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Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) can create participatory cultures by removing barriers to access materials, encouraging student modes of expression, differentiating student interactions through digital environments and increasing learner autonomy. Participatory cultures require competencies or new media literacy (NML) skills to be successful in a digital world. However, professional development (PD) often lacks training on CALL and its implementation to develop such skills. The purpose of this study is to describe teachers use of digital tools for multilingual learners through a relevant theoretical perspective.

This design-based research study examines 30 in-service teachers in South Carolina, a destination state for Latinx immigrants, focusing data over three semesters of PD: interviews and instructional logs. The researchers address the question: How are teachers using digital tools to advance NML for multilingual learners (MLs)?

The authors analyzed current elementary teachers’ use of digital tools for language learning and NML purposes. Three themes are discussed: NMLs and digital literacy boundaries, digital tools for MLs and literacy teaching for MLs and NML skills.

Teacher PD often needs more specificity regarding the intersection of MLs and digital literacy. The authors contribute to the literature on needed elementary teaching practices for MLs, the integration of NML and how these practices may be addressed through PD.

While most language departments of the university offer service-learning (SL) subjects based on language teaching, such as “Teaching Chinese as a Second Language in Local Schools” and “Serving the Community through Teaching English,” this paper aims to argue that teaching students to teach language(s) is yet to be the best strategy to serve the service recipients.

SL is widely understood as an experiential learning pedagogy that integrates academic focus, reflection and community service and is shown to be impactful. In Hong Kong, the first university that has made SL a graduation requirement is the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (the University). Considering this, new SL courses have proliferated over the past decade. Adopting a narrative inquiry approach, this paper examines personal narratives from a new SL subject aiming to raise awareness of refugees in Hong Kong. The data includes students’ reflective journals, co-created personal narratives and podcasts and semi-structured interviews.

This paper finds that crafting and recording narratives of shared experiences deepens cultural understanding, cultivates empathy and facilitates language learning in a genuine setting.

Ultimately, this paper advocates a well-designed SL that combines language, content and technology as a powerful, transformational experience for both college students and service recipients.

This paper focuses on a brand new SL course, “Storytelling for Understanding: Refugee Children in Hong Kong,” offered in Semester 1, 2022–2023. The subject was developed by the two authors from a language division affiliated to the University. The deliverables were podcast recordings, co-authored and co-edited by the students and the children.

This study aims to delve into the interplay between didactic audiovisual translation (DAT) and computer-assisted language learning (CALL), exploring their combined impact on the development of intercultural competence (IC) among learners of English as a foreign language (EFL).

Using a quasi-experimental approach with a quantitative research design, the study analyses the outcomes of a questionnaire answered by 147 students across 15 language centres in Spanish Universities. These participants actively engaged in completing the lesson plans of the Traducción audiovisual como recurso didáctico en el aprendizaje de lenguas extranjeras project, a Spanish-Government funded research initiative aimed at assessing the effects of DAT on language learning.

The current study confirms the reliability of the instrument developed to measure students’ perceived improvement. Beyond validating the research tool, the findings of the current study confirm the significant improvement in intercultural learning achieved through DAT, effectively enhancing students’ motivation to engage in language learning.

The current research solely examines students enrolled in higher education language centres. This paper closes with a CALL for additional research, including participants from other educational stages, such as primary or secondary education. In the broader context of CALL research, this study serves as a valuable contribution by exploring the potential of DAT in fostering IC in EFL settings.

This research confirms the potential of DAT and CALL to promote students’ learning process, as the combination of these approaches not only yields linguistic benefits but also intercultural learning.

Currently, owing to the influence of rapid globalisation, the issue of international and cross-cultural implementation of cross-cultural relationships is being widely discussed. This is also related to the readiness of graduates for international cooperation. The objective of this qualitative study is to identify and compare the requirements of company representatives from the Czech Republic – the Vysocina Region and Austria (Region Upper Austria) regarding the readiness of graduates to entering the workforce and the intercultural differences between the relevant regions.

A total of 20 Czech and Austrian companies from the relevant regions participated in the research. The results were obtained through in-depth guided interviews and a comparative method.

The qualitative study has theoretical implications in the context of new findings in the field of research. It contributes to the knowledge relating to the preparation of graduates for entering the workforce, and in the context of intercultural development, it extends this knowledge with the identified weaknesses of the mentioned preparation at the level of Czech or Austrian education.

The most effective and probable approach to enhance the development of cross-cultural competences in particular appears to be the integration of new techniques and content of education in the form of new subjects in cooperation with academics and practitioners from the particular country. Collaboration with these experts can build students' knowledge and skills from an intercultural environment to the highest degree possible.

Purpose: Students’ transition from education to employment is influenced by factors like the length and calibre of their education, demography, labour market conditions, and the general state of the economy. Regardless of the economy, education systems should seek to ensure that students have the skills required for the labour market. This will help them better transition from school to work. This study examines the work skills that companies require for entry-level positions in Romania.

Need for Study: Previously, text analysis studies treated the job market only for the IT industry in Romania. To understand the demand-side opportunities and restrictions, assessing the employment opportunities for young people in the Romanian labour market is necessary.

