Designing and managing international relations, educational projects and mobility schemes in Asian Universities
for the culture, the opportunity to develop language competences. Some students point out the opportunity to study new technologies and to transfer this knowledge to their country. Other are interested in internship opportunities and in their exploitation for their future careers. Almost all the students prefer a long term exchange because of the interest in being exposed to new teaching and learning methods and in exploiting new techniques; many of them say that short term mobility is “just a visit�. The very few (one out of ten) who prefer a short term mobility, say that it is their first experience and they are afraid of missing home or not to be ready for it. The list of expected benefits of a mobility period abroad is quite long: experience different teaching and learning methods; opportunity to know other countries and cultures; improvement of language and communication skills; career and job opportunities; development of soft skills (leadership, critical thinking, time management), personal development (new friends, independence, social skills, self-confidence). The most important challenge is language, mentioned by a large majority of students; other challenges refer to cultural aspects (different food, habits, weather) or to personal aspects (homesickness, loneliness, being away from families and friends). Financial issues are mentioned by some students (less than one fifth). Very few students already experienced a mobility period (one out of ten), the majority of them for a period from 1 to 6 months. They had information and support from their departments and the mobility was funded by international programs or by hosting institutions. The actions to improve internationalization at their institution are the following: increasing the number of agreements with international universities, of mobility programs and of scholarship schemes; increasing the number of visiting professors and of international workshops and seminars; developing an international strategy; teaching foreign languages; sharing information on mobility opportunities. In same case internationalization is considered a way to change and modernize the university in teaching methods and in research activities.
4.4.2. Challenges and needs – the voice of professors The three Myanmar partner universities submitted the survey (ANNEX 2) to a sample of academic staff and collected 70 replies. According to the collected answers, the importance of mobility program abroad is very high for academic staff and students (a mean of respectively 3,51 and 3,33) and a little lower for administrative staff (mean of 2,82). In order to facilitate mobility, the most important actions ranked by importance are the following: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
Signing agreements or memorandums of understanding (MoU) with international universities; Providing information on internationally funded programs; Providing scholarships to students and professors; Empowering the international relations office; Assuring credit recognition (for students); Improving language skills of students and staff.
The importance of mobility for students is based on many different considerations ranging from academic reasons (learn advanced technologies; learn foreign languages; experience different learning and research methods and environments) to soft skills (cross cultural communication, team-work, creativity, flexibility, problem-solving, mediation and negotiation; understand cultural differences) to personal development (understanding diversity; improving self-confidence; live new experiences; independence) to employability (find new opportunities in the job market; extend their social network).
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