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This study asks, “How can international educational exchange contribute to more peacefulsocieties?” To test the first two steps in a proposed causal pathway, this paper hypothesizes thatstudents from non-democratic countries who study in a democratic country will 1) have more favorable views toward human rights than students who have not studied in a democratic country; and 2) be more likely to advocate for human rights protections in their home country than students who have not studied in a democratic country. Utilizing a natural experiment design, this study did not find support for either hypothesis when comparing international students who had studied in the United States with those who were unable to due to Covid-19. There were, however, statistically significant differences in political activism levels for the variables of socio-economic status and previous experience in a democratic country before university. This suggests that students from lower socio-economic backgrounds who study in a democratic country may ultimately secure more politically influential careers in their home country due to the theory of cultural capital. As these students are more likely to support political activism, they may use their influence to advocate for improved human rights protections, contributing to more peaceful societies.

The focus of this case study was a study abroad program for student-athletes at a high academically achieving, small liberal arts college in the mid-west region of the United States. The program is designed to maintain a culture of internationalism and multiculturalism by exposing as many student-athletes as possible to study abroad. I reviewed literature to extract an appropriate theoretical framework along with variables that aligned with the purpose of the study; structural and organizational characteristics of the institution, student's background and pre-college traits, interaction with agents of socialization and institutional environment, and quality of effort. I used the semi-structured interview process to interview 9 senior student-athletes (3 female, 6 male; 7 White, 1 African American/White, 1 Chilean/White) who participated in study abroad during the 2015-2016 academic school year at the researched institution and to interview 5 administrators who facilitate the athletic department at the institution. I found that certain critical elements emerged as necessary to create and maintain a study abroad program geared specifically to the needs of the student-athlete population. I also found strong implications for adaptable elements that could generate opportunities for student-athletes to study abroad at a higher rate. These elements serve as a recommended framework and set of initial guidelines for student-athletes and athletic departments nationwide.

Betreute kulturelle Exkursionen sind ein fester Bestandteil von vielen Study-Abroad-Programme. Sie werden allgemein positiv bewertet und bieten viele Chancen für fremdsprachliches und landeskundliches Lernen, sowie als „Handlungsfeld“ für das Gelernte. Es fehlen jedoch wissenschaftliche Begründungen sowie empirische Untersuchungen, die den Lernwert von Exkursionen bei Study-Abroad-Programmen nachweisen. Deshalb wurden folgenden Leitfragen untersucht: Welche Lerneffekte können Exkursionen bei Study-Abroad-Programmen haben? Welche Lerneffekte haben Exkursionen tatsächlich bei Study-Abroad-Programmen? Ziel dieser Masterarbeit ist es, die Lerneffekte von Exkursionen im Rahmen eines Study-Abroad-Programms theoretisch und empirisch zu untersuchen. / Supervised cultural excursions are often included in the offerings of foreign language immersion study abroad programs. Such excursions have the potential to achieve a depth beyond sightseeing. Under certain conditions, excursions can foster linguistic and intercultural learning and skill acquisition in a setting that has advantages not only over the traditional classroom, but also over daily unsupervised immersion. These conclusions can be intuitively inferred, but have never been supported by empirical evidence. Therefore, the questions which guided this outcomes assessment research were: What are the potential learning effects of immersion program excursions? What are the actual learning effects of immersion program excursions? This thesis attempts to answer the first question with a literature review of immersion programs, their excursions, and holistic/action-based foreign language acquisition; and the second question with an empirical study of excursions offered by an immersion program in Germany.

Betreute kulturelle Exkursionen sind ein fester Bestandteil von vielen Study-Abroad-Programme. Sie werden allgemein positiv bewertet und bieten viele Chancen für fremdsprachliches und landeskundliches Lernen, sowie als „Handlungsfeld“ für das Gelernte. Es fehlen jedoch wissenschaftliche Begründungen sowie empirische Untersuchungen, die den Lernwert von Exkursionen bei Study-Abroad-Programmen nachweisen. Deshalb wurden folgenden Leitfragen untersucht: Welche Lerneffekte können Exkursionen bei Study-Abroad-Programmen haben? Welche Lerneffekte haben Exkursionen tatsächlich bei Study-Abroad-Programmen? Ziel dieser Masterarbeit ist es, die Lerneffekte von Exkursionen im Rahmen eines Study-Abroad-Programms theoretisch und empirisch zu untersuchen. / Supervised cultural excursions are often included in the offerings of foreign language immersion study abroad programs. Such excursions have the potential to achieve a depth beyond sightseeing. Under certain conditions, excursions can foster linguistic and intercultural learning and skill acquisition in a setting that has advantages not only over the traditional classroom, but also over daily unsupervised immersion. These conclusions can be intuitively inferred, but have never been supported by empirical evidence. Therefore, the questions which guided this outcomes assessment research were: What are the potential learning effects of immersion program excursions? What are the actual learning effects of immersion program excursions? This thesis attempts to answer the first question with a literature review of immersion programs, their excursions, and holistic/action-based foreign language acquisition; and the second question with an empirical study of excursions offered by an immersion program in Germany.

