Browsing by Subject "Intercultural Development"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
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    Assessing intercultural competence for educational leaders: an empirical investigation.
    (2012-05) El Ganzoury, Hala A.
    The growing diversity of multi-cultural student populations in public schools coupled with the persistent challenge of narrowing the racial achievement gap raises questions about the preparedness of educational leaders to meet the needs of their diverse student population. Educational leaders are facing the challenge of responding to the needs of their diverse student population without systemic strategies, knowledge, and skills necessary to succeed in multi-cultural schools. This study was designed to investigate the level of intercultural sensitivity of a group of educational leaders in a Northern Minnesota school district as measured by the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI). In this study, the placement of educational leaders in the Minimization stage means that they were in a transitional stage from ethnocentrism to ethnorelativism. However, the results of this study indicated that a well planned training can significantly develop the intercultural competence of educational leaders. Findings from this study also demonstrated a significant disparity between the actual Developmental level and the Perceived level of intercultural competence of the participants. This could mean an overestimated and unrealistic view about the participants’ ability to effectively handle the increasing diversity of student population. Overall, demographic and background variables were not found to be significantly related to the level of intercultural competence. However, some significant relations were reported between these variables and some of the IDI subscale scores.
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    Assessing the intercultural sensitivity of elementary teachers in bilingual schools in a Texas school district.
    (2009-03) Bayles, Peggy Porterfield
    This study explored the intercultural sensitivity of 233 elementary teachers working in five bilingual schools in an urban Texas school district. The purpose of the study was to assess teachers' intercultural sensitivity and to determine whether there were differences in intercultural sensitivity in terms of certain demographic and background variables related to their intercultural experience. A quantitative, non-experimental design was used for the study. The Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI), version 2, a psychometrically valid instrument based on the Development Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS), was used to measure intercultural sensitivity. A seven-item demographic and background information sheet was used to gather the information needed to determine whether the dependent variables (IDI developmental and scale scores) differed for teacher groups in terms of the independent variables: gender, age, level of education, years living in a bicultural setting, years teaching in schools, years teaching ethnically diverse students, and years teaching in a bilingual classroom. The IDI results revealed a mean developmental score of 95.09 for the group of teachers. This score placed the teachers in Minimization, an ethnocentric stage on the DMIS. This suggests that while the group of teachers may have a familiarity with different cultures and be aware of differences in cultural patterns such as values, beliefs, and communication styles, they may minimize student cultural differences and apply universal values and principles in their educational practice. The results also indicated a significant difference between the mean developmental score for teacher groups examined for two of the variables: years teaching in schools and years teaching ethnically diverse students. For both of these variables, the group of teachers with over 10 years experience had a higher mean developmental score than the group of teachers with fewer years experience. There were no significant differences in the scores between teacher groups for the other variables: living in a bicultural setting, years teaching in a bilingual classroom, age, gender, or level of education.
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    Fostering intercultural competence through study abroad: a gender- based analysis of individual and program factors influencing development.
    (2011-12) Nichols, Karen Preston
    This study explores how individual student characteristics, study-abroad program choices and gender influence intercultural competence outcomes through study abroad. The Georgetown University Consortium Project (GUCP) sample included 1,163 students who completed a pre- and post-test of intercultural competence using the Intercultural Development Inventory and were studying abroad on one of 51 programs around the world. The secondary analysis of GUCP data found that men and women differed in both individual and program characteristics. Women were more likely to start out with a higher level of intercultural development, take all content courses delivered in the target language, and receive frequent group mentoring more often than men. Both taking content courses in the target language and receiving frequent group mentoring correlated with greater positive changes in intercultural competence through study abroad. Considering only individual student characteristics, negative predictors of change in intercultural competence were found to be initial intercultural development level and majoring in non-international business. Being female was a positive predictor. When both individual and program characteristics were considered, initial intercultural competence level and majoring in non-international business remained negative predictors. Living with international students and living with a host family were also shown to be negative predictors of intercultural competence development. Being female remained the only significant positive predictor of intercultural competence development when all individual and study-abroad program characteristics were considered.
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    Students’ Intercultural Development During Faculty-led Short-Term Study Abroad: A Mixed Methods Exploratory Case Study of Intercultural Interventions
    (2021-05) Cressy, Kimberly
    The purpose of this case study was to examine the ways in which an instructor’s interventions and guided reflections influenced students’ intercultural development during a short-term study abroad experience in Oaxaca, Mexico The research questions were: (a) What was the impact of the study abroad program on the level of intercultural sensitivity and cultural intelligence of participants? (b) How did the instructor intervene to facilitate students’ intercultural development? (c) In what ways did the interventions influence students’ intercultural development? A mixed methods approach was employed, using both quantitative and qualitative methods to triangulate data, achieve deeper understanding, and further explain the quantitative findings. The population consisted of 10 students from one 4-year public higher education institution in the United States who participated in a faculty-led study abroad program. This study’s findings suggest that a short-term, faculty-led study abroad program can have a positive impact on students’ intercultural development. The major finding from the quantitative research is that students increased their scores on the Intercultural Development Inventory and the Cultural Intelligence Scale. The two major findings from the qualitative data are (a) guided reflections played a critical role in students’ intercultural development, particularly their culture-general learning, and (b) interactions with host nationals played an important role in students’ culture-specific and comparative learning. The findings have important implications for the design of short-term study abroad programs and for the instructors leading such programs.Keywords: faculty-led, short-term study abroad, guided reflections, interventions, intercultural development