Quantity or quality in internationalization of higher education?
In an effort to secure public attention, and possibly funding, attention of Higher Education management seems to focus on quantitative aspects. Although accreditation still plays an important role in informing the public about the quality of higher education, rankings have gained a lot of attention over the past few years.
Measuring the quality of internationalization of education in quantitative data is not necessarily a negative development, as it will hopefully limit the endless speculations of the benefits of internationalization in higher education and produce some real evidence. But it seems to me that we have lost sight of the principle brought up by Einstein: not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted counts.
What is the use of sending out 20% more students than last year if we are not sure what the impact of their study abroad is on the learning outcomes of our students? Or why would you want to increase the number of incoming foreign students by 250 to create more international classrooms, if you do not define the expected effects and measure the actual impact they have on the quality of education, the income of the higher education institution or the intercultural competences of local students?
A mere increase in numbers can never be the main aim of our internationalization efforts as internationalization is not a core goal of a higher education institution. The core goals are education, research and, possibly, a third mission (contribution to society). Therefore, the really interesting facts are not the numbers related to internationalization, but what they imply or lead to in terms of the core goals.
Still, it appears to be difficult to define the real aims of internationalization in terms of student learning outcomes, quality of education or research, or even increased income or reputation. Is internationalization effective? Or are we only interested in efficiency: showing increasing numbers in any internationalization activity while decreasing our input in terms of finances or staff hours to the absolute minimum as is required during difficult economic times?
According to initiatives like AHELO, MINT and the Quality label of the NVAO there is, in fact, a growing interest in qualitative data in higher education and therefore in internationalization. Now more than ever is the time to look at the impact rather than the output of internationalization. As budgets are being cut, internationalization will not only have to proof its validity, but will also have to be reorganized to maintain or even increase the impact with a smaller budget. The keyword is effectiveness rather than efficiency.
Culture seems to be an important factor in the focus on quantity or quality. In cultures where individual success and efficiency are highly valued there seems to be a higher interest in quantitative data. However, cultures where success is measured in terms of long-term effectiveness and impact seem to take more interest in qualitative data. But of course this is no black-and-white situation. Usually both types of data are used to complement each other.
Still, this difference does lead to a lot of debate which is usually not based on facts but rather on values. This makes it almost impossible to decide which party is winning the debate. At the EAIE in Nantes last week, four people took up the challenge to debate to their best abilities in favour or opposed to rankings in Higher Education. Winner of the debate was the couple debating in favour of rankings. However, winning was not based on the internal convictions of the voters but on how they valued the debating skills of the performers. Is this symbolic for the value of rankings in general? Are they valued for the way they present data in an easy-to-digest manner rather than for the value attached to the data itself, let alone for the conclusions that could be drawn from them?