The implementation of internationalisation in Israeli teacher training colleges

Abstract

Higher education institutions worldwide are increasingly investing in ‘internationalisation’, although its meanings and measures differ significantly between contexts, countries, and institutions. This article analyses the implementation of internationalisation in three second‐tier higher education institutions specialising in teacher training programmes in Israel under an EU‐funded TEMPUS (Trans‐European Mobility Programme for University Studies) project. We show how internationalisation is implemented at these institutions, where diverse motivations, power relations, and ideas intervene. We discuss the main themes that emerged through semi‐structured interviews with the colleges’ leadership, supporting our findings with a content analysis of the colleges’ strategic plans. Our study provides new insights, revealing how the EU internationalisation agenda is interpreted locally in such settings, thereby highlighting the importance of the particular context in this process.

From teacher to senior teacher educator: exploring the teaching-research nexus in Israeli Academic Colleges of Education

“…During the interviews, the interviewees described products they developed with peers from different cultures as a source of inspiration for teacher education. This corresponds with previous sources dealing with internationalisation in higher education in general (Yemini et al 2017) and in teacher education in particular (Author 2019 Q14 ), and explains the effort that must be made by the academic institution to integrate discourse on diversity and multiculturalism as a springboard for the new generation of learning. It is possible that institutional boundaries and progress along career paths characterised the interviewees, and sharpen the potential of the agency in these issues.…”

“…On a practical level, ACE teacher educators are rewarded for their teaching positions only, and conduct research in their free time as part of the promotion requirements. This is in complete contrast to teachers from institutions of higher education, such as USE teacher educators, for whom research is an integral component of their service and remuneration (Yemini et al 2017).…”

“…Nonetheless, many Israeli ACEs still define themselves as challenged in this regard, and the factors that inhibit them include the lack of socialisation for research (Cochran-Smith et al 2020), the intra-organisational culture that does not fully support research (Hofman and Niederland 2012), and the lack of internationalisation (Yemini et al 2017). In metaphorical terms, the predominant spirit of these institutions is of a small resource-poor town compared to a large city with the facilities to produce up-to-date academic knowledge.…”

Students Shaping Internationalization in a Conflict-Ridden Society: Experiences of Israeli Teacher Education Colleges

“…Here, we show how students’ agency reflected upon the intercultural dimension, expressing their wishes and worries within their agentic role in the process. We wrote earlier (Yemini et al, 2017) how in conflicted societies, internationalization is largely perceived as an engagement between the groups in conflict, groups who are not necessarily from different countries. In other words, in Israel, students often refer to the “Other” as a member of the conflicting groups Jewish/Palestinian Arab.…”

“…Both colleges, along with five others, participated in a European Union (EU)-funded TEMPUS project aimed at developing internationalization processes on campus. TEMPUS was an EU-funded program which supported the modernization of higher education in the EU’s neighboring countries in the Western Balkans, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, North Africa, and the Middle East through bottom up developed projects in these neighboring countries with the support of EU higher education institutions (Yemini, et al, 2017). Today similar projects are executed under the Erasmus plus framework (Yemini, 2017).…”