Marta A. Shaw

Students who attend our colleges and universities increasingly reflect national and global diversity. These students arrive on campus with different lived histories, cultural contexts, languages, faiths, and educational experiences. However, relatively little is written and understood about how to engage student diversity within higher education classrooms. It is important for faculty to design and facilitate classes in ways that utilize and engage diversity as an integral part of intellectual and professional development. Engaging diversity within classrooms can assist in developing intercultural competence which is centered on the ability of a person to engage and communicate respectfully with another so that they have the benefit of another person’s cultural perspectives. When developed, intercultural competence produces the ability to effectively communicate and form relationships with persons who are different than us, and to identify, interpret, understand, appreciate and utilize what is learned in new ways. Developing intercultural competence requires a process approach so that students are provided with regular opportunities to engage in intercultural interactions that are intellectually relevant to the course and to students’ future capacity to live and work in diverse settings. This volume focuses on the relevant literature, theories, and practices that enable faculty to engage diversity within the classroom in ways that develop student intercultural competence.

As governments and reformers attempt to forge a new identity for European universities, they contend with decades of research showing that reforms of higher education institutions are notoriously difficult to institute, and they usually fail. What may be seen as a historic exception to this pattern is the Humboldtian impulse for an unusually quick, deep, and lasting transformation of European universities. The aim of this paper is to propose a systems perspective of Humboldtian reforms based on the writings of another great German scholar, Niklas Luhmann (1986, 1995, 2009). The authors argue that far from being a reform, Humboldt’s accomplishment consisted in the naming and application of an institutional identity, which persists in European universities to this day and once again requires to be named and applied. In the higher education literature of the past two decades, the ideas of Wilhelm von Humboldt rarely come up in any context other than forecasting their demise. The model of higher education known as Humboldtian is frequently designated an atavism of a bygone era, mismatched with the demands of the information age (Renaut, 2006; Tavoletti, 2010; Pechar, 2012). The three pillars of Humboldt’s concept of the university – the unity of teaching and research, academic self-governance, and the pursuit of truth for its own sake – are under siege. Universities organized after Humboldt’s model have been caught in a crossfire of increasingly massified higher education systems and the demands of a knowledge-based economy at a time of a declining welfare state (Clark, 1997; Schimank, 2000; Krücken, 2003; Schimank, 2009). Yet studies of academic staff confirm that despite the environmental forces embattling Humboldt’s model, political pressures to do away with it, and organizational arrangements that make its realization impossible, Humboldtian tenets still form the core of organizational identity for many universities organized or reformed according to the model. For academics, Humboldt is the rallying cry against forces of massification and academic capitalism. Despite pressures to the contrary, what the German reformer stands for is not only alive and well, but flying on the banners of academics in Germany (Krücken, 2003), Austria (Pechar, 2012), the Czech Republic (Pabian et al., 2011), Italy (Tavoletti, 2010), and Poland (Shaw, 2012). Even though the Humboldtian model is considered outdated, it is proving difficult if not impossible to uproot as the dominant cognitive scheme of European universities. Why, then, has this particular model succeeded in the domain where today’s attempts at reform seem doomed to fail? To answer this question, the authors of this paper propose a theoretical lens that has only recently been applied to institutions of higher education (Lenartowicz, 2013), namely the concept of a social system's autopoiesis. The term, coined by two systems biologists, Humberto Maturana and Francesco Varela (Maturana, 2002, 2010; Maturana & Varela, 2010), describes a basic operational principle that differentiates any living system from artificially created machines. The principle is one of continuous, recursive self-production as the fundamental process that governs a system’s activities. Such self-production requires constant exchange with the environment, but the blueprint according to which the system organizes itself and obtains resources from the environment is its own creation. To employ an illustrative metaphor, the “shopping list” of a living system is predefined by its specific identity, not by the environment’s “shop window”. What rules the exchange between a living system and its environment is thus the system’s autopoiesis – its recursive self-production. The term made its way to social sciences mainly through the works of Niklas Luhmann (1986, 1995, 2009), who conceptualized the organization as an autopoietic social system. Luhmann’s theory developed within the field of organization sciences (e.g. Seidl, 2004, 2005, 2009; Seidl & Becker, 2006; Magalhães & Sanchez, 2009; Lenartowicz, 2013) suggests that within an organization, only such change is easily adopted that is compatible with the root identity. On that basis, the authors of this study pose the hypothesis that von Humboldt’s reform was lasting and effective because it was not a reform, but rather a reaffirmation of the root identity of European universities in a new context. This identity consists in a disinterested pursuit of truth undertaken by a community that unites teaching and research in the context of autonomous self-governance. The authors demonstrate how the notions of the pursuit of truth, the unity of teaching and research, and academic self-governance were recursively self-produced in both medieval and Humboldtian universities, and how they continue as the constitutive “myth” of European universities - “far away from their organizational realities while at the same time constituting their chosen…

