Seeking Sanctuary

Abstract

The internationalization of higher education has led to the influx of Chinese international students in Canada. Much of the literature on this subject has focussed on the factors that drive them to Canada, their academic learning experiences, and the impact of North American stereotypical constructions of “Chinese learners” on their English language learning. This paper is based on a narrative study investigating the mobility, English learning and test-taking experiences of ten Chinese international students, and the complex connections among their past and present experiences and imagined futures. Informed by theories on globalization, neoliberalism, and Bourdieu’s concepts of social power, in particular, on sanctuary, this paper presents selected findings relating to the paradoxes and dilemmas of the student experiences of leaving China for their higher education, imagining a better future.

Introduction

The proliferation of international education is a common feature of the educational landscape in our globalizing world. Commenting on the impact of globalization on education Luke remarks: “We live in a complex world of push—pull effects, where social and economic policies and practices with specific domestic effects have fallout with unpredictable half-life and collateral effects elsewhere on the planet.” 1 International education has not escaped these impacts, and in this context, international student mobility becomes situated in the complex connections among globalization, society and pedagogy, particularly in higher education. 2 (Brooks and Waters 2010; de Wit 2008). The formal and informal international education connections between China and Canada are a case in point illustrating one educational dimension of the multiple complex relationships between the two nations and peoples.

Canada has become the sixth most popular destination for international education (following the us, the uk, Australia, Germany, and France) among the rapidly increasing numbers of mobile students world wide and the diversified host countries of international education. 3 The top source country of international students for Canada has been China. In 2015, 118,915 Chinese international students studied in Canada, comprising 33.55% of all international students studying in Canada. 4 Among these Chinese international students, almost 66% were pursuing post-secondary studies. 5

Following an extensive review of the literature, the current research study was designed to be a holistic inquiry of Chinese international students to understand better their progression from a Chinese to a Canadian learning environment, how their past experiences shape and influence their perceptions of their learning and their future, and more specifically how their test-taking experiences color their view of education. The research questions sought to investigate the English language learning experiences of selected Chinese international students in China and in a Canadian university, including their English language test preparation and writing experiences. The study was also interested in exploring these students’ understandings and expectations of international education, and how this might have changed over time, and more closely, their identities and how they understood themselves as international students over time.

For the purposes of this paper, the scope and findings will be limited to presenting Chinese international student experiences of mobility between China and Canada, and a brief overview of some of their learning experiences based on Zhang’s original doctoral study. 6 Given the space limits of this paper, we will not be presenting details on English-language test taking experiences that the original study focused on. We begin with a brief overview of the background and context of international education and growth of English language learning in China. This is followed by a summary of theories (from among many used in the original study) that will form the conceptual framework. The methodology is briefly described next, and then some selected findings from this narrative study, accompanied by discussion.

A Review of the Context and Background

In order to set the context of the students’ beginning point of their educational journey, we will provide a brief overview of the influence of globalization on internationalization of education in China, on English learning and teaching in China, including the ideology of English learning, Chinese international students in Canada, and on English language tests and test taking.

The People’s Republic of China (prc) started its national journey to modernization of education after it was established in 1949, with communist ideology underpinning a socialist education system. 7 Then, China started its transformation from an economy with no market forces to one with an important role in the global economy when an open-door policy was introduced in 1978. 8

At the national level, “marketization, privatization, and decentralization” were adopted as strategies to enhance the competitiveness of universities. 9 China’s education has since come under the influence of globalization, which in turn has resulted in outward mobility. 10 China has become the top source country of international students in almost all English-speaking host countries. 11 Historically, the Chinese government promoted the coexistence of local and international experiences when traditional Confucian ideas and values were observed locally and foreign cultures were introduced to enrich the early modernizing educational thinking. 12 The open door policy also signalled the change of discourse of internationalization from a simple awareness raising to a conscious adoption by the Chinese government to enhance “China’s overall competency and profile through education” 13 Chinese students have been encouraged to go abroad in the hope that they would gain advanced knowledge and skills to contribute to the reform in science and technology in China. 14 This policy has been further enhanced in terms of the official financial support available to both students and faculty who study abroad, in the form of scholarships.

The open-door policy of economic reform also opened up China to the common influences of globalization, specifically, neoliberal logic. It is this logic that understands human capital or abilities as related to the knowledge economy that drives Chinese families to send their children to English-speaking countries for a better education, 15 and with the hope of obtaining citizenship in them. 16 Seeking higher education overseas has become the strategy of families to accumulate social capital so that the social status and prosperity of the family could be advanced.

