This text is part of the special Higher Education notebook
Established by a team of professors from different universities in the UQ network, the self-supporting training “Inclusive campuses for international students” (CAMIE) lasts only one hour, is free and aims to help students newcomers and local actors to understand each other better and help each other.
The training was developed by a dozen professors, including the project manager and professor of educational sciences at the Université du Québec en Outaouais (UQO), Marie-Josée Goulet, Andréanne Gélinas-Proulx, also professor at the ‘UQO and specialist in educational leadership and management, and professor specializing in intercultural issues from the University of Quebec at Chicoutimi (UQAC), Jorge Frozzini.
It was born out of a need, underlines Mme Gélinas-Proulx. “There has been field research with international students and teachers to find out how they interact. We started asking ourselves these questions in 2016,” she explains. The need for training quickly became apparent. “And with the internationalization movements of universities, it became more and more necessary to offer common training to support the entire university community,” says the professor.
Between 2010 and 2020, the international university student population has in fact doubled in Quebec, specifies Mme Gélinas-Proulx. According to the Canadian Office for International Education, 25% of the total student population in the province, whether at CEGEP or university, came from abroad in 2020.
A common core and targeted modules
All participants have access to a common core module addressing issues that concern them all, such as demystifying the increased presence of international students on campus, their challenges, the discrimination sometimes experienced or the positive aspects of socio-cultural diversity. “The burden of integration does not rest only on the arriving students, but on the entire university community,” believes Ms.me Gélinas-Proulx.
Once these common awarenesses have been achieved, two distinct modules are offered. One is aimed at international students and focuses on life in Quebec, the language, the climate, the importance of being informed and North American culture with its relational contexts. For local students and teachers, the other module addresses intercultural relations and teamwork, the relationship with the French language and the isolation that international students can feel and how to help them in this context.
Interactive training on real-life realities
All training content was designed by researchers specializing in interculturality. It has already undergone a trial period with users and is offered to UQO. It should also be available soon for all people in the UQ Network. International students themselves are targeted, but also local ones, as well as teachers and other members of the university community.
The training is intended to be interactive, describes Andréanne Gélinas-Proulx. To do this, questions punctuate the participant’s journey and answers and thoughts are shared along the way. An interactive map also allows you to go to a university context, on a campus, with classrooms, cafeteria and corridors, featuring international students interacting with local students or teachers. By clicking on the characters, we see extracts of verbatim statements from research work. “These are real testimonies collected which explain experiences, stereotypes for example, or feelings of exclusion in different contexts,” specifies the professor.
At the end of the training, there are ideas for making the common space more inclusive. “Whether in lesson plans, assignments or pairing activities, we provide ideas to break down the distance that separates them from each other,” explains Jorge Frozzini. However, he specifies that this training is only a tool that fits into several strategies specific to each university for the integration of their international students.
Recurring challenges
Several challenges were identified by international students. “For example, the response of teachers, who are not always sensitive to cultural differences,” underlines Mr. Frozzini. He gives the example of a sociology course where a professor would only give Quebec examples without providing context. Another recurring problem encountered by these students: teamwork. “International people often find themselves alone or among themselves,” he reports.
There are also video clips in which international students have agreed to share their reality. A way to touch people through real-life testimonies and to better understand their reality, think the two professors, who hope that once integrated into universities, this training will make the university community more inclusive.
New premises at UQAM
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