La tesi di ricerca traccia un quadro dell’insegnamento dell’italiano agli studenti undergraduate statunitensi. Attraverso l’analisi della tradizione di studio e insegnamento delle lingue straniere negli Stati Uniti, si conosce il retroterra formativo di provenienza di questi studenti e, mediante la riflessione sui contenuti dei documenti ufficiali della didattica delle lingue, si individuano gli obiettivi della glottodidattica statunitense per l’educazione linguistica e culturale dei propri cittadini. Si affronta poi il tema dello study abroad mediante l’analisi di: dati sulle scelte degli studenti, programmi universitari statunitensi presenti in Italia, studi americani circa l’importanza delle percezioni degli studenti durante il processo di apprendimento. L’indagine condotta presso le classi di un Istituto americano di Milano, permette di delineare un profilo dello studente statunitense e di capire le sue aspettative sul corso e sul docente di lingua. Alla luce di tutte le osservazioni precedenti, si procede con la discussione della natura del sillabo in ambito statunitense e italiano, e si conclude con la progettazione di un sillabo adatto alle esigenze degli studenti statunitensi: la scelta di un sillabo interculturale rappresenta l’incontro delle tradizioni glottodidattiche, statunitense ed europea, e permette allo studente di sviluppare quelle competenze richieste dal mondo globalizzato del ventunesimo secolo. / The research explores didactic aspects of teaching the Italian language to American undergraduate students. In considering the tradition of foreign language education and the contents of the official existing frameworks for the teaching of languages in the United States, the research underlines the diverse educational backgrounds of American foreign language students who come to Italy in a study abroad program. The study abroad experience is discussed through data on students’ motivation to choose a study abroad program, and students’ perceptions about their language learning process while they’re in a foreign context. The survey conducted among Italian language students of an American Institute in Milan demonstrates the different academic and linguistic reality students encounter when they come to study in Italy, and their expectations on the course and on the teacher. The dissertation moves on the analysis of the format of the foreign language syllabus and discuss the differences between the American syllabus and the Italian syllabi: designing a culture-based syllabus is the key to improve students’ intercultural competence, in line with the purposes of the United States and European foreign language education program.

The background to this study lies in the discrepancy between the perceptions of international student mobility in the context of the internationalisation of higher education by the EU and universities on one hand and international students themselves in terms of their motivations to study abroad on the other hand. This is a comparative study based on three main case studies, of six universities in New Zealand, Oxford University in the UK and the Charles University in the Czech Republic. It explores the students’ experiences abroad in terms of their intercultural competence, the shaping of identities, the acquisition and transfer of knowledge, the possible forming of cosmopolitan mind-sets and empathy, perceptions of employability and their future mobility aspirations. This thesis also considers the barriers and ‘push and pull’ factors of mobility, perceptions of risk and uncertainty in regards to mobility and the role of serendipity in student mobility, which has been overlooked in the literature on mobility and migration. The theoretical framework of the study builds on social capital theory, Europeanisation and the ‘do-it-yourself biography’ theory. The nature of this topic, however, suggested the employment of the concepts of globalisation, transnationalism and consideration of other forms of capital, such as the total human capital, mobility capital and transnational identity capital. This is predominantly a qualitative, mixed-method and longitudinal research project, which uses surveys, case studies, interviews and the data collecting tool called grounded theory. It triangulates data to support and enhance the analytical validity of the thesis. This research concludes that student experiences abroad as well as the internationalisation efforts of universities and the EU would benefit from the introduction of education for global citizenship, which should focus on the intercultural competencies of students. The thesis suggests sociocultural elements for example the cosmopolitan mind-set can enhance the economic, academic and political rationales of internationalisation, such as employability.