Drawing on contemporary research in neurobiology, the author of this article questions the Enlightenment notion of a separation between emotions and the intellect, investigating the implications of research findings for the training of educational leaders. The author analyzes three influential metaphors of the human mind as a chariot, car and rider of an undomesticated elephant, setting them side by side with current knowledge of the brain as a synchronized whole devoid of a central processor. Instinctual aspects of human functioning are presented as biological algorithms responsible for the success of Homo Sapiens as species, but also for behaviors in the current civilizational context that run counter to human well-being. The understanding and regulation of emotional aspects of human functioning are key challenges for the future of the human species on earth. The author contends that liberation from the illusion of rationality can and should begin with educational leaders.

Europejskie uniwersytety znalazły się pod presją reform, których celem jest uczynienie z nich instrumentów rozwoju społecznego i gospodarczego przy jednoczesnym zniesieniu statusu uczelni wyższych jako instytucji buforowanych społecznie. Celem artykułu jest zbadanie hipotezy, że napięcia i niekonsekwencje w dotychczasowych reformach szkolnictwa wyższego w Polsce mają swoje źródła w podstawowym konflikcie między instytucjonalną a instrumentalną wizją uczelni wyższej. Wyniki badań wskazują na przecinanie się „zracjonalizowanych mitów”, które zamykają sektor szkolnictwa wyższego w „gorsecie” odbieranym przez interesariuszy bardziej jako powrót do komunistycznej przeszłości niż droga ku lepszej przyszłości. Wyniki te, rozpatrywane z punktu widzenia teorii systemów drugiej fali, podważają założenie, iż historyczna instytucja uniwersytetu może zostać przekształcona w instrument służący realizacji priorytetów państwa dzięki zrównoważonej polityce nagród i kar.

Since the launch of the Lisbon Agenda, European higher education
systems have gravitated towards a common policy blueprint for governance that concentrates power in the hands of executive authorities and increases accountability to external stakeholders. The Polish system remains an outlier, providing an informative case study of a clash between European pressures and local path dependencies. The objective of this study was to investigate the forces that lodge the Polish system of higher education between the market and academic oligarchy, utilizing the lens of Burton Clark’s (1986. The Higher Education System: Academic Organization in Cross-national Perspective. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press) typology of governance. The author sought to uncover and compare the conceptualizations of governance held by two most powerful groups of higher education stakeholders. Findings indicate a stalemate of values between accountability to public interest and the independence of the academic order from short-term political interests. Conclusions from this study can inform reform efforts in contexts where externally legitimated blueprints for reform in higher education converge with social realities belying the blueprints’ inherent assumptions.

European universities have come under reform pressures to make them instruments of social and economic development, compromising their earlier status as socially buffered institutions. The aim of this paper was to investigate the hypothesis that tensions and inconsistencies in recent higher education reforms in Poland trace back to a fundamental conflict between institutional and instrumental visions of the university. Findings suggest an intersection of "rationalized myths" that locks the university sector in a "corset" experienced by stakeholders more like a return to the Soviet past than the way of a better future. Seen through the lens of second-order systems theory, these findings problematize the assumption that the historically grounded institution of the university can be reoriented as an instrument for achieving state priorities with a mere balance of carrots and state-of-the-art sticks.

