ISANA

Cathy Saenger

Abstract: Being a mentor to International Students in the Faculty of Business and Computing at a polytechnic in New Zealand, the author has experienced the trials and tribulations of International Students first hand. They begin fresh faced with many expectations, but very soon find that things are not as easy as expected. Some graduates have indicated that they have found it nearly impossible to find jobs and that they are not really well equipped to find good jobs. The main reason mentioned was poor English, even after several years spent in an English-speaking environment. The main regrets were choosing not to live with English-speaking families or flatmates and not having made more of an effort to socialise with local students during their years of study.

The proposed research intends to find out the variety of social and academic choices that are made by International Students in business and computing, together with their supporting reasons. The proposed research also intends to find out if these students would make the same choices given a second chance and what could have helped them make better choices. In-depth interviews will be conducted with current and graduate International Students with final numbers yet to be determined. This paper will focus on choices made by students, the reasons for these choices and what could have helped them make better choices.

Keywords: International Students, choices made, reasons for choices, second chances

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