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Globalization requires business leaders who can manage effectively in multicultural environments. Although many organizations assume leaders will enhance their multicultural skills through international assignments, it is unclear how leaders translate these international experiences into knowledge and skills that enhance their effectiveness. Based on experiential learning theory (ELT), we propose that cultural intelligence (CQ) is an essential learning capability that leaders can use to translate their international experiences into effective experiential learning in culturally diverse contexts.

Problematic attributes of providing development aid in International Service-Learning (ISL) placements exist with its paternalistic implications. Broadening the discussion of ISL by shifting the focus toward prioritizing the incorporation of goals of cross-cultural learning and fostering cultural humility addresses these problematic attributes. Approaching ISL placements with a learning mindset inverts the service-learning model by emphasizing learning over helping. Additionally, cultivating a deeper self-awareness and learning from the host communities prior to offering service encourages cultural humility, enhances the ability to remain open to different perspectives, and sustains engagement as a lifelong learner. A framework for developing international education experiences with a systems-oriented approach is proposed: one that acknowledges the interdependent relationships with others in global social and economic structures. The proposed framework applies Milton Bennett’s Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity and Vanessa de Oliveira Andreotti’s HEADS UP educational tool for critical engagement in global social justice issues. Transformative learning theory guides the process of perspective transformation and invites students to critically reflect on their own values, assumptions, and cultural beliefs. The intent is to establish a model for ISL placements which invites respectful collaboration across cultural differences and imbalances in power relations.

In recent years, the concept of cultural intelligence has attracted increased interest among scholars and practitioners in global leadership research. This chapter aims to contribute to the understanding of the impact of Experiential Learning Theory on the development of cultural intelligence in global leaders. It proposes a model that addresses the relationship between four modes of experiential learning and four facets of cultural intelligence; and hypothesizes that learning styles exercise a moderating effect on the relationship between international experience and cultural intelligence. Managerial implications for global talent selection and leadership development are also proposed based on the model.

The internationalisation of teaching and learning in higher education necessarily invokes the concept of culture with its emphasis on improving cultural awareness and developing intercultural competency. However, how students and academics respond to manifestations of culture in teaching and learning and how their perceptions have changed over the years have seldom been explored. Drawing on data from four studies on internationalisation, three paradigms of cultural responses in teaching and learning are identified: (1) a multicultural paradigm; (2) an intercultural paradigm; and (3) a post-cultural paradigm. Within institutions, all three paradigms co-occur, in different degrees. However, there are intimations here of a shift in the balance of the three paradigms over time. Further, this chapter poses questions about the pedagogical implications for internationalisation and interculturality in higher education so suggesting the opening of a future research programme on the relationship between pedagogy and culture.

This chapter focuses on pedagogies of working with diversity centers on West-East reciprocal learning through a Reciprocal Learning Program in preservice teacher education between a Canadian university and a Chinese university. By presenting our initial analysis of fieldwork with our Teacher Education Reciprocal Learning Program participants through excerpts from newsletters, surveys, and interviews, we explore how participants from both China and Canada made sense of their learning from the other cultural and educational system through the Reciprocal Learning Program within broad educational, social, and cultural contexts. We argue that both global and multicultural dimensions are cultivated in reciprocal learning that infused the lived experiences of both Canadian and Chinese preservice teacher candidates. We discuss the pedagogic implications for working with diversity and believe that reciprocal learning can take place while working with people from different cultures with an attitude of mutual respect and appreciation and an appetite for learning in our increasingly interconnected world.

A study of community college students enrolled in a for-credit study abroad program in Costa Rica sought to identify the experiences that influence intercultural competency growth during study abroad trips and to learn how the experiences influence the development of global leadership competencies. The results led to a modified global leadership development expertise model for understanding the process of global leadership development in student populations. The study revealed a key link between antecedent characteristics of participants and their transformational ability during the study. The study also revealed that there are types of transformational experiences that, when experienced sequentially, can maximize transformational potential and the development of intercultural competencies.

A narrative inquiry was conducted to explore the complexities of learning English and Korean as subject matter in cross-cultural contexts in contributing to teacher identity, with possible tensions of identity teachers experience as ethnic Koreans teaching at an international school in Korea that promotes non-Korean, international education in English as a “language of inclusion” and instruction. With expansions of international schools in South Korea, also growing are numbers of Korean teachers teaching at such schools as returnees, individuals with cross-cultural experience. Stories of one Korean language and literature teacher with international schooling experience were examined.

While identifying the practical benefits of acquiring English, she expresses her concern for the presumed loss of Korean as a product of the prioritized use of English on campus. Equally recognized are the diverse opportunities not commonly available at Korean public schools that the participant upholds from her own experience. She acknowledged that her opportunities for the development of English language skills to a high level of proficiency through international education is not commonly accessible to all students in the Korean public school system. She also considered possible impacts associated with prioritizing the use of English over Korean in her international education experience, including their influence on: her sense of identity as a teacher and as Korean; her cultural knowledge as Korean; and her teacher knowledge as she supports her students' learning of English as subject matter in ways that might, in turn, also impact their sense of identity as Korean.

This chapter provides a critical analysis of the literature on individuals in cultural transitions in higher education, namely, international students in culturally unfamiliar contexts; teachers of international students and culturally more diverse classrooms; and local students in increasingly culturally diverse classes. All these individuals are actors exposed to new and shifting cultural experiences expected to impact their motivation and engagement. Two broad perspectives emerging from the literature were used to organize the chapter: a perspective of adaptation representing research grounded in unilateral, bilateral or reciprocal conceptualizations, and a perspective of transformation, capturing experiential learning research leading to personal and academic development. The analysis highlights how motivation is a critical, yet under-examined construct. This leads to numerous suggestions for future research including: addressing the neglected role of agency in research on international students' sociocultural adaptation and the lack of research on successful processes of adaptation; examining the confounding issue of socialization into new cultural-educational environments and level of proficiency in the medium of instruction, which impacts on engagement; and scrutinizing the posited link between deep-level motivated engagement in cultural transitions and the emergence of transformative experiences. A case is made for research on individuals' engagement and motivation in cultural transitions to be conceptually and methodologically stronger and broader, moving from studies of single groups of individuals in need of adaptation, to investigations of the co-regulated, reciprocal adaptations of actors and agents operating in complex sociocultural contexts where power dynamics related to knowledge and language affect participation and engagement with cultural 'others'.