African students in Brazilian universities: the challenges of internationalization at home in university daily life

• Autor(a) principal: da Cunha, Maria Isabel
• Data de Publicação: 2017
• Outros Autores: Volpato, Gildo, Rocha, Maria Aparecida Marques, Pinto, Marinalva Moog
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Educação
• Texto Completo: https://revistaseletronicas.pucrs.br/ojs/index.php/faced/article/view/24240
• topic: Internationalization. Higher Education. African students.; Internacionalização. Educação Superior. Estudantes africanos.; Internacionalización. Educación Superior. Estudiantes africanos.

The objective of this research was to understand the internationalization process in higher education and its impacts, considering the presence of African students in two Brazilian universities. The approach of the research was qualitative and a questionnaire has been applied with students, as well as a semi-structured interview made with the managing board. Among the reasons to study in Brazil, some of them stand out such as: a bigger acknowledgement of a foreign diploma, also a professional formation differential and improvement in the labor force inclusion. As challenges, they highlight the adaptation to linguistic variations and writing, including their difficulty with contents they had not been exposed to. They revealed they intend to return to Angola in order to help with their country’s reconstruction, since that nation faced a civil war for 30 years. The managers revealed to be aware of the institutional strategies for internationalization, emphasizing sustainability and institutional actions dissemination as ways to give more visibility and turn the institutional image stronger. They support this process, hosting and sheltering those students and mention the social, cultural and academic values that come up from these experiences.