Cross Border Higher Education

This presentation was given to at the Offre d’enseignement supérieur a l’étranger: incitations bénéfices et modelés économiques – analyse et retours d’expérience workshop on transnational education (TNE) organised by France Stratégie.  It sets out the traditional business models for TNE, discussing the way that these are blurring and changing over time.  It then considers the forces driving the changes in TNE and speculates on a future in which TNE business models will change so significantly that they will no longer be TNE as we currently understand the concept.

Transnational Education (TNE) in the past 20 years has emerged as a prime mode of international higher education. This period of rapid growth in TNE activity has been driven by a shortage in supply of higher education (HE) in offshore markets. As this supply-demand gap starts to shrink – and offshore markets become more condensed –exporting institutions need to find ways to diversify their TNE operations.
So far, the prime focus of exporting institutions has been to replicate the home campus learning experience in their offshore partnerships. This replica model has been subject to criticism, primarily for its failure to recognise the impact of cultural and education factors affecting student experience across different countries.

At the same time, the prevailing views of the student as customer and of quality as value for money impose additional pressures on TNE exporting and importing institutions to balance between educational outcomes and student satisfaction.

This presentation sought to provide answers to the following three  questions:
1) How technology (and the role of virtual reality) can facilitate new models of TNE?​
2) How exporting institutions can differentiate their TNE provision via curriculum development?
3) How to align educational quality (e.g. learning outcomes) and service quality (e.g. student satisfaction) in a cross-border context?

The aim of the paper is to discuss the mobility patterns of university students in the context of a border area, taking into consideration the unique characteristics of this region. Special attention is given to the area between Italy and Slovenia where research was conducted among cross-border students attending the study programme for primary school teachers in Slovenia. In the introduction, a distinction is made between cross-border, transnational and overseas education. The following presents the reality of the Italo-Slovene border, an analysis of the factors influencing cross-border mobility and the outcome of the EDUKA2 project.

This lecture is part of the MA in International Higher Education Management at the University of Bath.  It covers TNE partnerships: scalability, profitability and sustainability:
1. What is TNE?
2. TNE in the landscape of internationalisation of higher education
3. Why the interest in TNE?
4. What are the main forms of TNE?
5. How important is TNE?
6. Characteristics of TNE partnerships
7. The scalability of TNE partnerships
8. How profitable is TNE?
9. Sustainability of TNE partnerships over time
10. Case studies of TNE partnerships

Higher education has become a global industry.  The most striking dimension of this internationalisation has been the rise in the number of students studying at universities outside their own country.  The equally rapid increase in the number of students studying for a foreign degree without leaving their home country has, however, attracted less attention.  UNESCO defines this form of transnational education (TNE) as ‘all types of higher education study programmes, sets of study courses, or educational services (including those of distance education) in which the learners are located in a country different from the one where the awarding institution is based’.  For some countries, notably the UK, there are now more foreign students studying for awards offshore than studying on-campus in the UK.  This presentation provides an overview of the types of TNE activity and discusses the broad trends and developments in this rapidly evolving, and largely unregulated, international market.

International branch campuses (IBCs) have a significant presence in Dubai’s higher education sector, yet the role of these institutions is not yet fully understood. Moreover, the evolution of the roles of IBCs in Dubai may be strongly influenced by public policy designs. This brief defines three key issues influencing the development of the education sector and relevant public policy.
First, in most importing nations, IBCs account for only a small proportion of the total number of postsecondary educational institutions, and most countries already have well established
public and private higher education sectors. In Dubai, however, the private higher education sector has developed rapidly and the number of IBCs is nearly half of the total number of
education institutions licensed to operate in the Emirate. Second, foreign education providers engage in a variety of capacity-building roles in Dubai, ranging from providing access to
expatriates excluded from the public system to signaling the increasing modernity of the Emirate to the world. Consideration should be given to how future public policy decisions may
affect these roles. Third, the use of free zones to facilitate the importation of foreign education providers has resulted in dual quality assurance mechanisms at the federal and local levels, as well as a lack of coordination throughout the sector. This has created an environment where there is significant duplication of degree offerings, confusion over regulation, and concern about
the quality of some programs. While such constraints are common in rapidly developing educational systems, left unaddressed they can challenge the effective contribution of
the entire sector to the development of the Emirate and the nation, as well as the long-term sustainability of each institution.* This brief provides an overview of key public policy issues and presents a set of questions to help frame the ongoing conversation.

