With the rise of globalization and a knowledge-based economy, nations around the world and their higher education institutions have actively pursued internationalization to increase their global competitiveness.The U.S. is no exception to this trend. Currently, one-fourth of faculty in U.S. higher education institutions are foreign-born.1 These faculty members “provide links to the outside world, particularly for first-generation students” as well as other minoritized students with socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds. Faculty of foreign origins are also significant contributors to the local communities, serving as role models for immigrants or expatriates. The presence and contributions of international/ foreign-born faculty remind us that higher education institutions “are globally, nationally, and locally implicated" in the globalized world. Not surprisingly, however,barriers to higher education remain for foreign-born individuals and are exacerbated for women, especially refugee women, a subject we don’t often address. Yet, it is the experiences and resultant knowledge of such women—with diverse cultural experiences of oppression, activism, and solidarity – that may provide the most dramatic advances in knowledge.2,3,4 Despite this potential, international faculty and staff often feel isolated at their institutions and may tolerate discrimination due to their immigrant status.Thus, this week, we will learn about ways to improve gender equity on our campus in the context of international faculty, staff, and students.
The myth that international faculty and students are agents of internationalization
Internationalization in higher education entails integrating international and intercultural content and analysis aspects into the curriculum, not only developing institutional capacity to support international faculty, staff, and students, but also promoting international collaborations for research and teaching. Jane Knight, a renowned scholar in the field of international higher education, identifies a widespread myth that higher education institutions believe that international faculty, staff, and students are natural agents of internationalization for their institution, meaning that by simply recruiting more international individuals to their institution, they will automatically increase internationalization with no additional investments needed. The reality, however, is that without an infrastructure to integrate international and domestic views (e.g., equipping domestic members with intercultural competence and providing effective mentoring/advising for international faculty), internationalization doesn’t happen. Instead, international faculty, staff, and students often find themselves navigating systemic racism and sexism and a general lack of intercultural support.5 Foreign-born faculty do this while also attempting to comply with a strictly American institutional and classroom context. As a result, international individuals tend to form intracultural affinity groups that are isolated from domestic elements. This may be attributable to a general sense of isolation as well as inadequate mentoring designed specifically for these colleagues.
Furthermore, international women faculty (like women faculty in general) have generally been found to accept heavier teaching and service loads, as they are often asked to teach/supervise larger courses and to advise students.6, 7 However, international women faculty feel this burden even more, as they are also often implicitly expected to contribute more, either officially or unofficially. For instance, they are asked to lead study abroad programs and create new courses on regional topics that use their “outsider” perspectives as well as advising international students.8,9,10 These disproportionate roles can make it take longer for the international women faculty to achieve their promotions, particularly when coupled with disproportionate caregiving responsibilities in their private lives.11
Confined paths
International faculty, staff, and students are often funneled into career paths and academic paths that offer more flexibility and fewer legal risks as immigrant workers and students. For instance, the U.S. government has continuously amended its immigration policy to host international faculty and students in academic fields that are considered imperative for national economic development.12,13 A typical example is the US government granting more generous visa permissions and giving citizenship preferences to international individuals in STEM fields. In this regard, a campus newspaper at Princeton reported a phenomenon wherein international students from non-STEM fields on their campus were unwillingly switching to STEM fields. They found that this was largely due to the legal disparities among the STEM and non-STEM disciplines in the U.S. and they urged the institution expand double major options across disciplines as a remedy. In addition, due to such legal restrictions, international students and faculty “lack many of the safeguards afforded to their colleagues, like the freedom to change jobs without having to leave the country or find another sponsor.”Consequently, they tolerate discrimination to avoid the cost or conflict that addressing discrimination might involve. For example, a study by OneZero exploring the experiences of international employees at high-profile tech companies in the U.S. highlighted the fact that 88% of their survey respondents were men, and all of the employees who participated in the interviews expressed their fear about the potential risks of being identified and the ways being identified as foreign could impact their personal lives. Based on these findings, it is reasonable to posit that inequitable working conditions and support for women in higher education in the US can cause even greater stress and repercussions for international women faculty, staff, and students, because they are more likely to stay silent in order to safeguard their status and protect their families.
Action Tips for Allies
Increase institutional and departmental intercultural awareness, particularly as it regards gender equity: It seems to be universal that women across the world tend to hold more responsibilities for household and caregiving.14 The pressure to conform to gender-role expectations is often magnified when the international women faculty, staff, and students are mothers and come from more patriarchal cultures and societies. These international women are found to experience greater internal conflicts regarding the cultural values of their home countries and those they encounter in the U.S., and several experience a lack of familial support for their studies and careers.15 Many of these women have been taught to make sacrifices for children and other family members, due to the strong presence of patriarchal values in their home cultures.16 Part of this sacrifice often means adhering to their traditional responsibilities of caring for their parents and attending to family matters, either in their new country or in the old one.17, 18 To support international women faculty, staff, and students, then, institutions as whole, or departments and programs, can offer opportunities for other faculty to learn about how the cultural differences affect the performance and well-being of international women on campus (e.g., re-evaluating influence of competitive and individualistic cultures and lack of institutional child-care support on these women).
Check-in with your international colleagues and students: International campus members are often affected by the issues and events that impact their families in their home countries. Yet, they often hold an immigration status that limits their freedom of mobility (e.g., not being able to leave the U.S. for a lengthy period of time) and of expressions (e.g., feeling vulnerable to sharing how the issues at their home are influencing them). Thus, we recommend checking in with your international colleagues and students individually and listening to them, particularly if you hear a news story that (could) impact their families at home. An important note here is not to make exclusionary or negative comments or assumptions about someone’s country or culture. Rather, one should first ask how the colleague or student is feeling.
Share information and opportunities: Refugee women are found to suffer from the separation from their loved ones and to exhibit strong desires to achieve something contributive for their people and country.19 At the same time, women who enter the resettlement process face additional levels of stress as the normal challenges can become complex and gendered experiences involving violence, health disparity, and discrimination.20 Aya Abdullah, a woman refugee student in Geneva, Switzerland, describes the difficulty in pursing higher education since institutions—with both resources and knowledge—simply close the door on her by saying “no” to refugee students without sufficient documents. On the other hand, Abdullah notes that her institution was extremely helpful by proactively offering her information and alternative opportunities instead of putting all of the burden on her to find her path. Such information can include DAFI scholarship for refugees around the world, and a list of institutions that offer a more flexible admission process by being flexible with English proficiency exam types and requirements as taking the traditional exams are costly and requires stable internet access. This story conveys the importance of small actions, like putting words out and sharing resources about support for refugees to pursue higher education so that it can reach refugee women who often lack access to such information.
Weekly Resources
Article: Forcibly Displaced Women in Higher Education—UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, calls us to create inclusive higher education for all women including refugee women and highlights the contributions of refugee women can make.
Video: Flee –An animated documentary telling a real-life story of a refugee man who navigated his identity as a gay man while experiencing an extremely oppressive life for refugees. This movie describes how the refugee man finds home, which has been elusive to him for 20 years.
Article: Experiences of International Women Faculty at One Striving University – Daniela Véliz identifies cultural elements at her institution that can enable international women faculty’s success while highlighting the gendered experiences of these women faculty in the U.S. institution.