Does Faculty-Led Short-Term Study Abroad Improve Students’ Global Competence? Findings From a Systematic Review and Evidence Gap Map

As a high-impact pedagogical practice, study abroad is frequently utilized as an internationalization strategy to build post-secondary students’ global competence, but the impact of faculty-led short-term study abroad may vary widely across outcomes of interest. An understanding of student learning outcomes is especially needed now as COVID-19 begins to shift from pandemic to endemic and universities restart international initiatives. This systematic review synthesized and mapped evidence on global competence outcomes of short-term study abroad for undergraduate and graduate students. Studies (n=92) reported a total of 215 outcomes representing the three global competence domains of knowledge (41.4% of all outcomes), attitudes (38.1%), and skills (20.5%). Data sources used to assess global competence outcomes included self-administered surveys (40.1% of assessments), student journals (24.9%), and qualitative interviews (13.6%). While findings from this sample of studies offer evidence of positive impact of short-term study abroad on students’ global competence, the substantive and methodological evidence gaps identified can help to build conceptual clarity and guide design of future assessment approaches.