While the label “international branch campus” can imply that the ownership or condition of facilities is important in the model, most operating definitions only require that there be a physical presence in a foreign country. The research has revealed that IBCs actually come in many shapes and sizes, ranging from rented storefronts to government subsidized architectural wonders. These data reveal five models that universities use when seeking to establish an IBC’s physical plant. It is important to note, however, that the use of these models will be limited, based on local regulations (e.g., some countries do not allow foreign ownership of facilities), as well as the ability to find a willing government, private, or academic partner to provide the space. Each arrangement comes with its own set of opportunities and obstacles. Wholly owned endeavors provide some stability and freedom from external interference but also pose a financial risk, should the enrollments not meet projections or government hospitality lapse. Partnering reduces the financial risks, but could lead to outside interference in academic affairs. While the models of facility ownership have been identified, more research is needed to understand their operational implications.

Executive Summary

International branch campuses (IBCs) remain a prominent and distinctive form of transnational higher education. This report defines, describes, and lists IBCs using the most up-to-date data and resources publicly available. While there is continuity with definitions and lists used by the Observatory and C-BERT in the past, the report embodies a unified definition and list of campuses.

In addition to describing and listing IBCs, the report attempts to categorize the many models of IBCs in existence.

For this report, an international branch campus is defined as “an entity that is owned, at least in part, by a foreign education provider; operated in the name of the foreign education provider; and provides an entire academic program, substantially on site, leading to a degree awarded by the foreign education provider.”

There are currently 249 entities that fit this definition. The report also classifies other types of cross-border higher education (CBHE) activity which fulfill some but not all the requirements to be considered IBCs.

In this, Part 1 of the report, data about location of home and host countries, age of IBC, enrollments, types of academic programs offered, and focus of research activity is provided and a new typology of IBCs is discussed.  The report also explores institutional and government motivations, and evolving quality assurance arrangements.

 
Key findings of the report include:

Overall
• Net IBCs. At the end of 2015, the number of international branch campuses worldwide hit 249, up 26% since the end of 2010 when taking into account IBCs that closed or changed status in that time.
• Steady Growth. In absolute terms, growth is steady: from 2011-2015, 66 IBCs were founded, compared to 67 from 2006-2010. In relative terms, as the base number has increased, the growth rate is down. From 2006 - 2010, the number of IBCs grew 45%.
• Students. At the end of 2015, an estimated 180,000 students worldwide were enrolled in IBCs as defined in this report.
• New Countries. Six new home countries, nine new host countries, and six countries newly engaged as both host and home appeared from 2011-2015. New home countries include Belgium, Estonia, Japan, South Korea, Turkey and Taiwan. Since 2011, nine countries have become new hosts to IBCs: Cyprus, Egypt, Finland, Ghana, India, Malta, Nicaragua, Rwanda, and Saudi Arabia.
• Developing Countries. Developing countries continue to become both home and host of IBCs, though there remains very little activity in Africa and South America: from 2011-2015, only four new IBCs were developed in Africa outside of the MENA region and just one in South America.
• Future. Branch campuses constitute a small portion of cross-border higher education (CBHE), but continue to grow in number. Though only four campuses were confirmed to have opened in 2015, this apparent slowdown is due, at least in part, to a lag in visibility and reporting. There are around twenty IBCs currently under development, suggesting ongoing growth

Home Countries
• Top Home Countries. IBCs come from 33 different home countries, an 18% increase from 28 home countries at the end of 2010.  The top five home countries, in terms of number of IBCs, are the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, France, and Australia. Together, these countries account for 181 branch campuses, or 73% of total IBCs.
• US & Europe. Growth continues to be largely driven by providers based in the United States and Europe. Of the IBCs currently under development worldwide, around half are planned by institutions based in the US and UK.