Development of intercultural skills is recognized as an essential outcome of a college education, but in order to facilitate students’ growth effectively, we must understand the points of the developmental journey at which students enter the college classroom. This study tests four hypotheses developed on the basis of leading models of intercultural development in relation to first-year students’ levels of maturity, attitudes towards difference, capacity for productive interaction, and emotions experienced in the face of difference.

To test the hypotheses, we collected written narratives on a formative encounter with difference from 414 incoming students at the University of Minnesota. Each narrative was coded for an initial, intermediate or advanced stage of intercultural development, as well as for the outcomes of the interaction and emotions experienced in the course of the encounter. Findings indicate that: 1) Only 21% of respondents display evidence of ethnorelative thinking; 2) The majority report very positive attitudes towards difference, but show evidence of veiled detachment and minimization; 3) There is no difference in reports of productive interaction between those who do and do not display mindfulness; 4) The emotions experienced at various stages of intercultural maturity do not yield a pattern of increasing comfort. We conclude that the points at which our students begin their intercultural journey may differ slightly from what is suggested by leading developmental models, and recommend adjusting the starting point of programming aimed at supporting intercultural competence development in college.

Integrity in research is fundamental to the advancement of knowledge, for the public’s support of research, and the autonomy of the academic profession. Misconduct in the forms of fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism introduces error and misrepresentation into the scientific record. This chapter reviews the history of research integrity and misconduct in the United States, as well as the nature and prevalence of misconduct. It then turns to factors associated with misconduct and efforts to promote integrity, which include policy and regulation, normative pressure, codes of conduct, training, and mentoring.

Efforts to develop coherent indicators to compare higher education systems in Europe open up the possibility for researchers and practitioners alike to escape nationalistic tunnel vision. This article argues that to realize the potential of its new tools, the field of international higher education must go beyond a synchronic and passive analysis of higher education systems. For the field to have real impact, it must heed the call of its founding father to “pursue the things that work” (Clark, 2007, p. 319). With this aim in mind, the present article briefly traces the landscape of governance change in European higher education and critically assesses emerging pathways of future research.

Academic staff in Ukraine face a convergence of institutional and professional pressures precipitated by a national economic crisis, projected declines in enrolment and dramatic changes to institutional procedures as institutions implement the Bologna Process. This article examines the extent to which these pressures are reshaping the way academic staff engage in their day-to-day work, their careers and their role in their university. Findings indicate that faculty are caught in a confluence of conflicting demands that elicits adaptive coping strategies and threatens to undermine national efforts to modernise Ukraine’s higher education system.

Problems with authorship are complicated enough in domestic research, but they can be particularly thorny in the context of international scientific collaborations. Whether authorship disagreements are more common in international or domestic research is an open question, but some aspects of cross-national collaboration do complicate authorship decisions. This article reports on authorship problems faced by scientists involved in international research based on on a series 10 focus groups and 60 interviews with scientists in the U.S. (and a few outside the U.S.) who are involved in cross-national research collaborations.

The growing influence of the Bologna Process on higher education around the world has raised concerns about the applicability of this set of reforms in diverse cultural contexts. Ukraine provides an instructive case study highlighting the dynamics occurring at the convergence of the new framework with a state-centered model of higher education. The goal of this study was to examine the professional identity of faculty at one Ukrainian university and their perceptions regarding the implementation of Bologna at their institution. We found that
instructional and institutional innovations were successfully implemented only to the extent that they were integrated with the existing pattern of values and beliefs held by faculty. These findings provide insight for how other countries may approach Bologna compatibility in the presence of social and cultural forces divergent from those in which the Bologna process originated.

Encouraged by their institutions and governments and aided by advances in technology and communication, researchers increasingly pursue international collaborations with high hopes for scientific breakthroughs, intellectual stimulation, access to research equipment and populations, and the satisfaction of global engagement. International Research Collaborations considers what can and does go wrong in cross-national research collaborations, and how scientists can avoid these problems in order to create and sustain productive, mutually-enriching partnerships. This chapter outlines cross-national differences in the training of scientists that may pose challenges for collaboration.

