Aspirational Meaning Making: A Qualitative Case Study of Education for Global Citizenship in U.S. Higher Education

Abstract

In recent decades, Education for Global Citizenship (EfGC) has emerged as a prominent way to discuss internationalization and global learning efforts in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). The concept of global citizenship is a controversial one though, and there is no consensus on a definition of global citizenship nor on EfGC. Much of the extant literature has focused on typologizing EfGC efforts or on assessing student learning outcomes or programs. This leaves a critical gap in understanding the crucial yet overlooked role university instructors play in HEI’s internationalization and global citizenship efforts.In this qualitative case study at one U.S. university, I focused on: (1) how university instructors made meaning around the concept of global citizenship; (2) how instructors believed they educated for global citizenship and how students perceived EfGC efforts; and (3) how educators felt motivated, enabled, or constrained in their pedagogical pursuits around global citizenship. To answer these questions and analyze how these understandings and educational practices are shaped by specific personal, contextual, and temporal factors, I propose a theory of aspirational meaning making and models of Ways of Understanding Global Citizenship and Ways of Educating for Global Citizenship based on instructors’ ways of knowing, being, doing, and aspiring. Findings from this research suggest that instructors’ understandings of global citizenship and ways of educating for global citizenship are deeply complex, context-specific, and far more dynamic and adaptable than has been acknowledged in previous studies. Taking place during a uniquely challenging time during the COVID-19 pandemic, findings from this study demonstrate how the ambiguous and adaptable nature of EfGC, combined with the contextual adaptations instructors made, allowed instructors to keep their educational efforts responsive and applicable to contemporary concerns. The findings of this research have important implications for theory, teaching and learning, and policy and practice. This research contributes to the fields of comparative and international education, higher education, and global citizenship education by addressing a gap in the literature on internationalization and global learning, specifically on how global citizenship and EfGC is understood and practiced by individuals in a particular temporal and situational context in a U.S. HEI.