 
Host Countries
• Top Host Countries. IBCs are hosted by 76 countries, a 10% increase from 69 countries at the start of 2011.  The top five host countries are China (32) , the United Arab Emirates (31), Singapore (12), Malaysia (12), and Qatar (11), which together host 98 IBCs, or 39% of the world’s total. China has overtaken UAE as the top host country.
• Trends. The number of IBCs continues to increase, with concentrated growth in China, Malaysia, Mauritius and South Korea from 2011-2015 and slowed growth in UAE.

Part 2 of this report, to be published in 2017, will be based on interviews with institutional leaders at a sample of IBCs in operation for at least a decade. Part 2 will go into greater detail on motivations and operations of mature IBCs and explore the question of how to judge success from different perspectives and what combination of conditions breeds success.

The present report is free to Observatory members and available for purchase for non-members. Please contact [email protected] for login details or to purchase the report.

By applying New Regionalism Approach, this paper delves into a rather unexplored area of regionalism (higher education) in a less investigated region (Southeast Asia) and state (Philippines). It treads through a relatively recent terrain of bridge-building between higher education and regionalism. Through in-depth interviews and document analysis, the exploratory study investigates how ASEAN regionalism has influenced the cross-border research of a Philippine university. Examining cross-border research sheds light on the dynamics of ASEAN regionalism as research is considered crucial to the formation of a knowledge society, which, in turn, serves as a potent tool to pursue regional and national objectives. The findings of this study demonstrate that the ASEAN higher education regionalism offers vital mechanisms to enhance the university’s research performance and its overall competitiveness in an era of globalisation. However, in spite of these advantages, there are ideational, political and material challenges that pose limits to this potential. This paper argues that cross-border research has not yet been robustly activated as a mechanism for regional and national pursuits, and that the points of collaborations and contestations are still to be addressed adequately to maximise the promises and mitigate the perils of ASEAN higher education regionalism.

A new research community sharing knowledge to improve transnational education decision-making and good practice launched on 10 June with a Research Symposium at Nottingham Trent University. It aims to bridge gaps, connecting researchers worldwide and contributing to TNE strategic planning and investment.

The UK has long been an attractive destination for international students. Yet despite large increases worldwide in numbers of people attending university, the percentage studying abroad has stayed small. So universities in Britain, the US, Australia and other countries now provide education in new, innovative ways.

Transnational education, delivered in a country other than that where the awarding institution is based and known by the acronym TNE, is a way for students worldwide to participate in and benefit from higher education without necessarily spending time far away from home. It is evolving at a bewildering rate.

More Malaysian students, for instance, now study at branch campuses of UK universities than travel to Britain to study, and an array of partnerships offer the chance for students to study for a year or two at a university in their home country and at an overseas university, earning a ‘dual degree’ from both institutions.

UK universities have already built an impressive presence among transnational education ‘exporting countries’, but as demand and supply has increased, so has international competition, the variety of TNE operating models used, and concerns about quality and reputational risk for awarding institutions.

Dr Vangelis Tsiligiris, Senior Lecturer at Nottingham Trent University, envisaged the ‘TNE-Hub’ to help share the best research and experience with universities engaging in TNE. Based partly on his own experiences managing TNE partnerships with UK and Czech universities, he has gained substantial research and consultancy expertise in the internationalisation of higher education.

The  Higher Education Academy has developed a  strategic framework for internationalising higher education (including transnational education). The framework is designed as an enhancement tool to inspire and assist in enhancing HE policy and practice, recognising internationalisation as a process rather than an end in itself. This Good Practice Guide is designed to complement the framework, providing guidance on TNE which will help HEIs take forward internationalisation objectives.

