Defining the Scholar-Practitioner in International Higher Education: Context, Potential, and Future Prospects

• In Event: Internationalizing U.S. Higher Education Through Student and Scholar Mobility

Abstract

International higher education involves many different activities, players, institutions, and realities today. A wide range of stakeholders participate in making international higher education, in all its diverse forms, possible. However, when we look closely, two distinct categories emerge: those who ‘do it’ and those who ‘study it’ – the practitioners and the scholars. Practitioners are often viewed as those who work daily in the expanding professional management of international education, while scholars are viewed as those who conduct research and publish scholarly reflections on the phenomenon of international education. We give these categories separate names but the dichotomy is overly simplistic: it excludes those scholar-practitioners who engage in both kinds of activity. There are many who, by the very nature of their work in international higher education, bridge both areas. It is these bridge builders this presentation defines and profiles. The discussion is based on essays on the notion of the scholar-practitioner by a wide range of experts in international higher education for a forthcoming book (Symposium Press) co-edited by the presenter.

Author

• Bernhard Thomas Streitwieser, The George Washington University