The topic of this thesis is study abroad. The theoretical part presents knowledge about the process of adaptation in a new country and its culture; then it deals with acculturative and coping strategies, culture shock and its determinants and also reverse culture shock, which takes place after arrival home form a foreign country. It also introduces the age group of participants on study abroad (21 {--} 26 years old) from the developmental psychology point of view. Then it describes the already known correlation relationships between personality characteristics and some aspects of long term stays abroad. Finally, it outlines a personality profile of the ideal person for a long term study abroad. The research part informs the reader about knowledge we have found out from 3 research questionnaires that were completed by students before, during and after the experience of study abroad, and also knowledge we have gained thanks to interviews with the students. The main research areas are the following: the personality profile, changes of chosen characteristics that have taken place due to the experience of the study abroad, motivation, expectations and their fulfillment, process of culture shock and reverse culture shock.

Motivation is one of the strongest predictors of success in learning a foreign language. Although it has been discussed extensively, most studies have examined large world languages. This paper brings new insight into the motivation to learn Czech as a second language in the context of study abroad at Charles University in Prague. First, the theoretical part introduces essential theoretical frameworks of motivation in applied linguistics from a historical perspective, including the L2 motivational self-system (L2MSS) chosen for the empirical part. Secondly, study abroad as a language learning context is described, and literature on motivation to learn L2 in this context is reviewed. The methodology chapter summarizes possible approaches to research language learning motivation and assesses their suitability for the presented research. The empirical part examines the dynamic process of motivation among students coming for one semester to study in the Erasmus+ program at the Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, and in the American program UPCES (Undergraduate Program in Central European Studies) Study Abroad, Charles University. The data collection tools (diaries, questionnaires, and interviews) were tested in preliminary research. It was revealed that there is a relatively significant change...

Syftet med studien är att öka förståelse kring studenters uppfattningar om vad de utvecklat och lärt sig under deras utbytestermin på universitetet, för att sedan skapa kunskap och förståelse för hur användbart det de lärt sig varit ute i arbetslivet, samt att analysera vilken sorts lärande som är relevant i relation till utbytesstudier och arbetslivet. Den teoretiska utgångspunkten var livslångt och livsvitt lärande (Jackson, 2011; Jarvis, 2007) där fokus ligger på att lärande kan ske i olika miljöer och olika åldrar. Kopplat till det tas Jarvis (2004; 2007) syn på formellt, icke-formellt och informellt lärande upp. Även Säljös (2000) syn på sociokulturellt lärande nämns där fokus ligger på lärande i sociala samspel. En kvalitativ studie har genomförts som bestod av tio semistrukturerade intervjuer med tidigare svenska utbytes-studenter som nu befinner sig i arbetslivet. Studien har använt sig av Braun och Clarkes (2006) tematiska analys för att presentera ett resultat på de två första frågeställningarna och för att besvara sista frågeställningen om vilken sorts lärande, används den ovannämnda teorin. Studiens resultat visar att de tidigare utbytesstudenterna upplever att de lär sig mycket under en termin utomlands i form av personlig utveckling. Utvecklingen av språk och akademiska kunskaper har varierat i omfattning vilket delvis skiljer sig från tidigare forskning. I arbetslivet upplever deltagarna att de främst haft användning av sitt ökade självförtroende i form av att anta nya utmaningar på jobbet och inte ta någon skit. De upplever även att de haft nytta av lärdomen i att acceptera alla i form av att vara bra i bemötandet och kommunikationen med människor i arbetet. Användningen av språk och akademiska kunskaper i arbetslivet har varierat. Slutligen visar studien att det informella lärandet varit mer relevant än det formella lärandet i relation till det som deltagarna upplever att det lärt sig på utbytesterminen och sedan kunnat nyttja i arbetslivet. / The purpose of this master thesis is to gain knowledge and understanding concerning what exchange students learn during their exchange studies, in which way it has been useful in their work afterwards, and to analyze which kind of learning that has been most relevant in relation to exchange studies and working life. The theoretical framework included theories of lifelong and life wide learning (Jackson, 2011; Jarvis, 2007) which focuses on learning in different environments and ages and Jarvis (2004, 2007) view on formal, non-formal and informal learning. Sociocultural learning according to Säljö (2000) is also presented with focus on social and cultural interaction. The design of the study was qualitative and consisted of ten semi-structed interviews with former exchange students that are now working. Thematic analyze was used to present results for the two first questions and the theory mentioned above was used to analyze the last question regarding which sort of learning. The findings showed that students learn a lot by going abroad in terms of personal development. Related to language and academic learning outcome results variated between the participants. The former exchange students described confidence, meeting and communicating with colleagues as useful learning outcomes from studying abroad that they can now use in working life. The usage of language and academic knowledge in work were mixed. The results also showed that informal learning has been more relevant than formal learning in relation to what exchange students have learnt and found useful in their working life.