What to Measure and how to Measure the - Internationalization in Higher Education

One of the most widespread and used definition internationalization in higher education is ‘at the national, sector and institutional level as a process of integrating an international, intercultural or global dimension into the goals, activities and services of higher education institutions’ (Knight 2003, 2). Internationalization can have many positive benefits and new opportunities for higher education institutions and its stakeholders and broader community (Hénard, Diamond, and Roseveare 2012, 40). Moreover, nowadays internationalization is no longer perceived as a goal in itself but rather as a means to an end, such as enhancing the quality of scholarship and research, alleviating poverty, or producing globally aware and competent graduates. Institutions need to judge not only the quantity of internationalization activity but also its quality and its contribution to overall institutional goals (Green 2012, 4). In order to fulfil those means, we need to measure internationalization ‘as a component of overall institutional performance, to judge the effectiveness of an institution’s internationalization strategy or its components, to benchmark with other institutions, and to improve internationalization programs and practices’ (Green 2012, 4). In this paper, we are analysing different tools and its’ indicators that are focused not just on the internationalization activities but also on two specific aspects: (I) on the data management at the institutional level (understanding data, use of data, etc.) and (II) to bridge the gap in communication and joint work that often exists between HEI faculty, staff, senior management and students in internationalization efforts and activities. This paper was created in the framework of the Erasmus+ (Key Action 2) project titled Higher Education Internationalization Data (HEIDA), which involves the following partners Koç University, Istanbul, TURKEY (project coordýnator), Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona Barcelona, Spain (Project Partner) and International School for Social and Business Studies (ISSBS) Celje, Slovenia (Project Partner). One of the main goals of the HEIDA project is to design, test and implement a data collection and sharing tool/platform for the internationalization activities of higher education institutions. More specifically, to create an accessible, user-friendly tool that will enhance the institutional understanding of the multiple performances of internationalization across the diverse range of interconnected activities at a higher education institution.