The changed discourse of internationalization in China has not only encouraged the rapid increase in the numbers of Chinese students going abroad, but is attracting students from other countries and regions to study in China. Hosting international students has become an important way for China to gain international recognition in the globalized world. In 2010, an aggressive plan called “Study in China Program” was issued to make China the most popular destination for international students in Asia by increasing their number from 265,090 in 2010 to a projected 500,000 by 2020. 17 In 2015, the number of international students reached 377,054, with 60% being Asian, 18% European, and 11% African. 18 China’s increasing share in hosting international students, as illustrated above, owes much to its national strategy for internationalization and the state-directed effort 19 leading to China becoming the third highest receiving country of international students, following the us and uk, in a relatively short space of time. 20

After the open-door policy was issued in 1978, English began to recapture attention in primary and secondary education for the purpose of the university entrance examination (Gaokao). English education was acknowledged officially as the main foreign language in secondary education across China in 1982 21 and English has been privileged in the national curricula. 22 The Chinese government has adopted different policies at various sociocultural periods in English education, and the national curriculum and textbooks of English have been influenced accordingly. English curriculum at the secondary education level has been oriented toward assessment by examination, in particular Gaokao, which focuses on testing students’ knowledge of textbooks rather than their abilities in applying the knowledge they gain. 23

In the following two decades, the Chinese government called for a wider appropriation of linguistic resources necessary for more international interactions between China and Western countries, and English became the “barometer of modernization.” 24 The Chinese government issued policies to raise the awareness among the public and educational institutions of the importance of English education at all levels and across various disciplines. Since public schools are the major channel for Chinese students to learn English, their understanding of English as a foreign language is mostly shaped by the English ideology as transmitted in the curriculum and textbooks.

The attitude of Chinese people towards English has been shifting as the political, historical, social, and cultural contexts in China have changed in the past few decades. In the process of globalization, English has been widely accepted and promoted as a global language that critically influences the access to and communication with other countries individually and nationally (Dai 1999; Hu 2001). 25 Despite the persistent precautions (explicitly or implicitly) against Western culture and ideology filtering into national policies, curriculum, and textbooks through the English language, English has been promoted as an important instrument for the country’s economic modernization (Adamson 2004; Chang 2006; Gao 2009; Orton 2009). The pragmatism of English as a means to achieve individual success is located at the core of the popular ideology of English learning in China. It is the linguistic capital and the symbolic power of English (Bourdieu 1991), and the potential enhancement of one’s social and economic status and mobility that attract most of the learners of English in China (Hu 2002; Zhao and Campbell 1995).

Understanding English as an international language reflects the neoliberal notion that regards human capital or abilities as inseparable from the knowledge economy (Heller 2003; Urciuoli 2008; Williams 2010). As an important aspect of human capital, English competence becomes a principal factor in deciding the career opportunities and upward socioeconomic mobility of individuals (Kubota 2011; Park 2010, 2011).

To Chinese families, to learn English in a country where English is the native language is undoubtedly one of the major factors leading to Chinese students to their journey of international education in Canada.

The literature shows that the factors initiating the decision-making process of Chinese students and their families have been changing over time. Chinese students and their families usually regard going abroad as more advantageous in helping students to get a better education, understanding foreign countries to be better, building up comprehensive skill sets to secure a better job after graduation, and increasing their potential for successful immigration (Gareth 2005; Gu, Schweisfurth and Day, 2010; Lowe 2007). In addition, many now perceive going abroad as a preferred alternative to the highly competitive examination system in China.

When success in education is related to job prospects, it is connected with social reproduction and parental anxieties. 26 In this scenario, schools outside the mainstream system, argued Bourdieu (1996), could offer a “sanctuary” to students. Going abroad for international education becomes an option to find a “protective enclave” against the fierce competition in Gaokao in China. 27 In a study on professionals returning to Hong Kong after studying overseas in Canada, Waters (2007) finds that to secure academic success and find alternatives to the local educational system, these students take “roundabout routes” and attend “sanctuary schools” in Canada. They develop “an exclusive and elite group identity” (p.494) that shapes them as transnational professionals back in their home country. Exploring the transnational mobility of these students, Waters (2008) argues that international students from Hong Kong, together with their middle-class families, are actually looking for an alternative way to escape the highly competitive local educational system.

In the past decade, studies on international students in Canada have increased, and this includes research on Chinese international students, which can be identified in three major strands. The first strand investigates the factors that drive this group of students to come to Canada for international education (Li, Dipetta and Woloshyn 2012; Li and Tierney 2013; Zhang and Zhou 2011). The second strand focuses especially on the academic learning experiences of Chinese international students (Guo and O’Sullivan 2012; Hu 2010; Windle et al. 2008; Huang and Cowden 2009). Studies on the identities of Chinese international students form the third strand of literature (Fang 2014; Ilieva 2010; Ilieva and Waterstone 2013; Lee 2008). These studies informed the investigation, but will not be elaborated on in this paper.

The original study on which this paper is based, looked more closely at Chinese student’s test-taking experiences. In order to be eligible for a degree course in a Canadian college or university, international students have to achieve certain scores in specific standard English proficiency tests. It is a general practice for post-secondary institutions in Anglophone countries to use ielts 28 in the admission of international students from non-English-speaking backgrounds. The presumption behind this practice is the idea that certain scores in the test would enable international students to succeed in their post-secondary academic studies. ielts has been widely recognized as a large-scale and high-stakes English test.

