Conference Agenda

This research project explores teaching and learning cultures in transnational higher education by examining three pedagogical development programmes organised by a Finnish university in universities in Palestine, Brazil, and Thailand. As a part of transnational cooperation of these institutions between 2016 and 2019, three programmes were organised as pedagogical development training for university teachers. The research datasets were compiled from texts produced by the participants during the three case-study programmes and analysed using poststructuralist discourse analysis.

Aiming to understand the cultural change processes engendered by the transnational cooperation, the research is led by two main research questions: (1) What are the features of teaching and learning cultures in higher education institutions (HEIs) located in three national contexts (Palestine, Brazil, and Thailand)? (2) What kinds of change processes are introduced by the transnational pedagogical development programmes and how are those manifested in the (institutional) teaching and learning cultures?

Theoretical and methodological framework of this qualitative inquiry draws on conceptualisations outlined in the previous research into international/transnational education, institutional cultures, and poststructuralist discourse analysis.

Transnational education (TNE) – also called cross-border education or internationalisation abroad – refers to movement of people, programmes, policies, or other educational activities across national or regional borders (Knight, 2012). Finnish HEIs have recently increased their TNE activities mostly by offering commissioned programmes and training packages to partners globally. Generally seen as beneficial for HEIs, TNE may widen the opportunities for intercultural exchange, economic development, and modernisation of higher education systems (Korhonen & Alenius, 2018). However, TNE programs have been criticised as profit-seeking endeavours of HEIs in developed countries providing education in developing countries (Djerasimovic, 2014). The economic rationale of TNE raises concerns about equal opportunities and access to education resulting with unequal power distribution between the “producers” and “consumers” of TNE (Pyvis, 2011). Previous studies question transferability of pedagogical ideas in different national contexts and call for greater cultural contextualisation to make learning relevant for the learners (Allen, 2014; Bovill et al., 2015; Jordan et al., 2014; Leask, 2008). More research is needed to better understand the dynamics behind this process of cultural contextualisation in TNE.

Our three case studies have been implemented as inter-institutional transnational cooperation; therefore, we focus on teaching and learning as one analytical aspect of institutional cultures in higher education. Our approach draws on the fragmentation perspective (Martin, 1992) and anthropological approaches (Alvesson, 2002; Trowler, 2008) to institutional culture. Characterised by ambiguity, pluralism, and contradictions, culture is constructed and enacted through community’s meaning-making processes. Following the poststructuralist perspective, we see institutional cultures as discursively constructed (Berti, 2017; Foucault, 2002). Thus, we define teaching and learning cultures as discursive meaning-making processes that guide the ways in which educational processes are understood and organised at an institution.

The presentation will give an overview of this ongoing research project and discuss the findings of two case studies: Finnish–Palestinian & Finnish–Brazilian cooperation. The role of diversity (in sense of increasing variety) is particularly visible in discursive construction of institutional teaching and learning cultures during a transnational collaboration. The findings of the two case-studies show that teaching and learning cultures are fragmented and constructed by diverse and often contrasting discourses in and around HEIs. As it introduces additional alternative discourses into the institutional meaning-making, transnational collaboration diversifies the ways in which educational processes are understood and practiced at a HEI. In other words, diversification of (pedagogical) perspectives in TNE enables discursive transformation and pedagogical development not only on the level of individual university teachers but also on the level of community and institution.

The increased demand for independent researchers, coupled with high attrition rates on doctoral programmes, have focused attention on the support provided to aid doctoral researchers become ‘active relational agents’ in research communities (Pyhältö and Keskinen 2012). In this paper we explore how an analysis of doctoral researchers’ experiences as they negotiate community participation and engagement can further our understanding of the support needed to facilitate a move towards more participative culture for those at the early stages of their doctorates. The university research environment is often seen as key to supporting the development of creative, collaborative and autonomous researchers, with its significance noted in high-stakes assessments. Despite the attention on this, doctoral researchers in the UK consistently report lower levels of satisfaction with research culture than with other aspects of their experience (Neves 2022). The focus on improving the support provided to doctoral researchers has frequently been focussed on supervisors. These issues are also of concern elsewhere in Europe, for example through recent calls to develop research cultures where doctoral researchers have opportunities to engage with research communities from the start of their programmes (Corcelles-Seuba, Suñe-Soler, Sala-Bubaré & Castelló 2022).