The purpose of this article is to analyse some of the key ongoing debates in transnational higher education (TNHE). First, we discuss a selection of the claimed benefits and drawbacks of TNHE for home and host country stakeholders (students, governments and institutions), and then we suggest alternative realities, for which there appears to be evidence in practice. It is concluded that (1) recent TNHE developments on the provision side act as a counterforce to the spread of neo-colonialism; (2) international branch campus development continues but there is evidence that the forms, motives, and markets of these initiatives are changing; (3) distance/online/MOOC programmes do not pose a threat to the sustainability of other forms of TNHE; (4) the majority of TNHE programmes are of acceptable quality due to high levels of competition in international higher education markets and increased regulatory demands from quality assurance agencies; and (5) these forces also contribute to students generally being satisfied with their TNHE study experience.

In order to operate effectively and efficiently, most higher education institutions depend on employees performing extra-role behaviours and being committed to staying with the organisation. This study assesses the extent to which organisational identification and employee satisfaction are antecedents of these two important behaviours. Key objectives of the research were to identify possible antecedents of organisational identification and to discover whether the consequences of organisational identification vary among the employees of multinational universities at home and foreign campuses. We developed a model that was tested using structural equation modelling, which assesses the influences of organisational identification on employee satisfaction, extra-role behaviours and turnover intentions. All of the paths in our model were significant, but employee identification, satisfaction and extra-role behaviours were lower at foreign branches than at the home campuses of universities, and turnover intentions were higher. These results suggest that higher education institutions need to implement different human resource strategies at home and foreign branches, with a focus on improving organisational identification at the foreign subsidiaries.

The UK has been the main exporting country for transnational education (TNE) – that is, for providing higher education to foreign students who study wholly in their own country.  In the latest data (2020/21), UK universities reported 488,095 TNE enrolments, up 13% on 2019/20.  This compares with 605,130 for international students studying in the UK.

Post-Covid, there is growing interest in New Zealand entering the global TNE market. There are several reasons for this interest:

- Covid-19 and growing geo-political tensions have blunted the appetite for conventional export education (studying overseas) in key source markets, notably China.

- While global enrolments in higher education have soared to reach 235.3m by 2020, only 6.1m (2.4%) are internationally mobile, a percentage which has not changed since 1980.

- Export education is increasingly seen as exploitative and environmentally unsustainable.  TNE, in contrast, reduces the carbon footprint of international education and typically involves building deep partnerships between exporting HEIs and the host countries.

This presentation considers what New Zealand universities can learn from past and present global TNE development, and reflects on where Aotearoa’s approach may differ from the UK’s. It examines the need for stringent Quality Assurance processes to ensure students entering TNE pathways are set up for success.

Higher education is a labour intensive activity and strong organisational performance depends upon employee commitment. This study analyses antecedents and consequences of employee commitment in universities that are involved in transnational higher education, with a focus on identifying differences between the employees at home and foreign branch campuses. The data for the study were obtained using a questionnaire that was completed by both teaching and non-teaching staff at three institutions in the UK, three institutions in Malaysia, and two institutions in the United Arab Emirates. A conceptual model was proposed and tested using structural equation modelling. The results indicate that employees at international branch campuses are not as motivated and committed to their organisations as their counterparts at home campuses. The findings suggest that institutions need to employ different and customised human resource strategies at home and foreign campuses, specifically with the aim of improving employee commitment and performance at the foreign campuses.

This policy paper addresses the question of how well quality assurance systems support the quality of international branch campuses (IBCs) in the United Arab Emirates. There are different systems of quality assurance for IBCs in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Ras Al Khaimah, and a federal system of accreditation that is unevenly utilized across the emirates. Furthermore, the UAE’s 38 IBCs hail from 13 countries, each with its own procedures for regulating branch campus quality.* This complexity results in a segmented quality assurance environment with different quality assurance models applied to the UAE’s branch campuses.

This qualitative study is based on interviews with 47 IBC stakeholders conducted in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Ras Al Khaimah from January to April 2012. The paper begins with an overview of the dimensions of quality in higher education and a description of how the UAE’s current quality assurance systems approach quality assurance. The paper then presents the study’s findings on stakeholders’ perceptions of IBC quality assurance in the UAE. Finally, recommendations aimed at improving the alignment between quality assurance and stakeholders’ expectations for IBC quality are presented.