Studies on the ielts test focuses on the identities of test-takers, ielts preparation courses, and its impact on the academic performance in Degree Programs and on the emotions of test-takers. A key finding in this literature is that test-takers internalize their language proficiency based on how they perceive themselves performing on a language test (Brown 2003; Brown and McNamara 2004; Lazaraton and Davis 2008). Other findings suggest that an ielts preparation course may be more effective than an English for Academic Purposes (eap) course; 29 that there are substantial differences in ielts preparation courses offered by different schools, 30 test-driven preparation courses may offer no advantage in helping students get higher ielts scores; 31 and that ielts preparation courses may inspire students to keep learning English after class, and improve their English proficiency in the long run. 32 Rahimi and Nazhand (2010) propose that students have high expectations for the ielts preparation courses, and believe that these courses would help them achieve success.

In summary, there are many factors rooted in economic globalization, national policies, competitive educational environments, family pressures and social aspirations that drive students from China to seek their higher education in a Canadian university.

Theoretical Lenses

For the purposes of this paper, we will work with selected theories from globalization and social power noting that the original study is more complex and is analysed through a multi-theory framework addressing interrelated topics of mobility, language learning and test-taking, and identity. 33

We first focus on economic globalization, and more specifically, the rise of neoliberalism. Neoliberalism, described by Harvey (2005) as the view that “human well-being can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade” (p. 2), has left the responsibility for economic, social and employment security squarely in the hands of individuals. This ethos has extended to education, where people are pressured to understand the purpose of education as positioning themselves to be competitive in the global marketplace, and is manifested in the dominance of neoliberal policies that have depreciated the value of education where knowledge production is governed by economic rules. 34 In the context of neo-liberalism, actors in educational settings (e.g. students, faculty, staff, and policy-makers) identify education as a “site of struggle and compromise” 35 in conditions marked by the deregulation of education institutions and the victory of the market. 36 The function of schools is promoted to be primarily for the preparation of the workforce; market forces play a more important role in the process of decision-making and skills acquisition among programs, faculty and students, and whole institutions. 37 Neoliberalism is manifest in international student recruitment. In Canada, international students contribute greatly to the national and provincial economies, 38 and to the funding of schools, benefitting communities and their economy. 39 Dixon specifically addresses how universities are increasingly consumer- and market-oriented (2006). One-way (South-North) student mobility results in reproducing unequal power relations in the creation of a global knowledge economy. In recent years, the global rankings of universities have been playing a more significant role in recruitment of international students. 40 As a result of rankings, degrees from some countries are endowed with more value 41 and high-ranking institutions are more attractive to international students who believe they will gain internationally recognized capital in learning in these institutions.

As has been argued by many scholars in globalization theory, the neoliberal or economic dimension of globalization alone limits our understanding of the complexity, depth and sheer breadth of globalization, in particular in how people experience its effects. We turn to Appadurai’s (1996) conceptualization of globalization as a series of flows: ethnoscapes (the unprecedented mobility of individuals and groups), technoscapes (the influence of technology in creating connectedness among people and spaces), mediascapes (the flow of images and representations across a diversity of media), ideoscapes (the formation and movement of ideas in the form of discourses and counter narratives), and financescapes (the movement of global capital). These “scapes,” “perspectival constructs, inflected by the historical, linguistic, and political situatedness of different sorts of actors” 42 influence people differently and unevenly, and it is important to see the interconnections among them rather than seeing globalization solely as an economic process.

Appadurai expanded the role of imagination in these processes, “the imagination as a social practice.” “[C]entral to all forms of agency,” he continues, imagination is “the key component of the new global order.” Connected to Taylor’s (2004) ideas on the social imaginary, “the way we collectively imagine … our social life,” Rizvi and Linguard (2010) expand on the notion of a global social imaginary as how people make sense of their current existence and imagine their futures, influenced heavily by the discourses they are surrounded by.

In summary, the selected themes and ideas from globalization theory support the interpretation and analysis of the conditions and influences on mobility. The scholarship on the influences of neoliberalism on higher education generally, and on international education in particular, extending to practices of internationalization, illustrates the importance of using these lenses in considering student mobility in this study.

To analyze mobility in the context of globalization and internationalization, it is important to discuss how structure and power are at play. Pierre Bourdieu’s (1984, 1986, 1991) sociological framework has been widely applied to understanding structure and power. In this study, Bourdieu’s concepts of capital, habitus, field, and sanctuary are important ideas in explaining the factors that impacted Chinese students to choose Canada as the international destination for their higher education, what experiences they invest in/divest in, and how they made plans for the future.

Bourdieu’s (1986) notion of economy of practice articulates how the social and cultural practices of language learning and use are linked to power and capital. In his theorizing, individuals and groups are all involved in exchanges that take place within an economy of human social practices. Bourdieu theorized the terms capital, field, and habitus to indicate how social relationships are reciprocally shaped in the complex and practical social environment.

