University Staff and the Internationalization of Higher Education in Australia and South Korea : A Critical Realist Scoping Study

Abstract: Though more recognition has been placed on the cruciality of university staff in their roles supporting the internationalization of higher education (HE), research-based understandings of micro level engagement have been largely neglected. This critical realist scoping study explores the extent of peer-reviewed articles published between 2017 and 2022 regarding university staff experiences and perceptions of internationalization in Australian and South Korean HE. A total of 34 relevant articles were found using a systematic approach to data collection. The findings confirm previous studies which demonstrate that internationalization research largely focuses on the perspectives and experiences of academic staff while non-academic staff and HE leadership and management are under-researched. Six dimensions of internationalization were represented, with ‘Teaching, Supervising, and Supporting Students’ being the most-researched across the body of literature overall and the ‘Internationalization of the Curriculum’ and ‘English-Medium Instruction Practice and Policy’ the most-researched in Australia and Korea respectively. The review also brought up several conceptual issues. While all university staff research participants in the Korean HE context were explicitly defined based on their nationality, ethnicity, and/or cultural background, university staff participants in the Australian HE context were often not described beyond their occupation. However, the majority of articles researching staff interactions with international students in the Australian HE context did include descriptions of national, ethnic, and/or cultural background. Additionally, the authors of the selected articles in both contexts rarely disclosed their own subjectivity and connection to the topic being researched. This study has illuminated the need for future research on the perspectives and experiences of all university staff in relation to internationalization and argues for future research that acknowledges the positionality of the researcher and the complexity of the identity of its participants.