those students who feel their expectations (of what UNO would provide them) are not met indicated their academic performance is reflective of their own efforts, an idea that students feel is fostered by UNO. However, there was no significant factor that may have helped or deterred positive experience overall.

Over the past twenty years, high school students in China have been learning the British Columbia (BC) public curriculum in certified private offshore schools with the intention of attending post-secondary institutions abroad. This internationalization and privatization in the Chinese education system began after critical reforms that allowed non-state actors to own and operate schools or programs that offer foreign curricula and credentials. BC offshore schools (BCOS) are one of the foreign curriculum options available to students in China and are comprised of approximately 12,000 students in thirty-seven certified schools. These students then may become international students when they migrate abroad, often to Canada. Within this setting, this case study explores the perspectives and experiences of five female first-year university students who have just recently graduated from three different BC offshore schools. The theoretical framings of sociocultural theory, second language socialization, community of practice, and transnationalism help situate the perspectives of the students in this dynamic educational phenomenon. The primary data sources include semi-structured interviews at the beginning of their first and second semesters at a large BC university and participant responses to journal prompts through the semester, as well as publicly available BC educational documents. This study’s findings indicate that graduates of BCOS were prepared for undergraduate academic courses because of their socialization into foundational research skills, essay writing, lecture listening, and project-based assessments. The similarities between the BC and university curricula have helped these participants transition from high school to university as well as from China to Canada. Each participant revealed different challenges that they faced including systematic grammar knowledge, increased reading requirements, and socializing with Canadian peers. Overall, Chinese BCOS graduates are a dynamic, diverse, and under-researched population. Participants’ socialization into the learning environments in British Columbia offshore schools has helped them prepare and learn skills necessary for favourable experiences in university. / Graduate

This study was designed to describe the experiences of acculturation, acculturative stress, and coping behaviors among Black international students. While research exists on the acculturative and coping experiences of international students in the United States, very few studies have been designed to explicitly examine the experiences of Black international students of sub-Saharan and Caribbean origins. A majority of the existing literature has focused on experiences of Asian and Latin American international students (Malcolm & Mendoza, 2014). This study was intended to provide information about the acculturative experiences of Black international students enrolled at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. Interviews were conducted with four focus groups, each comprising three participants. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed using an interpretive phenomenological approach, and themes were generated from the interviews. The themes that emerged shed light on experiences related to acculturative stress, anti-Black and anti-immigrant discrimination, and adjusting to a new academic environment. Themes also highlighted several ways that Black international students coped with these experiences (e.g., talking to other international students, keeping in contact with family in their home country, and relying on a faith community). Results from this study will inform future research on how Black international students learn race within the U.S context, how geographical location influences the acculturative experiences of Black international students, and the interactions between Black immigrant communities and African American communities. Results of this study could also be used to develop diversity trainings for university staff and community members, and to develop social programs specifically for Black international

Thesis advisor: Philip Altbach / While there is a significant body of literature concerned with the experience of international student acclimatization to life and study on campuses all over the United States, very little of this research examines their self-reported satisfaction with student services. This study examines what services are important to international students and what is their experience? This is a study of international students at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Western New York and their satisfaction with programs and activities provided to welcome, serve, retain and involve international students in mutual intercultural learning with Americans. The study results reveal that services related to academics provide the most satisfaction and meet the expectations of the international students surveyed. The study further revealed that the services registering the lowest satisfaction were: (1) Student Financial Services; (2) Housing Operations; (3) Co-operative Education Placement; (4) Dining Services; and (5) Transportation Services. The findings also reveal that female international students reported the highest satisfaction and the lowest dissatisfaction / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Educational Administration and Higher Education.

Thesis advisor: Philip G. Altbach / This is a phenomenological study of ten graduate international students at Chardin University (pseudonym). Through 30 in-depth interviews, multiple social contacts, and group and member checking sessions, stories emerged that highlight the social experiences of these graduate international students through their transient lives. Theoretical frameworks used to interpret the findings were transnationalism, adult transitional theory, and the graduate socialization model. This study provides a forum for participants to narrate their stories instead of being invisible and silent as they pass through our institutional corridors. What emerged from these narratives is that graduate international students cannot be grouped as one monolithic entity because they all lead variant and divergent lives. This research enumerates the intricacies, shades, and textures of their lives as they persist, succeed, and develop identities. In the past, graduate international students' social experiences have been portrayed in an oversimplified fashion, when in fact such students lead extremely complex lives as they negotiate a world that comprises both home and host country. Strongly lacking in the realm of social experiences have been meaningful relationships with American peers (looking beyond superficial ones), the university, and the local community. Operating within transnational social fields, regular prolonged conversations with family and friends from home tend to prevent participants from seeking out new connections in the United States. Most participants find comfort within their own ethnic enclaves, leading to cross-cultural isolation, which is still prevalent after decades of research conducted on this population. This study challenges universities to forge new pathways to engage with this vital and vibrant student body in meaningful, innovative, and creative ways. It is the responsibility of institutions of higher learning to understand the intricacies of their lives, as well as differences in religion, language, and socialization patterns. Universities need to find new ways to stay relevant in the lives of graduate international students during their tenure in the United States. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2010. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Educational Leadership and Higher Education.