Habitus is both structured by “one’s past and the present circumstance” and structuring because “one’s habitus helps to shape one’s present and future practice.” 43 Dispositions composing the habitus are “durable” and “transposable,” and enable the agents to practice in different fields. 44 The exchange of “capitals” is what drives all social interaction within a field; recognized and legitimate capital benefits people who possess it. Bourdieu distinguishes between economic capital which can be converted into money “immediately and directly” 45 and symbolic capital which takes two forms: social capital, which refers to resources connected to networks, relationships or memberships unique to a given community, and cultural capital, which includes knowledge, linguistic practices, credentials and skills. The value of cultural capital is decided by the recognition and status of institutions who grant qualifications, certificates or credentials. In particular, academic qualifications may convert into economic capital through the labor market. On entering a field, a newcomer brings with him or her certain amount of social, economic, and cultural capital. Whether the capital is convertible or not, and what the exchange rate might be, depends on the recognition granted by the social field to that particular capital.

Bourdieu (1986) argues that life chances are determined by access to economic, cultural, and social capital. Coming to Canada for international education starts with the investment of economic capital, which may enable international students to gain cultural capital in the form of academic qualifications. There exists in China a perceived relationship between academic success and upward mobility; the if/then propositions are understood as causal links—if a child receives a good education, he or she will qualify for a good job with high income (Pieke 1991; Waters 2008). Overseas qualifications, those gained from Western countries in particular, represent differential symbolic power in conferring social status in the Chinese employment market. 46 In particular, “the kinds of symbolic capital that have international recognition and value, not only in the country of origin, but also in the country of destination” are of more value to Chinese international students. 47 An international education will earn Chinese international students desirable institutionalized qualifications and credentials that carry field-specific market value. The concept of cultural capital is a particularly useful tool to analyze how their interpretations of the value of the credential students pursue change as the locations of practices vary.

Methodology

Narrative inquiry is the study of experience as a story, and a strategy for thinking about as well as approaching that experience (Clandinin and Connelly 2000; Connelly and Clandinin 2006). A premise underlying narrative inquiry is that our lived experiences can be interpreted and given meaning through stories. 48 The storied lives of people are described, collected, told, and written through narratives of experience by narrative researchers and participants. 49 As a form of experiential inquiry, narrative inquiry offers a peculiar lens for understanding “the past events of one’s life and for planning future actions” 50 In line with this perspective, He (2003) argues that narrative thinking and narrative unity will enable us to “make meaning out of our lived experiences, modify the quality of our on-going experiences, and capture the moving force of every experience in the future” (p. 122). Constantly refining their approach, Clandinin and Connelly developed “a three-dimensional narrative inquiry space” (2000, p. 50, emphasis in original) which included the personal and the social (interaction), the past, present, and future (continuity), and the concept of place or situation.

As Zhang (2017) wanted to investigate the English language learning and test taking experiences of Chinese international students, through their stories of their past, expectations, current efforts, and imagined futures, narrative inquiry emerged as an effective methodological framework, and first-person narratives as a legitimate source of data to record their learning accounts. 51

The study was conducted at Mountain University (mu), a high-ranking medium-sized comprehensive university in Canada, within a program for international students called the Pathway Program. Students took 25 hours of classes (including six hours of tutorials) each week in subjects such as Academic Culture and Learning, Academic Skills, and Academic Writing. International students could enter the program and be conditionally admitted to mu with a 5.0 score in ielts. Students then had to pass the Pathway courses and achieve 6.0 in a designated ielts test 52 by the end of the semester to exit the program and achieve official entry to mu.

Participants were recruited through email invitations sent to student mail-lists, and by word of mouth through the instructors in the Pathway Program. Ethics protocols that ensured confidentiality and anonymity were described. Below is a list of participants showing their field and year of study at the beginning of the study.

The main data were generated through two rounds of in-person narrative interviews with each participant to create ‘text’ for this study, taking about one to two hours, at a location on campus that was most comfortable for the participants. Based on the stories emerging in the first unstructured, free-flowing, exploratory, and open-ended narrative interview, the second semi-structured interview was designed to elicit more focussed stories from the participants. By combining unstructured and semi-structured interviews that kept the information and interpretation a two-way street, the needs of the researcher and that of the participants were balanced, and also the potential inequality between them was decreased.

The interviews were conducted in Mandarin, the language of both the participants and the researcher, and they were audio-recorded, and later transcribed, also into Chinese, allowing for a deeper and more accurate meaning of the stories to emerge, a feature that helped also with data analysis. Field notes were an important record becoming “the text out of which we can tell stories of our storied experience.” 53 Other data consisted of written autobiographies from each participant on their educational experiences in China and Canada, informal conversations that took place in coffee or lunch meetings and phone calls outside of the scheduled interviews and even text messages and phones calls.

To analyze stories collected, the researcher used narrative data analysis methods and maxqda software. In the data analysis, the researcher focused not only on the narratives that the participants shared deliberately but also on the underlying perceptions contained in these explicit stories. The audio-recorded data were transcribed and semi-coded immediately after each field text was completed, and transcript accuracy was checked by both researcher and participants. maxqda, a computer assisted qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods data, text, and multimedia analysis tool, also supports a multilingual user interface, allowing for the transcript to be uploaded in Simplified Chinese. This feature allowed Zhang to concentrate on the data in the same language that it was collected in and to avoid code-switching between Mandarin Chinese and English.

