Roles of International Teachers in the Internationalization of Chinese Higher Education: A Comparative Perspective

In the context of economic globalization, cultural exchanges are becoming more and more frequent, and more and more international teachers come to China to teach. Using qualitative data collected from a university in Beijing, this study explored the international teachers’ roles perceived by school administrators, students, and international teachers in the internationalization of Chinese higher education. Results indicate that international teachers play an important role in promoting higher education internationalization in China by serving as the backbones of the teaching process. They also act as walking billboards of internationalization and bridges facilitating communication with international students. However, the cognitive differences between international teachers and students regarding teaching, coupled with administrators’ lack of understanding of international teachers’ professional needs, hinder the teachers from fulfilling their roles and seeking continuing development. This study provides a new analytical perspective on the role of international teachers, exploring their role from the perspectives of students, school administrators and international teachers themselves, presenting practical recommendations to enhance international teachers’ roles and providing suggestions such as cooperation model between international teachers and domestic teachers for future research, which may help managers of high education institutions to find the reason why they should introduce many international teachers and what kind of kind of teachers they should introduce to develop education internationalization.