The reforms of Polish higher education in the 1990s lent support to the notion that that national systems are converging towards a common model (Gibbons et al., 1997). Post-socialist reform was openly inspired by the model of a market-oriented university, and other policies were expected to follow along the same trajectory, especially since Poland adopted the Bologna Process (Dobbins, 2011). Yet such market-oriented reforms have not occurred in the vital area of public university governance. The persistence a model of “academic oligarchy” (Clark, 1983) was not altered by Poland’s adoption of the Bologna Process or its integration into trans-European networks favoring a market-oriented paradigm. Government and university leaders agree that the current governance of Polish universities is ineffective, but they do not agree what policies to adopt in response. A deepening public perception of a crisis in higher education has emboldened the current market-liberal government to pursue reform, but no significant change has occurred to date (Kwiek, in press).

The purpose of this research study is to examine 1) why the governance of public universities in Poland has not undergone serious reform since the post-communist transformation; and 2) what are the criteria that determine which future governance reforms are likely to be accepted by major groups of higher education stakeholders.

This research study is rooted in the notion that successful policy is a balanced product of technical feasibility and political viability (Patton and Sawicki, 1986). In the context of globalization, perceptions of feasibility and viability emerge from the tension of world culture – the policy trends considered as definitive in the global arena (Arnove, 1980); and path dependence – the trajectory set by past decisions and commitments (Pierson, 2000). While current European trends emphasize marketization and accountability, older traditions, such as Humboldtian and post-Soviet legacies, offer competing narratives about the role of universities and ways in which they should be governed. This research offers to produce a cross-sectional view of the factors that shape how various higher education stakeholders in Poland construct their notions of good governance.

With an official adoption of the Bologna process in 2005, Ukraine has committed itself to bringing its higher education in line with European standards. As recent studies have shown, the results remain patchy, and implementation efforts have been complicated by significant differences in the organizational path dependence of Ukrainian universities as compared to their Western counterparts (Shaw, Chapman & Rumyantseva, 2011). This paper analyzes the extent to which mixed results of recent Europeanization efforts stem from inconsistent implementation of the Bologna process, and the extent to which they are related to fundamental differences between the models of higher education governance in Ukraine and the countries where the Bologna process originated. Using an emergent analytical framework for the cross-country comparison of higher education governance (Dobbins, Knill & Vögtle, 2011), the author examines how the Soviet governance legacy and the new push for Europeanization intersect in the Ukrainian system of higher education, in ways that are both productive and detrimental, to shape institutional structures of the university, patterns of control and evaluation, and relations to the state and society. The paper concludes with three alternative scenarios of the future development of Ukrainian higher education and draws four recommendations for future reform efforts that take heed of path-dependent trajectories.

Journals typically specify criteria for authorship, and institutional and national codes of ethics provide guidance. Unfortunately, however, authorship disputes and inappropriate assignment of authorship persist, with particular challenges arising in the context of international collaborations. This presentation was based on empirical evidence from a national study of integrity issues in international research collaborations.

University instructional staff in Ukraine face a convergence of institutional and professional pressures precipitated by a national economic crisis, projected declines in enrollment, and dramatic changes to curricula and institutional procedures as the Government adopts the Bologna process. The goal of this study was to examine the extent to which these pressures are reshaping the way instructional staff view their day-to-day work, their careers, and their role in their university.

This qualitative study involved semi-structured interviews with instructional staff and administrators at a flagship university outside the capital city.

Using an emergent theoretical framework combining the concept of a double bind and Weaver’s notion of a hypocrisy trap, the authors identify three paradoxes faced by instructional staff. Faculty experience increasing pressure to do research, but their remuneration is based on teaching; they face new professional demands associated with joining the European Higher Education Area, but continue to receive the same salaries as before, requiring supplementary income to make ends meet; and they derive the meaning of their work from teaching, but their job security is pegged to sustained research productivity. Findings indicate that instructional staff are caught in a confluence of conflicting demands that elicits counter-productive coping strategies and threatens to undermine the national efforts to modernize Ukraine’s higher education.