Benefits and Challenges of Transnational Education: Reflections From a Sino-British Joint Venture University

Abstract

Since the turn of the 21st Century, the higher education sector has witnessed a proliferation of transnational education arrangements, including joint venture universities. Concurrently, there has been a surge in published literature on transnational higher education. While the current literature on transnational education explores various issues including with respect to regulation, management, quality assurance, and impact, there is a deficit of lived accounts of the benefits and challenges of transnational education from teacher perspectives and pedagogic tools used to deal with language and learning culture differences in transnational education settings. Based on the author’s own experience in a Sino-British joint venture university in China, this paper draws on in-class observations, reviews of seminar recordings, informal conversations with students, and anecdotal reflections to highlight the potential of using student audio podcasts to mitigate oral reticence and increase interactions in lectures and seminars.