Drawing on a communities of practice theorisation, we map the communities that doctoral researchers participate in, situating these in relation to the wider research environment, and the access to resources this affords. Then, using agency theories, we frame doctoral researchers’ relationships within and across communities and networks. We explore how these relationships vary, considering spatiotemporal dimensions (Aarnikoivu 2021), and ‘embodied, material or imaginary mediators of experience’ (Hopwood 2010, p109). The concept of professional agency, utilised in studies of teacher professional learning (Eteläpelto et al., 2013 p.61) frames an understanding of how experienced professionals engage in the early stages of researcher development. Previous studies of doctoral researchers’ engagement and participation in research communities have identified relational agency (Edwards 2005) and the development of relational expertise (Douglas 2020) as offering productive ways of thinking about support for doctoral researchers. In this paper we consider how relational pedagogical practices may be made more explicit, developing a research culture that offers both support and challenge to doctoral candidates in their journeying to become researchers.

We focus on the following research question:

• How do doctoral researchers in the first year of a professional doctorate navigate research communities?

The challenge of engagement with and participation in research communities for those at the start of their doctoral programmes has increasingly been the focus of research. Candidates on professional doctorates, typically experienced professionals with successful careers, may bring networking skills from practice that can be utilised to aid research networking. At the same time, they are aware of being ‘novices’ in research, facing the challenge of making sense of identity shifts as they begin the process of socialisation into research communities. In this paper, we consider the opportunities that professional doctorates provide and how the pedagogical affordances such programmes offer might be exploited for other forms of doctorate.

The aim of this paper is to analyze transformative learning in Higher Education spaces. Thousands of students from universities in the “Global North” engage with communities in the “Global South” while conducting fieldwork and mobility programs. However, there are not many courses offered to provide students with a transformative learning approach. “Transformative learning can be described as a process of changing deeply held assumptions (i.e., frames of reference or meaning perspectives) about the world and oneself, thereby strengthening one’s capacity to contribute to social change processes” (Singer-Brodowski, 2023 p.2).

One of the objectives of this paper is to study how courses at universities deal with how different power structures - based on colonial, racial, gender, wealth and knowledge inequalities - benefit the Global North, and what this implies from a personal and academic perspective. Taking an anti-oppressive approach (Stein, 2015) entails identifying power structures and transformations regarding social and cognitive justice, which requires taking into consideration different epistemologies (Escobar, 2006). These diverse epistemologies refer to processes of producing and valuing different forms of knowledge based on the practices of social groups that have been historically discriminated against, especially in the Global South.

Developing competences on transformative learning to overcome disciplinary boundaries, encompassing elements that are essential for researchers such as grant writing and participation in cooperative and international teams. These competences are essential for educators and researchers who aspire to be “transformative intellectuals” who combine mutually interdependent roles as critical educators and active citizens (Giroux, 2013). At the same time, it is possible for academic institutions to alienate potential 'organic intellectuals' from communities (Mayo, 2015). This can occur through the use of a type of language or behaviour that creates a gap between the researcher and the community. Consequently, this hinders the development of organic intellectuals with respect to the struggles that communities are engaged in (Mayo, 2019).

Although there is a growing interest in more critical and decolonial methods in the field of higher education, the number of publications analysing empirical cases of learning environments at universities using such methods are still very limited (Hayes et al 2021). There is still a lack of opportunities to engage with these critical competences inside university curricula and practice (Sklad et al., 2016).

In order to fill this gap, this paper proposes Theatre of the Oppressed as a methodology that fosters critical thinking, teamwork, dialoguing among different epistemologies and proposing ideas of critical sustainability based on more equitable participation in decision-making and, more importantly, the ability to identify power dynamics, co-production of knowledge and transdisciplinary work. Such competencies are crucial for developing international research projects that take into account power inequalities and aim to contribute to the scientific debate.

Developed by Boal (1985), Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) is a method, inspired by Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1971), which is particularly interesting as it approaches reality in a more complex way. In order to take into account, during fieldwork, the intersections of different variables with the object of study, TO can help embracing how we relate with reality through our emotions (Méndez de la Brena, 2021). In this regard, it is fair to claim that disembodied academic research can lead to unconscious auto-ethnographic processes (García-Santesmases Fernández, 2019). In this regard, TO proves to be a useful participatory methodology to challenge the "common sense" of the student body.