Based on Lincoln and Guba (1985), Loh (2013) scrutinizes the trustworthiness of narrative inquiry and concludes that verisimilitude and utility should be emphasized and revisited to make narrative studies trustworthy. Verisimilitude for Loh (2013) means that the study has to make the audience empathize with participants so that readers could put themselves in a similar situation and find the stories understandable and plausible. He then highlights the importance of using member checking and peer and audience validation to achieve such trustworthiness. Therefore, narrative researchers should underline the “authenticity” 54 of the narrative data collected, but not worry too much about whether the stories reflect reality. This view resonates with Bochner’s idea that people’s narratives are “knowledge from the past and not necessarily knowledge about the past.” 55 Participants in narrative studies exercise their power and agency to explain and interpret in telling their stories. These and other considerations ensured a wholistic approach to establishing trustworthiness of the study.

Stories of Mobility and Learning

The data below have been selected from the comprehensive data set of the original study to provide an understanding of mobility experiences, and a glimpse into the English-language learning experiences of the ten participants in this study. Their English language test taking experiences, an important focus of the original study, are not included in this paper for limitations of space.

Escape from Gaokao

Gaokao, the entrance examination that decides entrance into universities in China, was an animated topic in all of the interviews with the participants, who unanimously declared avoiding this highly competitive national exam as one of the major reasons for coming to Canada for higher education. These selected stories from Chen, Sam, North, and Sean are representative and thought-provoking.

Chen described her experience of writing Gaokao as “agonizing.” Chen was born in Shenzhen of Guangdong Province in China, and she is the oldest of three children. Her parents, hard-working and successful business people, attached great importance to the education of the three children though they themselves were not well educated. They sent Chen and her brother to private schools from elementary to high school, and abroad for their higher education, believing that they could be better prepared for their future.

In Chen’s memory, preparing for and writing Gaokao is

so agonizing, and many students’ dreams broke because of the unsatisfactory scores in the test. Students’ life and fate is decided by a single test. It’s like a life-changing gambling…. Years of efforts and hard work would mean nothing if we fail this one and only test…. In a mock English test before Gaokao, I got 80 out of 150 and I broke down. I felt that my failure in Gaokao was predestined. In fact, no one gave me any pressure in my family; all the pressure was from the test, and from the intense atmosphere of the classroom. We had a countdown board in the classroom, and our teachers would remind us of the time we had before Gaokao. You could smell the pressure in the air. I attended Gaokao as planned anyways because it is once-in-a-lifetime experience. But I didn’t do well enough to enter a good university. Then going abroad was inevitable. Before that, going to another country for education always seemed remote to me. My family has never travelled to other countries because of my aging grandma. We are a very traditional family, and we value staying together with our family as much as we could. I don’t think I fit the test-oriented education system in China when my life chances are determined by one exam.

Sam, from Hubei Province of China, and an only child, described his experiences of writing Gaokao as “a great escape.” Sam’s account of his high school life was full of pressure, “a nightmare,” including failing the tests that would have helped him to avoid Gaokao. He ran away from school eventually, and saw counselors and psychiatrists for his state of depression. “Then my parents sent me to Canada. My great escape worked!” After the initial euphoria of arriving at mu, he began to feel the pressure again, because his family had very high expectations of him.

North’s top reason to come to Canada was to free himself “from a vicious cycle” in the education system in China. North who was from a small city in Hebei Province of China, remembers that the three members of his family were always in three different places: his father was doing business in Beijing, his mother was working in his hometown, and he was away for education. In North’s opinion, Gaokao was a waste of time and a failure in the educational system in China, creating “a vicious cycle.” “This kind of education is short-sighted,” he claimed. “After being trapped in the test-oriented education system for so many years, I didn’t want to waste my university life anymore. I decided to go abroad.”

Unlike other participants, Sean had been comparatively relaxed before and after coming to Canada. He said he simply came to Canada to “run away from Gaokao.” Growing up and attending school in Shanghai, Sean attributed his relaxed attitude to his parents, who understood him well and did not push him in learning, although they were concerned about his performance in tests like all other Chinese parents, and planned early on to send him abroad. He justifies the decision, saying “I can’t do well in test-oriented education.”

Chen, North, Sam, and Sean had painful memories of preparing and writing Gaokao, and they were fortunate because they knew they had an alternative if they failed. Going abroad was their escape.

Learning English

When talking about the impetus behind their decisions to go abroad for education, many of the students highlighted the importance of English proficiency and foreign qualifications in terms of seeking a “good” job in the future.

