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International Students’ Perceptions Towards their Learning Experience in an International Network Seminar in Japan: During and Post the COVID-19 Pandemic
Søndergaard, M.; Takita, F.; Van Rompay-Bartels, I. International Students’ Perceptions towards Their Learning Experience in an International Network Seminar in Japan: During and Post the COVID-19 Pandemic. Sustainability2023, 15, 8641.
Søndergaard, M.; Takita, F.; Van Rompay-Bartels, I. International Students’ Perceptions towards Their Learning Experience in an International Network Seminar in Japan: During and Post the COVID-19 Pandemic. Sustainability 2023, 15, 8641.
Cite as:
Søndergaard, M.; Takita, F.; Van Rompay-Bartels, I. International Students’ Perceptions towards Their Learning Experience in an International Network Seminar in Japan: During and Post the COVID-19 Pandemic. Sustainability2023, 15, 8641.
Søndergaard, M.; Takita, F.; Van Rompay-Bartels, I. International Students’ Perceptions towards Their Learning Experience in an International Network Seminar in Japan: During and Post the COVID-19 Pandemic. Sustainability 2023, 15, 8641.
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has struck educational experience systems around the globe. This paper investigates and evaluates the student participants’ perceptions who joined the international exchange seminar on global citizenship and peace held at a University in Hiroshima, Japan. Approximately seventy students and faculty members from nine to ten different universities from around the globe joined this summer program in August 2021 (online) and 2022 (face-to-face). This study is a mixed-method study. The first part consists of a quantitative analysis of BEVI data obtained from the students in the seminar before COVID-19 and after. The research concludes that there are no changes in the way students learn. The second part consists of qualitative data. This data shows the perceptions of students of online teaching versus hybrid teaching. It compares the differences in participants’ perceptions reported in students’ feedback on the programs during and post-COVID-19. Our results confirm prominent differences exist in the students’ perceptions of their learning experience during the pre-pandemic and post-pandemic periods. The findings of this study suggest that universities need to strive and define a meaning and purpose of international seminars, which enables students to experience a high level of intercultural social interaction face-to-face.
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
