Rama Venkatasawmy
Many Australian communication and media studies degree programs get delivered in South East Asia by local teaching staff who are instructed to use only the resources provided by host universities and to stringently stick to the curriculum detailed by the universities that own those programs. Standards of quality and excellence in curriculum delivery has habitually been associated with tight control (of curriculum design, teaching materials, assessment) exerted by the program and curriculum owner – which, paradoxically, often ends up becoming a significant contributing factor to the failure or difficulty of achieving quality and excellence in many transnational higher education (TNHE) program delivery situations offshore. Differing practices in quality assurance and in teaching and learning between countries importing TNHE programs and the Australian universities exporting those programs generate a number of pedagogic challenges on each side of TNHE operations. This paper discusses how originally Australia-specific higher education communication and media studies curricula can be transnationalized to enable their more effective and successful delivery and reception in offshore teaching and learning situations. This paper then proceeds to explain how pedagogy, content and assessment can productively be adapted to the specificities of TNHE delivery contexts in order to increase the chances of achieving positive outcomes with regards to teaching, student learning, engagement and experience in communication and media studies programs in particular.
Transnational higher education (TNHE), communication and media studies curricula, Australian universities, Australian higher education, internationalization of higher education, transnationalizing higher education curricula, offshore delivery of higher education, Australian higher education in South East Asia.