Liushu thought learning English was extremely important. As the only child in a family in Qingdao, China, Liushu just needed to focus on school work and academic achievement: going to school, working hard, and getting satisfactory scores in different tests at various levels before she came to Canada. Her parents would take care of everything else for her. She passed Gaokao, was admitted to a provincial university, and had finished her first year of university study when she decided to come to Canada. She described herself as willful; one day she came up with the idea of going abroad and asked her parents to start the whole application process for her immediately. To facilitate the application process, her parents even changed her family name from lv to lu because it would take Liushu longer to get her correct family name on her visa. Liushu’s enthusiasm for learning English was common among the students, thought in varying degrees. Going abroad was equated to acquiring more English, and she talked about the importance of learning English repeatedly. She said:

English is so important! English is super important now. It’s super important. You have to learn English well if you want to be in line with the world. I mean it’s important for both nations and individuals. Do you want to go to a good university? Learn English well! Do you want to get a good job after graduating from your university? Learn English well! You also have to keep learning English even after you graduate from university. You may need English for your work and for your promotion in the future.

Students in China learn English for passing different kinds of examinations: the entrance exams of junior and senior high schools, and Gaokao, among others. This is not the end; after they enter universities, they learn English for passing College English Test 56 Band 4 or Band 6. If they want to pursue graduate studies, English test is compulsory in the entrance exam. After graduating from universities, they have to keep learning English for job promotions and other professional development. Higher level of English enhances the comprehensive qualities of an individual. No one can afford not to learn English. English is like a stepping-stone that will lead you to the next stage of your education or work. The idea of English as a stepping-stone was another common theme among the students and their parents. Kaddy described her mother’s attitude:

My mom wasn’t very well-educated; she barely finished her junior high school. People like her really worship English. I think this is because English has in a sense been mystified and elevated to a very high position in China. I can’t think of any other non-English-speaking country that would be so crazy about English. Sometimes I would think to myself that I hope, one day, native English speakers will have to learn Mandarin Chinese every day.

Discussion

Overall, participants’ stories on why they came to Canada confirm some of the push-pull factors identified by. 57 Among them, the belief that Canada’s education standards were imagined as higher than that of China, and that learning in an English-speaking country would greatly enhance the value of their credential, was evident. The desire to study in economically developed English-speaking countries shows the impact of the neo-colonial discourse generated by neoliberalism, and its promise of competitive advantage of that education in a globalized and market driven economics. Another factor that was mentioned by participants was the influence of family and friends. This aligns with Beck’s (2008) research that shows the significance of family influence in creating the desire for an international credential as advancing family and individual fortunes. As well, we see the social imaginary at play, with the finance-scape and ideo-scape 58 creating an imagined future for the student and their family.

Gaokao has been a prevalent topic throughout this study. The participants named it as the foremost factor that led them to make the decision to go abroad for international education, and how this test has negatively impacted their learning experiences. The data in this study confirm the literature that international education is sought after to increase social, cultural, and economic capital. However, very little attention has been paid to seeking enclave, escape, or sanctuary as an important motivation for Chinese students to go abroad for their education.

According to Bourdieu (1984), education is connected with social reproduction and parental anxieties when its success is related to job prospects. In this context, schools outside the mainstream system, argues Bourdieu (1996), could offer a “sanctuary” to students. Paradoxically, the pursuit of “sanctuary” from Gaokao requires Chinese international students to secure a seat in a preferred university overseas, and the admission requires a satisfactory score on standardized English proficiency tests such as ielts. This necessity triggers the increase of competitiveness in preparing for and writing such language tests, and the “sanctuary” these students and their families invested in heavily turns out to be an unexpected challenge, both before getting admission, and as we see in the next set of data, continues in the university classroom.

Learning Experiences

Participants in this study were offered “conditional admission” to mu and at the time of this study, they had succeeded in the Pathway Program and were at different stages in their programs of study at mu. Some naturally compared their learning in the mu classrooms with that in the Pathway Program and felt great differences between the learning in the two settings. Kaddy used the metaphor of Shangri-La to refer to her experiences in the Pathway Program, an opinion that was echoed by several other participants.

The students/participants reported that they enjoyed a very accommodating and inclusive learning environment in the Pathway Program. Chen, Sam, Liushu, Zoe, Leo, North and Winnie agreed that the Pathway Program was helpful in terms of the course design and class delivery. They talked a lot about how learning had taken place in the Program, and how the skills and strategies they learned from the Program had proven helpful for their university learning. They attributed their successful learning to the Pathway instructors. For Chen,

The Pathway Program was pretty open and could guide me in learning…. The most valuable part was that all the instructors knew each student well. They delivered classes and also arranged individual tutoring for students after class. The class size was small and every student could feel the attention from the instructors. The comments that one instructor gave on a writing assignment were longer than my writing. I was surprised to see how well she knew me and my writing! Her comments were very helpful…. I felt that I had to work harder because my teacher knew me and cared about me.

Sam thought the Pathway Program was a good fit for him and prepared him for the current university learning. He said “I think teachers play the biggest part in the classrooms of international students. I knew no other native English speakers except for my teachers (at that time). Students could do better if teachers are good.” To Liushu, the Pathway Program was good even though the workload was heavy. Zoe provided details on how well an instructor had taught her grammar.