There is currently renewed interest in transnational education (TNE) amongst UK universities as a means of taking education to the 98% of tertiary students worldwide who are geographically-immobile.  In this discourse, the home universities are characterised as the dominant players, seeking strategic opportunities to commercially expand into foreign markets.  This paper argues that, in contrast, there are four key stakeholders in TNE – the home university, the partner organisation, the host government and students in the host country – and a TNE partnership is shaped by their relative power and motivations.  The paper finds that unless the motivations of stakeholders are broadly aligned to the form of TNE partnership, it is unlikely to succeed.  It highlights the fluid nature of these motivations which change over time – often slowly, but sometimes abruptly when there is a change in university strategy or policy on the part of the host government.

This paper investigates the challenges of managing transnational education (TNE) partnerships from the perspective of the home university managers. The study adopts a qualitative, 'insider researcher' methodology'. It uses a sample set of eight managers who operate from the home university and 13 'in-country' managers who are seconded to head up the overseas TNE partnerships. The sample are all drawn from UK universities to standardise for other variables (eg, legislative framework). It finds that the managers based at the home campus report a generally negative attitude, emphasising the riskiness and the lack of scalability, sustainably and profitability, as well as the general resistance to TNE from staff on the home campus. The in-country managers, in contrast, experience the same lack of empathy from their peers at home, but this group tends to more closely associate themselves with their local colleagues and to be drawn into building relationships with local stakeholders. The limitation of this research is that it is based on a sample of managers from the same country. In practical terms, the findings suggest that universities need to do more to increase awareness and commitment to their TNE partnerships amongst staff at the home campus, while providing better professional development and more frequent rotations for their in-country managers. This paper extends the very limited literature on the management of TNE partnerships.

Over the last decade, the growth of the international branch campus (IBC) has been one of the most striking developments in the internationalisation of higher education.  There are now over 200 IBCs across the world, mostly in the Middle East and East and South-east Asia.  Despite the growing numbers of IBCs and the considerable financial and reputational risk they pose to their home universities, relatively little is known about the challenges of managing these foreign outposts.  This paper reviews the growing, but still fragmented, literature in this increasingly important sector of higher education.  It finds that managers of IBCs are faced with a range of challenges, which primarily stem from dealing with key stakeholder groups: students, staff, home and host country quality regulators, the home university and the host government, as well as the IBC’s local joint venture partners.  It concludes that further work is required to better understand the factors which influence and constrain IBC managers in balancing the competing interests of stakeholders.

This lecture is part of the MA in International Higher Education Management at the University of Bath.  It covers TNE partnerships: the challenges of managing partnerships across borders and culture:
1. The dimensions of the management challenges
 Culture
 Language
 Legislation
2. The limitations of home universities in managing TNE
3. The stakeholders in TNE revisited
4. What do stakeholders want from TNE?
 Home university
 Joint venture partner
 Host government
 Students
5. The importance of alignment
6. Case studies of successful and failed TNE partnerships

International student mobility has emerged as a key source of societal and educational transformations in the booming economies of East Asia. International competencies are increasingly valued by employees and employers alike. Given the uneven distribution of international student flows, and the inequitable levels of benefit that they bring to various locales and institutions, some jurisdictions are seeking the optimal policy instruments for leveraging public and private interests in the mobility of human resources and knowledge. This case study of Hong Kong looks at the outbound–inbound student flows and explains how the government facilitates cross-border education balances. The researchers utilized the four modes of the General Agreement on Trades in Services framework, and found it to be a helpful tool in analyzing the government's balancing act, despite the challenges associated with the conceptualization of international student mobility as a commodity or trade in services.

