ABSTRACT

There are a handful of programmes in higher education that offer students a joint international study programme and research shows that students have certain levels of anxiety when starting studying in such graduate programmes. This study aimed to explore levels of student anxiety and investigates the prerequisite skills in order to better prepare students for studying in an international Master programme of Marine Biological Resources with 10 European campuses in seven countries. We applied mixed-methods including online questionnaires and interviews capturing student experiences and teachers’ perspectives. Results show that especially mature and non-native English-speaking students experience anxiety and that there is a high class-heterogeneity in terms of academic background and life experience. This may simultaneously act as a barrier for and enable learning. The presented results show a need to improve the student acculturation process in international programmes. This could be done by better communicating expectations and by providing resources for social, methodological, and pedagogical skills. More specific strategies are a) prerequisite courses that use quantitative measurements as the most significant causes of anxiety, b) educators to better state what a good practice of learning in their course is, c) mixing local and international students in courses i.e. groupwork or other class interactivity.

摘要

高等教育中有少数课程为学生提供联合国际学习计划和研究表明，学生在开始学习此类研究生课程时会有一定程度的焦虑。本研究旨在探索学生的焦虑水平并调查必备技能，以便更好地为学生在七个国家的 10 个欧洲校区学习海洋生物资源国际硕士课程做好准备。我们采用了混合方法，包括在线问卷调查和访谈，捕捉学生的经验和教师的观点。结果表明，特别是成熟和非英语母语的学生会感到焦虑，并且在学术背景和生活经历方面存在高度的阶级异质性。这可能同时成为学习的障碍并使学习成为可能。所呈现的结果表明需要改进学生在国际课程中的文化适应过程。这可以通过更好地传达期望以及为社会、方法和教学技能提供资源来实现。更具体的策略是 a) 使用定量测量作为焦虑的最重要原因的先决课程，b) 教育工作者更好地说明在他们的课程中学习的良好实践是什么，c) 在课程中混合本地和国际学生，即小组合作或其他课堂互动。