The Pathway Program is a place where teachers knew each student individually, recognized their learning needs, supported them, cared about their progress and their struggles, and provided skilled instruction that helped them improve in their language learning. Such memories of the Pathway Program seemed more dear and cherished by the participants when their learning experiences in the classrooms at mu turned out to be strikingly different.

With the success in completing the courses in the Pathway Program and getting a satisfactory score in the designated ielts Test, all the participants earned their official admission “ticket” to mu. They now entered disciplinary courses rather than just English language classes, and their peers expanded to include students from more diverse backgrounds. This changed situation brought new challenges to the students in this study.

As Sam recounted: “English is still my biggest headache. Professors speak fast and I have difficulty following them in class … Class sizes are a lot bigger (than in the Pathway Program) too, and it seems impossible for professors to know all the students in person, not to mention to provide individual support to each of us.” Liushu felt that university professors in her classes were not very supportive to international students, and were not equipped with the knowledge on how to help international students. Kaddy attributed her unpleasant learning experiences in mu classrooms to her insufficient English proficiency. She related a painful experience of seeking help from a professor whose only advice was that she drop the course because she did not have the necessary language skills. In an interaction with a fellow student, she faced the same impatience. Other students reported similar experiences; Zoe was the only participant who described how a professor fostered communication between local and international students in class.

Discussion

In describing their learning in the Pathway Program, participants ascribed their successful or unsuccessful learning to their instructors and how they were encouraged, inspired, or supported (or not) by them. These comments are based on the traditional criteria of a good instructor in the Chinese culture. They specified qualities in instructors that they valued highly such as attention paid to each student by the instructors, and how a “reasonable push” (Sam) from instructors provided motivation to learn. In comparison, when they talked about their experiences in classrooms at mu, they would point out how university professors lacked the desirable attributes of a good teacher.

The attributes that the participants valued in instructors of the Pathway Program, and that their professors in the disciplines seemed to lack, reflect the students’ understanding of teaching in China where it is a highly regarded profession and teachers much respected professionals. Chinese students rely on teachers not only for knowledge, but also for care, concern, and help; the teacher-student relationship is reciprocal. 59 In their descriptions of disciplinary professors at mu, some of the participants were disillusioned because the professors failed to attend to this reciprocal relationship that they were used to while in the Pathway Program and in China. We can see how they applied the ideological understanding of good instructors developed in the learning habitus of China. Kingston and Forland (2008) wrote about how international students from East Asian countries deal with the clash between their traditional philosophies in academic studies and the norms lying behind the academic and social environment in the uk, and observe that the inconsistency between their expectations and their experiences was probably because of the tension between collectivist and individualist cultures in classrooms—an observation which this study seems to confirm. The participants lack what Zhu (2016) describes as appreciation of the unique academic learning features of the host country that would help these students make progress in their learning. Since most of the participants were comparatively new to Canada when the narratives were collected, they may not have had the chance to sufficiently understand the particular Canadian academic culture, not to mention appreciating it. What they experienced in their university classrooms showed that the accommodating and inclusive environment in the Pathway Program did not prevail in the university classrooms; they had to wake up from a language learning Shangri-la to face a harsher reality in the university classrooms.

The importance of English as the global language (Pennycook 2001; Tollefson 2002) is prominent in the narrative accounts of the students, whose strong beliefs confirm Ng and Tang (1997) that English is critical in seeking higher education, good job opportunities, and workplace promotion in China. Liushu’s comments on English showed her blind embrace of the idea that English is important without much evidence: “English is so important! English is super important now. It’s super important,” Osnos (2008) proposes that English has become “a defining measure of life’s potential,” one of the “unifying beliefs,” even “an ideology.” 60 This idea helps to understand Kaddy’s account of how less-educated people like her mom would embrace the glamour and popular ideology of English. As Tsui and Tollefson (2007) explain, English is “a multinational tool essential for achieving national goals” on the one hand, while on the other, it is “an indispensable resource for personal achievement” to individuals (p.18). The seeming unproblematic acceptance of English among the participants also shows the existing neo-colonial influence of English and its reproduction because people with no or less English competency are disadvantaged in education and the job market. 61

The student narratives show how individuals understand the “linguistic capital” of English, its power in determining the social and economic assets that these students could possess, including being converted into other forms of capital such as educational qualifications. Leung and Waters (2013) who believe that English represents desirable embodied cultural capital.

The pragmatic function of English in China has been evident throughout the history of English teaching, learning, policy making, and in the formation of a popular ideology of English. Though various policies have been issued to alleviate the heavy focus on the function of English as an instrument, the enactments of these policies are not satisfactory, and helping students earn a high score in Gaokao has always been the priority of English education. The student stories reflects the popular ideology which regards English as a language that will offer a passage to advanced knowledge and information in industry, economy, and business. 62 Learning English for pragmatic purposes can be explained using Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, a system of dispositions which is both structured by “one’s past and the present circumstance” and which “helps to shape one’s present and future practice.” 63 Liushu, Leon, and Kaddy’s stories showed that they all have accepted the notion of learning English for its instrumentalism. Their dispositions composing the habitus of learning English proved to be “durable” in presenting the popular ideology of English. 64 They implied that they had to learn English well for reaching higher levels of education (e.g., college and graduate studies), for finding a good job, and for professional development and promotion. Learning English overseas for such pragmatic goals confirms Griner and Sobol (2014), who found that learning English as a tool for future job searching was popular in their study on the motivations of Chinese international students going abroad, and with Gu et al.’s (2010) finding that Chinese international students learn English to enhance their career prospects. We realize that these students have not been protected from the discourses of neoliberalism and the individual pursuit of academic capital in a competitive environment.

