IADIS

Focus on International Higher Education

Perth (AU), September 2012 - Technology like transport, communication, and media-based learning have increased the ambitions to make education more global and international. Higher education has gradually felt more affinity towards the exchange of students. Diversity and the study of different cultures have been identified as components of the educational road map for the coming decades. These and other topics will be discussed at the IADIS International Conference on International Higher Education from 28 - 30 November 2012, in Perth, Australia.




An initial target is developing the motivation for international higher education to promote students' mindset towards different cultures, languages, and traditions. The second step is to encourage students to learn multi-cultural contexts and later to aspire to careers that involve cooperation in international teams. As an inevitable side effect, universities welcome international students as source of both income and a diverse spectrum of knowledge and skills. To be more precise, students will take part of their courses abroad, and they should be matched by a similar number of incoming students in order to establish a balance in the programmes.

This conference aims at developing the scientific, pragmatic and policy awareness among scholars who face the direct need to make their curricula more culturally fair. European exchange programs like Erasmus Mundus, the U.S. Council on International Educational Student Exchange, and the Euro-American "Atlantis" program all envisage an urgent agenda on how to balance local needs with more global criteria in higher education.