Purpose -The research aims to assess the achievements and challenges of international branch campuses (IBCs) to date, and to consider how IBC development may progress in the future.
Method -The article presents a review of the scholarly and grey literatures on IBCs. The commentary and discussion is structured around the objectives, perspectives and experiences of three key stakeholder groups, namely the institutions that own IBCs, students and host countries.
Findings - Some IBCs have failed to achieve their student recruitment and financial targets, while others have been successful, often expanding and moving into new, larger, purpose-built campuses. In the last few years, several countries have announced their intention to become a transnational education hub, or at least to allow the establishment of IBCs. It may be reasonable to assume that when there is demand for a particular product, supply will eventually follow. IBCs will survive and prosper as long as they provide benefits to each of their main stakeholder groups (i.e., students, institutions and governments), and as long as the local demand for higher education places exceeds the total supply.
Originality -The article provides a comprehensive and up-to-date review of IBC developments and research during the period 2000-2020. The findings and conclusions will be of interest to both researchers and practitioners.

This empirical article examines the policies, perspectives, and practices of building and developing crossborder and transnational higher education (TNHE) programs, with special attention given to the international joint and dual degree programs in North America and Asia. Specifically, this paper reviews the historical, political, and social dimensions of two international collaborative academic degree programs between the United States and Mainland China using Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis (IUPUI) and Sun Yat-set University (SYSU) as the case study. Findings suggest that IUPUI’s most cited challenge with SYSU concerns alignment with general education requirements. On the other hand, SYSU’s biggest challenge with IUPUI concerns language and cultural differences. This article offers five recommendations for teacher-scholars, policymakers, and advanced practitioners interested in developing, designing, and implementing dual degree programs during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Implications for future research on and applications and practices for TNHE programs are discussed.

In recent years, an increasing number of major universities have set up international branch campuses (IBCs).  There are now over 200 IBCs, with more under development.  Little is known about the unique challenges that face IBC managers, who are normally seconded from the home university to set up and operate the satellite campus in a new and alien environment.  At the same time, there are significant financial and reputational risks for the home university should an IBC fail.  This paper reports the results of a qualitative study into the ‘lived experiences’ of IBC managers working in the three largest host markets for IBCs – China, Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates.  It finds that the fundamental challenge for managers is balancing the competing demands of a range of internal and external stakeholders and concludes that universities need to do more to prepare and support IBC managers.

The paper summarizes the findings from a survey of 78 International Branch Campuses (IBCs).  The paper provides information on the age of branch campuses, language of instruction, availability of student transfer options, academic program offerings, enrollments, and origin of students.

The study investigates how in international partnerships the brand credibility of each partner, student-institution identification with each partner, and perceived service quality relate to student satisfaction. A structured survey questionnaire was completed by 528 students taking a co-branded higher education program in Hong Kong or Sri Lanka. The results indicate that the brand credibility of a foreign institution is a stronger influencer on student identification with the foreign institution as compared to the relationship between credibility and identification with the local partner. The negative relationship between organizational identification and cognitive dissonance for each institution in the partnership is also stronger for the foreign institution. As the popularity of international partnerships and co-branded higher education programs continues to grow, the importance and dominance of foreign brand credibility and student identification with foreign institutions is recognized.

Franchising degrees to overseas providers, normally for-profit private companies, has become big business for English universities.  The latest data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency reveal that there are now more international students registered for the awards of English higher education institutions that are studying wholly offshore than are on campus.  There is an extensive economic literature exploring the role of franchising (or licensing) in the internationalisation of multinational companies.  There are, however, few studies that have attempted to understand the reasons why so many English universities have moved beyond exporting (educating foreign students on campus) to franchising their degrees to overseas partners.  This study uses an exploratory research methodology to get ‘inside the black box’.  It investigates the motivations of decision-makers entering and maintaining franchising operations at four English universities, revealing that financial considerations are less dominant than widely believed within the sector and are overshadowed by other, non-commercial considerations.

Cross-border academic collaborations in conflict zones are vulnerable to escalated turbulence, liability concerns and flagging support. Multi-level stakeholder engagement at home and abroad is essential for securing the political and financial sustainability of such collaborations. This study examines the multilayered stakeholder arrangements within an international academic health science network contributing to peace-building in the Middle East. While organizational forms in this collaboration change to reflect the structural, epistemic and political expectations of various support groups operating locally and globally, the legitimacy of the international research and its contribution to the peace-building process last as long as institutional norms of academic enterprise – integrity, impartiality and collegiality – are sustained. This paper analyzes the reconciliatory strategies used by the collaborating health scientists to mitigate organizational turbulence, reduce resource asymmetries and continually build and rebuild bridges across stakeholder communities.

