Remote International Student to Remote Teacher

The aim of this chapter is to reflect on the experience of designing teaching and learning training for international graduate student teaching assistants (ITAs) during the pandemic, which caused a move to remote teaching. This chapter is particularly important for educational researchers who have an interest in supporting international teaching assistants as well as domestic teaching assistants. The chapter is divided into five sections. In the first section the authors describe their background and previous experience and their aim for designing the training itself. The authors will include the training design in the second section. The third section will lay out the challenges that the authors identified. The fourth section will contain the lessons learned from this experience and the resulting best practices. Finally, the fifth section will include the future directions.

LEARNING THE “LANGUAGE” OF MOTHERHOOD AS INTERNATIONAL GRADUATE STUDENTS

As international students seek degrees in U.S. institutions of higher education, their role as students is forefronted and recognizable by faculty and peers. However, what often remains invisible are international students' social and personal experiences during academic study abroad. Although there is a great deal of feminist research on academic identity and motherhood, almost nothing has been written regarding the experiences of international women who become mothers while pursuing graduate studies in the U.S. This poetic ethnographic study focuses on the lived experiences of eleven international graduate student first-time mothers from Chinese mainland and Taiwan who became new mothers during their programs of study in the U.S., especially how they kept learning their ongoing, dynamic, multifaceted, and embodied “language” of motherhood through various kinds of social interactions, and among divergent practices, beliefs, and cultures. This article explores how poetic inquiry can contribute to the understanding of international graduate student mothers’ experiences as a social, cultural, and educational phenomenon. This article also discusses the issues of ethics and self-reflexivity of conducting poetic inquiry research.

Embrace the Uncontrolled Nature of Poetry Writing: A Poetic Ethnographic Study on International Graduate Student Mothers’ Intercultural Discourses

Through presenting a series of poetry findings from a larger poetic ethnographic study on the lived experience of 11 international graduate student first-time mothers’ learning of the “language” of motherhood during their journey of pregnancy, birth, and early years of motherhood, this article reflects on the uncontrolled nature of poetry writing in an ethnographic study and discusses the long-lasting concerns on the quality, qualification, and criteria for evaluation associated with poetic inquiry and arts-based research in general. I aim to provide methodological insights for the use and evaluation of poetic inquiry, as well as other forms of arts-based research in academia.

Reflections of an international graduate student in a North American Communication Department

This essay examines various aspects of my intellectual experience as an international graduate student studying in a North American university grappling with questions of postcolonial life in Africa. Specifically, I examine the intellectual tensions of dealing with the underdeveloped questions of colonialism in communication theory. The article draws on work calling for the de-Westernization and decolonization of communication theory. While the call for decentering ‘academic Eurocentrism’ is important, it is pertinent not to erect another epistemic fundamentalism in its place. Overall, the article calls attention to epistemic plurality and why communication scholarship needs to seriously consider what Comaroff and Comaroff (2012) call ‘Theory from the South’.

International Graduate Student Labor as Mergers and Acquisitions

This study critically examines the self-reported experiences of international graduate students using a framework understanding internationalization as acquisitions and mergers. Students reported positive experiences with their advisors. However, students’ accounts of laboratories and other research settings were diverse, ranging from co-contributors to knowledge and respected collaborators to employed cheap labor that their advisors depended upon for their own gains. In some cases, these students feared that their funding would be cut off or dismissed from the program (and consequently deported from the US) if they challenged their advisors. Whether such apprehensions were valid is unknown as this study focused on perceptions of the students only. The findings do lead to important future directions for research and practice.

Speaking in Tongues: Can International Graduate Students Read International Graduate Admissions Materials?

A recent Educational Testing Services report (2016) found that international graduate students with a TOEFL score of 80—the minimum average TOEFL score for graduate admission in the United States—usually possess reading subscores of 20, equating to a 12th-grade reading comprehension level. However, one public flagship university’s international graduate student admissions instructions are written at a 17th-grade reading comprehension level, or, a 27-30 band on the reading section of the TOEFL. This study seeks to answer the question, “Do U.S. graduate programs compose admissions materials at unreadable levels compared to these programs’ minimum reading comprehension levels for international graduate student admission?” Findings reveal average public flagship international graduate student admissions materials are written above 15th-grade reading comprehension levels, with select flagships composing these materials at 19th grade reading levels. Implications for practitioners and policymakers, as well as areas of future research, are addressed.