Transnational teacher educators in internationalised higher education in the Arabian Gulf

Abstract

ABSTRACT This interpretive study contributes to an understanding of the work and beliefs of transnational teacher educators in diverse international contexts. Due to their influence on the development of future teachers in their host country, and the influence of those future teachers on future generations of learners, transnational university-based teacher educators are a particularly significant, yet understudied, group of mobile academics. The study investigates, through in-depth interviews and a selection task about preferred conceptions of teaching, how ten transnational teacher educators experience and conceive of their work in higher education in the Arabian Gulf cities of Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, and Dubai. Despite diverse international backgrounds, participants in this study express common critically reflective, constructivist, and sociocultural conceptions of their work as teacher educators who are preparing future teachers to work in transformed schools in a region engaged in ongoing educational reform. They report that they explicitly model active, learning-centred strategies while coaching future teachers. They believe that their work is important for national capacity building, although they would welcome greater involvement in educational planning. They are cognisant of local cultural considerations, while noting pedagogical challenges around teaching students through English as the medium of instruction in higher education in the Gulf. This study yields understanding and provides implications for professional development and orientation programmes for transnational teacher educators migrating to work in such internationalised settings.