International branch campuses (IBCs) are essentially offshore subsidiaries of a university.  The Observatory on Borderless Higher Education (OBHE) and the Cross-Border Education Research Team (C-BERT), the two leading research groups monitoring the growth of IBCs, define an IBC as "an entity that is owned, at least in part, by a foreign education provider; operated in the name of the foreign education provider; and provides an entire academic program, substantially on site, leading to a degree awarded by the foreign education provider" (Garrett et al., 2016).  In its latest survey, C-BERT identified 248 operational IBCs, 41 IBCs which have closed and a further 22 pending development (C-BERT, 2017).

There are a number of features of IBCs which make their management distinctive (Wilkins and Huisman, 2012).  These include the differences in the operating environments between the university in the home country and the IBC in the host country, the organizational form of the IBC and the limited capacity of the university to manage an IBC at distance.

This research assesses the extent to which the critical relational variables of university reputation, student trust, and student-university identification influence student behaviour towards transnational education partnerships. Students undertaking British degrees at two transnational partnership locations (Hong Kong, n = 203 and Sri Lanka, n = 325) completed a quantitative survey questionnaire. A conceptual model was developed and tested using structural equation modelling. University reputation and student trust were found to be significant predictors of student identification with each partner institution, and student-university identification was a significant predictor of student satisfaction, loyalty, and extra-role behaviours toward both the local and foreign educational organisations. The findings suggest that student relationship management strategies should focus on strengthening the higher education institution's reputation, and increasing the students' trust and identification with the institution. Moreover, universities should also assess potential partners for these qualities when entering into transnational education partnerships. Drawing on theories of social and organisational identification, this is the first study to consider student-university identification as the linchpin between the exogenous constructs of reputation and trust, and the endogenous constructs of student satisfaction, loyalty, and extra-role behaviours in both the international education and international business literatures.

To date, much of the research on internationalization and globalization of higher education has focused on the institution or higher education system as the unit of analysis. Institution based studies have focused on the analysis of institutional practices and policies designed to further internationalization. System-level studies focus on state policy initiatives or approaches. In this paper we explore the inter-relationships among multiple levels of authority within a higher education system through an analysis of research policies and activities related to internationalization. While we are interested in the internationalization of university research, our primary objective is to explore the relationships between policy initiatives and approaches at different levels. Using the ''Global Higher Education Matrix'' as a framework, we discuss the policy emphasis on the internationalization of research at the federal, provincial (Ontario), and institutional levels of authority, as well as the international research activities associated with two large professional schools operating at the understructure level. By focusing on the inter-relationships among initiatives at different levels of authority, this study explores the complexity of policy perspectives within the internationalization of research in the context of multi-level governance.

The growth in the number of international branch campuses (IBCs) has been one of the most striking developments in the internationalization of higher education in recent years.  IBCs are overwhelmingly branches of universities in the developed ‘West’.  The United States, the United Kingdom and Australia dominate provision.  In contrast, IBCs are concentrated in the Middle-East and Asia.  The cultural distance between the home and host countries of many IBCs is considerable.  This distance poses a major challenge for the successful management of an IBC.  Should it localize its curriculum and pedagogy to better meet the learning styles and educational needs of its students or should it provide an education experience that is comparable to that enjoyed by students on the home campus?  This paper takes as its theoretical framework the global integration – local responsiveness (I-R) paradigm.  Using an exploratory research design, it finds that the I-R paradigm can be operationalized for IBCs, to predict how faculty, the curriculum and research are likely to be localized in response to pressure from an IBC’s main internal and external stakeholders.

