Abstract
Taking an exchange program is an effective way for students to broaden their disciplinary perspectives, to improve their intercultural competences and also strengthen professional skills. However, students are hardly aware of these effects. And if they are, they have great difficulty to both articulate these newly acquired skills and link these to their identity, personal and professional development and competences. To what extent and how does a training trajectory around an exchange program increase (awareness of) professional skill development and equip students to capitalize on their exchange program’s learning effects? This paper describes the design and first empirical results of a training trajectory targeting UU outbound exchange students. The trajectory aims to improve exchange students’ recognition, understanding, and mobilization of intercultural and other professional competences towards employability skills. Based on a quantitative approach using data collected via pre-departure and back-home questionnaires, we find that the participants are motivated students, who are confident in already mastering particular skills, but aim to actively develop other skills as well. Their (self-reported) skills mastered at the end of the exchange differ from the skills they had before going abroad. Next to intercultural competences, students also reported to have developed in particular self-management and problem-solving skills. In a next project phase we plan to compare the skill development of exchange students who do and who do not take part in the training trajectory, and to explore whether, in what way and why both student skill development and reflections on their learning from exchange programs differ.
Presenters
Rena ZendedelAssistant Professor, Intercultural Communication, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands Veronique Schutjens
Professor, Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Utrecht University, Faculty of Geosciences, the Netherlands, Utrecht, Netherlands
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Exchange Program, Learning from Experiences, Reflection Competences, Professional Skill Development, Training Trajectory
