Virtual Internationalization to Support Comprehensive Internationalization in Higher Education

The study develops and presents a concept of Virtual Internationalization (VI) in higher education, which refers to internationalization implemented using information and communications technology (ICT). VI is contextualized with the inclusiveness of international experiences and with external challenges to internationalization (posed, for example, by the Covid-19 pandemic). Conceived as an institution-spanning concept, VI is developed from the ACE-CIGE model of Comprehensive Internationalization. It is inferred from actual practice based on a content analysis of conference abstracts from relevant fields, employing coding and computer-assisted text analysis (CATA). Based on the findings, the VI concept includes strategies and articulated institutional commitment as a transversal category and online and distance education (ODE) as an additional category in contrast to the concept of Comprehensive Internationalization. This research furthermore considers two dimensions of VI: one that is directly internationalization-related and the other concerned with broader aims of the combination of the virtual and the international. It concludes with a perspective on a “new normal” of hybrid internationalization in higher education.