Methodology: A text mining approach from 842 unstructured data of the existing job positions in October 2022 for fresh graduates or students is used in this chapter. The study uses data from LinkedIn job descriptions in the Romanian job market. The methodology involved is focused on text retrieval, text-pre-processing, word cloud analysis, network analysis, and topic modelling.

Findings: The empirical findings revealed that the most common words in job descriptions are experience, team, work, skills, development, knowledge, support, data, business, and software. The correlation network revealed that the most correlated pairs of words are gender–sexual–race–religion–origin–diversity–age–identity–orientation–colour–equal–marital.

Practical Implications: This study looked at the job market and used text analytics to extract a space of skill and qualification dimensions from job announcements relevant to the Romanian employment market instead of depending on subjective knowledge.

Culture is considered a critical aspect of social media usage. The purpose of this paper is to explore how cultures and languages influence multilingual users' cross-cultural information sharing patterns.

This study used a crowdsourcing survey with Amazon Mechanical Turk to collect qualitative and quantitative data from 355 multilingual users who utilize two or more languages daily. A mixed-method approach combined statistical, and cluster analysis with thematic analysis was employed to analyze information sharing patterns among multilingual users in the Chinese cultural context.

It was found that most multilingual users surveyed preferred to share in their first and second language mainly because that is what others around them speak or use. Multilingual users have more diverse sharing characteristics and are more actively engaged in social media. The results also provide insights into what incentives make multilingual users engage in social media to share information related to Chinese culture with the MOA model. Finally, the ten motivation factors include learning, entertainment, empathy, personal gain, social engagement, altruism, self-expression, information, trust and sharing culture. One opportunity factor is identified, which is convenience. Three ability factors are recognized consist of self-efficacy, habit and personality.

The findings are conducive to promoting the active participation of multilingual users in online communities, increasing global resource sharing and information flow and promoting the consumption of digital cultural content.

This paper aims to explore the Spanish Self-Initiated Expats’ (SIEs) motivations and factors involved in the choice of the host destination.

Through an exploratory and qualitative study, drawing upon SIE literature on motivations and careers, 22 Spanish SIEs were interviewed in a semi-structured way.

Most SIEs clearly detailed the line of reasoning behind the host destination choice (specific destination); a second group considered a limited number of potential countries to relocate to (alternative destinations), and the smallest one did not choose a specific location. Career motivations were the most mentioned ones and different degrees of career planning were found: those with a very defined career planning process relied upon one potential destination, while those with a less defined one considered several alternative host destinations. The European Region Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students experience was one of the most mentioned factors influencing the choice of the host destination, which may be common to other European Union (EU) nationals. As to the limiting ones, the visa requirements outside the EU were identified. Other factors were particular to Spain, such as the perceived need for English proficiency for a successful global career and the degrees of career planning.

These findings may assist Talent Management Managers to align organizational strategies with SIEs motivations. They may also help future Spanish and European SIEs in their individual career management process.

This study contributes to a better understanding of the expatriation motivations and factors influencing the destination location of Spanish SIEs, adding to the SIE and global career literature.

The authors conducted 22 in-depth longitudinal interviews with 11 Hungarian migrant workers in the Dutch logistics sector, before and during the COVID-19 crisis, using thematic analysis and visual life diagrams to interpret them.

This study aims to contribute to conservation of resources theory, by exploring how global crises influence the perceived employability of migrant workers in low-wage, precarious work.

The authors find that resources are key in how migrants experience the valence of global crises in their careers and perceive their employability. When unforeseen consequences of the COVID-19 crisis coincided with migrants' resource gain spirals, this instigated a positively valenced career shock, leading to positive perceptions of employability. Coincidence with loss spirals led to negative perceptions.

The authors contribute to careers literature by showing that resources do not only help migrants cope with the impact of career shocks but also directly influence the valence of global crises in their perceived employability and careers.

Interestingly, when the COVID-19 crisis did not co-occur with migrants' resource gain and loss spirals, migrants experienced resource stress (psychological strain induced by the threat or actual loss of resources) and no significant change in their perceptions of employability.

This study aims to analyze the factors driving Syrian refugees into the informal labor market in Türkiye despite the existence of regulations and programs to facilitate their integration into the formal labor market.

This study presents results from a literature review of secondary sources and primary data collection through semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders and Syrian refugees.

The study shows that the implementation of policies and programs to boost formal employment among refugees has yielded limited results. Many refugees continue to operate within the informal economy. This informality is due to various socio-economic challenges, including anti-refugee sentiments, geographical restrictions and economic crises. The 2023 twin earthquakes have further exacerbated the vulnerable situation of refugees, intensifying the difficulty of achieving self-reliance.

The study’s drawbacks include a small sample size. This implies that the sample is not representative; therefore, results may lack generalizability.

The study’s findings could stimulate greater engagement in public policy, facilitate the management of public perceptions regarding refugees and provide support to the private sector, all to enhance the integration of Syrian refugees into the formal labor market.

This study addresses crucial areas previously unexplored, including the impact of economic and natural disaster crises on the labor market integration of refugees. To the best of the author’s knowledge, by investigating these factors for the first time, this study offers novel insights into their influence on refugees’ labor market integration.