Intercultural Immersion for Education Majors: Components of Successful International Student Teaching Programs for Teaching Tolerance

Degree Name

MA in International and Intercultural Management

First Advisor

Karen Blanchard

Abstract

In my experience, the field of International Education has always included the public education system in the United States. Waves of migration and international settlement in the U.S. have led to an ebb and flow of linguistic and intercultural challenges that the whole school community faces. A need for more interculturally competent educators has emerged in the current time of increased awareness of the interconnected and global nature of the economy, information systems and social networks. The majority of people studying to be public school teachers in the U.S. are still White, middle-class women with little or no intercultural or international experience prior to entering the classroom. The cultural clashes that are apt to arise due to the difference in background and experience have led me to my research question. What are components of a successful international and intercultural university program that allows pre-service teachers to learn to tolerate differences among their future students? This study involves a qualitative study of 9 international student teaching (IST) programs for undergraduate education majors. I use the model of grounded theory to develop a theory based on the data I collected from questionnaires and phone interviews of program directors and teacher education administrators. I discovered that there are three models for a successful IST program, yet all of the data supports the fact that there is a greater need for more pre-service teachers to participate in these programs prior to entering multicultural classrooms. This study can be used by both IST program administrators, and those universities and Schools of Education that are planning on implementing one of the three models of IST in the future.

Disciplines

International and Comparative Education | Teacher Education and Professional Development

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