Dr. Eva Maria Vögtle

This presentation outlines selected findings and conclusions from a study that compares and contrasts the 6th Global Survey on Internationalisation of Higher Education by the International Association of Universities (IAU) with findings from the qualitative INDISTRA project which focuses on digital transformation strategies in German higher education. The key topics of this presentation are the main drivers, priorities and challenges associated with virtual internationalization.

This session presents the key findings of the INDISTRA project. INDISTRA is a project funded by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) with a duration from December 2021 to January 2025. The research agenda of the INDISTRA project focuses on the question of how internationalisation is understood and managed by universities as a digitally supported development opportunity and what goals, opportunities and risks universities associate with digitalisation in this context. The aim of the project is to determine the strategic perspective of universities and their committees and organisational units responsible for internationalisation.

The scoping review conducted in the context of the project Internationalization in the Digital Transformation – INDISTRA, analyses 45 scientific journal articles published in English between June 2017 and June 2022. The study draws on international scientific literature to trace the evidence available on the intersections between covid-driven digitization and its systematic integration into the internationalization strategies of higher education institutions. The focus of the scoping review lies on teaching and learning, cooperation, administration, and decision-making processes.

The war in Ukraine has not only ushered in a "turning point" in military terms. This conflict also has far-reaching consequences for academic mobility and transnational academic cooperation - both for strategies and concepts in international research and academic policy and for research on academic exchange and multilateral cooperation between universities. In a joint workshop with representatives of science exchange organisations, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the Federal Foreign Office, parliamentarians and scientists, we discuss these consequences for science and politics.

The governance of higher education and science, understood as coordination and decision-making mechanisms, faces the challenge of increasingly taking social values into account. Societal values such as justice, equality or sustainability are brought to universities and research institutions by a wide range of stakeholders. This leads to value orientations external to science finding their way into evaluation processes and even into the design of scientific agendas via the way governance processes are conducted. Current approaches see universities as prototypes of evolutionary organisations consisting of self-managing teams that are responsive to societal values.

In many countries across the globe scholars report an over representation of women in TSM (e.g. Hurst 2019; Salisbury et al. 2010; Shirley 2006; Simpson and Bailey 2020; Thirolf 2014; Tompkins et al. 2017 Van Mol 2021, Holloway et al. 2012, Sondhi and King 2017). Gender roles are key to explain this imbalance: educational performance, interest profiles, labour market orientation and anticipated discrimination differ between girls and boys, women and men and lead to more female students going abroad. As societal gender roles vary across countries (Guo & Gilbert 2012), the gender specific motivation to study abroad could also depend on the country’s gender (in)equality.

While the important role of institutions and trust for economic transactions is well-acknowledged in institutional economics, the effects of appropriate institutions, historical legacies, and cultural similarities such as language and religion has not yet been systematically analysed in research on transnational student mobility. In our research, we analyse the phenomenon of transnational student mobility by combining and testing aspects of these different perspectives. We focus on outbound students and analyse what determines whether a particular country receives a high proportion of international students.

While the important role of institutions and trust for economic transactions is well-acknowledged in institutional economics, the effects of appropriate institutions, historical legacies, and cultural similarities such as language and religion has not yet been systematically analysed in research on transnational student mobility. In our research, we analyse the phenomenon of transnational student mobility by combining and testing aspects of these different perspectives. We focus on outbound students and analyse what determines whether a particular country receives a high proportion of international students.

While the important role of institutions and trust for economic transactions is a well-acknowledged in institutional economics, the effects of appropriate institutions, historical legacies, and cultural similarities such as language and religion has not yet been systematically analysed in research on transnational student mobility. In our research, we start from the assumption that the more functional institutions of potential host countries are, the more attractive they are for foreign students. Using aggregate data, we focus on the attributes of countries and the relationship between them to explain patterns of international student exchange.

In the 2018 Bologna Process Implementation Report, consitutional and legal protection of academic freedom has been monitored; however, given the obvious discrepancies between law and practice in some EHEA countries, a purely legal analysis risks capturing a misleading picture if a country's de facto situation is not assessed against it. The paper to be presented is concerned with the impact of the Bologna Process on the de facto state of academic freedom. Thus we analyze not only whether countries have provisions for the protection of academic freedom in place, but also use the Academic Freedom Index (AFI) and its components to assess the actual state of academic freedom in the sampled countries.

Having seen academic freedom challenged in some European Higher Education Area (EHEA) member countries, the protection of academic freedom is high on the Bologna Processes’ agenda until recently. The paper presented is concerned with the de facto state of academic freedom in the participating countries, given the obvious discrepancies between law and practice in some EHEA countries. In addition to monitoring constitutional and legal protection of academic freedom, the academic freedom index (AFi) and its components sre used to assess the actual state of academic freedom in the sampled countries. The lack of the students' perspective is also discussed.

Which role does institutional fragility or stability play for the attractiveness of a country as study destination? How does this interact with socio-economic conditions? Is homophily between countries still influential for transnational student mobility if we analyze a global sample without any pre-selection of countries? Are colonial ties between countries still influential for the direction and intensity of student exchange networks?