International, Inaccessible, and Incomplete

A Texas Case Study of International Student Websites

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.32674/jis.v0i0.756

Keywords:

access, admissions, application, internet, institutional websites

Abstract

As the number of international students attending U.S. higher education institutions has declined 2 consecutive years (Saul, 2018), several institutions are exploring ways to increase international student interest. In Texas, the sociopolitical climate has become increasingly anti-immigrant (Watkins, 2017), leading many international students to question whether study in the US is feasible and safe. As institutional websites have been found to be important sources of international student information (Huang & Bilal, 2017; Taylor & Bicak, 2018), this study examines international student information on all public, 4-year institution websites in Texas. Findings suggest international student materials are difficult to read, are rarely translated, and lack basic information such as cost and housing information. Implications for future research and practice are addressed.

Author Biographies

  • Z.W. Taylor, The University of Texas at Austin, USA

    Z.W. TAYLOR, MA, MS, is a PhD candidate in Higher Education Leadership at The University of Texas at Austin. His research focuses on linguistics, disability, and technology in higher education

  • Ibrahim Bicak, The University of Texas at Austin, USA

    IBRAHIM BICAK, MA, MEd, is a PhD student in Higher Education Leadership at The University of Texas at Austin. His research interests focus on college access and success for underrepresented students, focusing on those who are first-generation college students from low-income families.

References

Glum, J. (2017). Donald Trump may be scaring international students away from colleges in the U.S. Retrieved from http://www.newsweek.com/trump-international-education-study-abroad-708667

Huang, L.-M., & Bilal, D. (2017). “Not what I thought!”: Information seeking behaviors of international students during the application for graduate study in the USA. Proceedings of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 54(1), 709-711. https://doi.org/10.1002/pra2.2017.14505401125

Marcus, J. (2017). The decline of the midwest's public universities threatens to wreck its most vibrant economies. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/10/midwestern-public-research-universities-funding/542889/

Redden, E. (2018). New international enrollments decline again. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/11/13/new-international-student-enrollments-continue-decline-us-universities

Saul, S. (2018). As flow of foreign students wanes, U.S. universities feel the sting. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/02/us/international-enrollment-drop.html

Taylor, Z. W. (2018). Intelligibility is equity: Can international students read undergraduate admissions materials? Higher Education Quarterly, 72(2), 160-169. https://doi.org/10.1111/hequ.12155

Taylor, Z. W., & Bicak, I. (2018). Institutional, informational, international: Predicting international student enrollment and rate by online information. Journal of Comparative and International Higher Education, 10, 61-65. Retrieved from https://www.jcihe-hesig.org/s/Taylor-and-Bicak-Winter-2018.pdf

Watkins, M. (2017). Texas universities forced to trim their budgets, even with big state cuts averted. Retrieved from https://www.texastribune.org/2017/07/27/texas-universities-forced-trim-their-budgets-even-big-state-cuts-avert/

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Published

2019-11-15

Issue

Vol. 9 No. 4 (2019)

Section

Research Articles (English)

License

All published articles are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 Unported License.

How to Cite

International, Inaccessible, and Incomplete: A Texas Case Study of International Student Websites. (2019). Journal of International Students, 9(4), 1009-1014. https://doi.org/10.32674/jis.v0i0.756