It is a widely accepted maxim that, like business generally, higher education is internationalising. For many countries, higher education is now an important export sector, with university campuses attracting international students from around the world. Licensing production, in the form of franchising degree provision to international partners, is beginning to mutate into foreign direct investment as universities set up campuses in other countries. Driven by advances in information and communication technologies and the growing hegemony of English as the world’s common language, higher education is generally thought to be following the classic pattern of internationalisation familiar in business (eg, Scott, 1998; Altbach, 2002; Hira, 2003). While trends in higher education around the world appear to support this orthodox view, the paper offers an alternative interpretation of developments, which leads to a different vision for the global higher education ‘industry’ of 2020.

Several education hubs have emerged in the last decade in Asia and the Middle East. These ambitious policy initiatives share a common interest in cross-border higher education even though diverse rationales underpin their development. While some claim to be an international education hub, others claim to be a regional education hub or simultaneously international and regional. Considerable rhetoric and assumptions of uniformity exist in the discourse of education hub development. This paper clarifies the regional dimension of education hubs in terms of concepts, rationales, and strategies of regional engagement. Policymakers pursue different definitions of region as they leverage higher
education to gain geopolitical influence in targeted spheres. Furthermore, the distinction between the role of a regional leader and regional broker presents different opportunities for an education hub. The paper compares the development of three key education hubs in Asia: Malaysia, Singapore, and Hong Kong.

Cross-border education refers to the movement of people, programs, providers,
knowledge, ideas, projects and services across national boundaries. A fuller
description of cross-border education is included in the Guidelines for Quality
Provision in Cross-border Higher Education jointly developed by UNESCO and the
OECD as, “higher education that takes place in situations where the teacher,
student, program, institution/provider or course materials cross national jurisdictional
borders (UNESCO/OECD2005).

Higher education is more critical than ever in determining a country’s economic development and standards of living. Knowledge and innovation are increasingly important to the economic competitiveness of a nation. Higher education services have thus emerged as an important and growing component of many nations’ economic strategies. Recent estimates place the value of the global higher education market above $1 trillion including both domestic and international expenditures.

The purpose of this paper is to begin to bridge the divide between the international education community and the international trade community. The paper shows where education overlaps with the four primary modes of trade: 1) cross-border supply (e.g., online delivery to students in another country), 2) consumption abroad (e.g., student mobility); 3) commercial presence (e.g., international branch campuses or study abroad locations); and 4) presence of natural persons (e.g., faculty members traveling overseas to teach a class). Each of these activities can be regulated, often unbeknownst to educators, by trade agreements between countries.

South-North migration has largely characterized international migration patterns for decades. The South has traditionally been the source of both low-skilled and high-skilled labor of developed countries. This has fueled serious concerns about the apparent loss of valuable knowledge and skills in developing countries, or what became known as ‘brain drain’. However, the extent of migration between developing countries, or South-South migration, has intensified in recent years due to the economic progress in some regions, such as East Asia. This paper suggests that the ASEAN economic integration can be viewed as an opportunity for brain gain for the member-countries. The envisaged ASEAN economic community in 2015 may boost both South-South and North-South movements of skilled labor as a result of the growth of cross-border education, increased mobility of professional workers with the implementation of the mutual recognition arrangement (MRAs), and the possible return migration of expatriate professionals to the ASEAN region given a vibrant regional economy in the long run that can provide more competitive remuneration packages. In turn, these will facilitate knowledge exchanges and collaborations, technology transfers, economic and business linkages, investment flows, and increased remittances.  However, the more advanced economies in the region will have an edge in exploiting these opportunities in the initial years of the AEC. The ASEAN integration can be a double-edged sword for member-countries that may not be able to improve their competitiveness in the long run. Various issues affect the potential of many ASEAN countries to engage in cross-border education, such as language issues, underdeveloped tertiary education systems, and low innovation capacity. The potential of return migration of expatriate professionals is also compromised by low global competitiveness, particularly of the CLMV countries, which reflects poor capacity to absorb high-level skills and global capital.  The full implementation of the MRAs will mean greater competition for skilled labor among the member-countries. The challenge remains for the member-countries, particularly the lagging ones, to improve the quality of their tertiary education system and develop their human resource pool to make it more competitive.