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    Review of 'Exploring the relevance of sustainability values and principles : Impact of International Social Education (ISE) in a local context'

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    Exploring the relevance of sustainability values and principles : Impact of International Social Education (ISE) in a local contextCrossref
    Thought provoking article on the future or education in higher education institutions.
    Average rating:
        Rated 5 of 5.
    Level of importance:
        Rated 5 of 5.
    Level of validity:
        Rated 5 of 5.
    Level of completeness:
        Rated 4 of 5.
    Level of comprehensibility:
        Rated 5 of 5.
    Competing interests:
    Prof. Thönnessen and me teach at the same university, but in different areas. I am a professor for strategic management in nonprofit organizations.

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    • Article: found
    Is Open Access

    Exploring the relevance of sustainability values and principles : Impact of International Social Education (ISE) in a local context

    This article explores the relevance of sustainability in international social education (ISE). Our empirical data is based on a survey of 30 social work students from Switzerland, Austria, Germany and Sweden. Theoretically, we draw on Bronfenbrenner's theory of social ecosystems and Dewey's emphasis on democratic learning. We use a qualitative approach based on Strauss' Grounded Theory, which allows us to dig deep into the meanings of the students we interviewed. The interviewed students experienced more or less continuously that learning in an international context is learning with all senses, is a "24/7 learning", and is learning in another language (at least most of the time). The results of our survey underline that acquiring knowledge in an international context contributes to a comprehensive understanding of social work as a profession and to the formation of a broad and professional identity. This includes a broad range of critical and systemic thinking skills that enable enquiry, integration and holistic thinking, i.e. sustainability.
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      Review information

      10.14293/S2199-1006.1.SOR-SOCSCI.AZ8LS4.v1.RETAXV
      This work has been published open access under Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Conditions, terms of use and publishing policy can be found at www.scienceopen.com.

      Education,Social & Behavioral Sciences
      Experience,Internationalization,Professional identity,Social education,Sustainability

      Review text

      The article from Thönnessen and Christensen discusses the interesting question how education in higher education institutions can foster essential topics as sustainability, innovation or comprehensive cooperation. They go as far as to state that the social mission of universities is to bring transparency and comprehensive cooperation. In this context they research a sample of 30 student participants of an international course.

      The theoretical framework is well written and gives an extensive overview on theories of education of social work students. They connect here the qualities of a future social worker with learning methods such as reflective, reflexive and glocal learning and sustainability. I like the combination between Deweys practical ideas on democratic pedagogy and contemporary sustainability education. The theory part covers a lot of thinking ground and invites to think more on the role of higher education in terms of educating critical thinkers that value democratic discourses in an intercultural setting. It would have been interesting to follow these theoretical approaches even deeper. Understandably in an article the space for these theoretical musings is limited.

      As part of the empirical research and before delving into the methodology I would have liked to have a short description of the course and the didactic outline of the learning experience for the international student group. For me it would have been interesting, if specific learning outcomes were defined, how much they reflect on social work contents and how much they focus on topics as critical thinking, sustainability, intercultural expertise, etc. It would have shown me where the discussed theory comes to life in the researched course.

      The method of the research is described very well and to use the grounded theory makes absolute sense concerning the sample, the technique and the data collected. I understand that the questions are very open on purpose. But it is a bit surprising, that the questions cover purely the aspect of learning, internationality and future career. The bridge to the theoretical framework of sustainable education, comprehensive cooperation and critical thinking is unfortunately not very strong. The coding strategy is impeccable and gives a very good glimpse into the data collected. Again I would have loved to read more on the data collected and get a more in depth insight into the answers of the students. Due to the limitations of an article a lot is left out here so that reading the discussion the reader might have the impression that important results might have been left out and are discussed now without being analysed beforehand.

      The discussion is very interesting and comes to very interesting and good findings for a sustainable higher education. This leaves room for more consideration and further researches. Methodwise I suggest for a future approach maybe journaling could be an interesting approach to also get a better picture of the learning process over time.

      All in all I can highly recommend to read this article and think more about the how we teach and not so much about the what we teach as professors. I agree completely with the authors that our universities have to have a social mission in our teaching approaches – not only of social work students but also of business administrators, law and engineering students, to just name a few. Comprehensive cooperation and democratic understanding are getting more and more important for our students and their future development.

      Comments

      First of all, many thanks to Gesa Birnkraut for her detailed and intensive commentary. Gesa criticizes the following in our article: A deeper pursuit of the theoretical approaches, a brief description of the course and the didactic outline of the learning experience the article is about, a bridge between the questions on the one hand and the theoretical framework of sustainable education, comprehensive cooperation and critical thinking on the other, as well as more information on the data collected and a more in depth insight into the answers of the students.

      However, Gesa Birnkraut also repeatedly emphasizes that all of this cannot be achieved in an article of limited size. This is just one important point. In addition we refer to our comprehensive data collection, which can be sent to all readers of the article on request. Some of the information missing above, in particular the students' detailed responses, can be found in this empirical material. The other 'gaps' mentioned are not actually gaps, but reflect the possibility of arguing within the framework of a limited article. The missing bridge between the questions on the one hand and the theoretical explanations on the other is well recognized. We intend to address these questions in the context of a longitudinal follow-up study or in a follow-up article.

      2024-02-08 09:40 UTC
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