Perceived Roles of Academic Advisors in Pursuing Internationalization at Public State and Community Colleges in Florida

This research study investigated the perceptions of academic advisors in the Florida College System (FCS) concerning globalization, internationalization, and their role in the process of internationalizing their colleges. Participants in the study included 54 academic advisors from 15 of the 28 colleges in the FCS. The sample was comprised primarily of female advisors with master’s degrees, who had been working in higher education for less than 13 years. This was a nonexperimental, quantitative study and analyses included descriptive statistics, ordinary least squares regression, and Pearson’s product moment correlations. The results revealed that the responding advisors believe that globalization is inevitable and good, and that colleges must prepare to face any challenges that result from it. They also indicated that the advisors thought colleges should engage in several strategies that could lead to progress in internationalization, including international exchanges of faculty and staff, study abroad opportunities for students, and the development of collaborative relationships between their college and foreign institutions. Advisors also indicated relatively strong support for the assertions that globalization and internationalization were important, and would continue to increase in importance going forward. They also generally agreed with the concept that academic advisors should be involved in the process of internationalization at their colleges, but their agreement in this instance was not as strong as it was when discussing globalization and internationalization more generally. In contrast, advisors did not as readily agree that students should take additional courses in foreign language, or that colleges should actively recruit foreign students. The majority of advisors also rejected the idea that the college should adopt a broad, international/global definition of diversity that includes language, customs, and ethnicity. They did not as readily envision the role of academic advisors in the process of internationalization to be as important or necessary as the overall concept of progress in the areas of internationalization and globalization. That is, advisors indicated more agreement with the theory, but not as much agreement with the practice, of internationalization as it relates to their job responsibilities