Being Chinese and Being ‘International’

The data from the study illustrated other aspects of their lives, such as their national identities, and their experiences of being under the identity of ‘international student’. North, for example, felt the strong urge to identify himself as Chinese in different situations. He said, “My sense of being a Chinese in fact brought me a lot of pressure.” He continued, relating another incident:

One night, I went to a pub downtown. On my way home, I met a group of local teenagers who were drunk. They stopped me and asked if I was Japanese. When I told them that I was Chinese, they laughed. I was mad and scared at the same time. But I thought I should do something; I shouldn’t behave like a coward. They knew I was a Chinese, so I couldn’t lose face for Chinese people.

Some of these stories show that some students grew in their alignment to China while in Canada. The notion of patriotism and their identity as Chinese was provoked by racist attitudes they encountered; their difference and their being seen as different prompted an allegiance to their national identity, and to their roots. As North reflected, “the deepest feeling that I developed in the past two years in Canada is my identity as a Chinese. I’m not only an international student who is seeking a degree in Canada, I’m Chinese.” This development of patriotism challenges the common assumption that leaving a home country results in breaking or lessening of one’s affinity to a national identity. In this case, the students who left China in search of sanctuary from a competitive exam regime, resulted in recognizing their roots and affiliation to a home country, when they faced intense difficulties in Canada.

The students reacted in different ways to the identity that was ascribed to them—‘international students’—some resisting this identity of a “second class” status, and others critical of their fellow Chinese students who clung to old habits and “Chinese” ways of being and thus missing out on the international experience. North said angrily, “Some Chinese international students feel that we’re nothing and inferior to local people. That is not true. They can just speak better English than we do. That’s it.” He also urges Chinese international students to mix with local students: “some international students are still in China though they are in Canada physically. If an international student just eats Chinese food, shops in T&T, 65 and spends all the time with their Chinese friends, they are still in China even though they own a house and a car in Vancouver.” Kaddy recounted her mixed feelings in carrying the label of “international student.” “I feel proud and meanwhile inferior when called a Chinese international student. Sometimes I feel it’s a label that carries with it all the negative meanings.” Winnie realized the importance of self-identification as an international student from China; meanwhile, she was confused about it too.

As a Chinese international student, I know how I feel about myself and how I identify myself is very important. But my problem is that I don’t know how I should position myself in and out of classrooms…. Am I a Chinese? Yes I am; but I’m a Chinese international student in Canada. I feel uncomfortable when hearing people say this is a Chinese international student. I don’t know. I think I could feel the unfriendly hint there.

The students, overall, however, are all very much aware of “the unfriendly hint,” or the “pressure” (North) and how their status as an international student makes them “less than” (North) their peers. Sean’s words summarize the complexity of their experience well: “We just don’t have the sense of belonging.”

The stereotyped images of Chinese international students are very different from how the participants of this study talked about themselves. For example, Zoe and Kaddy both mentioned that Chinese international students were smart and hard-working, and this perception of Chinese students was typical in their home country. Like Zoe, Sam also believed that learning abroad would not be difficult for Chinese students as they worked hard and were good at math; on the contrary, Canadian students were supposedly not good at subjects in sciences, and did not spend much time learning. These views about Canadian students are as stereotypical as the Western views about Chinese international students. One explanation would be the different “stereotyping” of Chinese students operating in China: they are represented as hard-working, tenacious, smart, and good at math and sciences while students in foreign countries are usually described as learners who are not good at certain subjects, and who spend too much time having fun. The implied meaning is that Chinese students will be able to succeed in their studies in a foreign university because local students can do so even though “they are not good at math, physics, and chemistry” and they lack discipline. It seems that the Chinese image of Chinese international students has been overshadowed in Canada by the predominant portrayal of them as dependent, shy, reticent, unable to think critically, and always staying in their “comfort zone” with students with the same background (Grimshaw 2007; Huang and Cowden 2009). The mutual stereotyping between Chinese international students and local students in Canada is an educational barrier on both sides.

Concluding Thoughts

Most of the study participants came to Canada with the expectations of escaping the highly competitive Gaokao, learning English, and acquiring advanced knowledge. Their international education in Canada did not end up in the imagined sanctuary, but led them to other problems and tensions that they did not foresee. Their learning turned out to be another “academic battle” that may be comparable to Gaokao, 66 With the keen awareness of the importance of English in achieving these expectations, they have been investing immensely in learning the language both in China and Canada. In this sense, English itself plays a double role of the goal and the tool to achieve their goals; this double role of English perpetuates the concept of learning English for pragmatic purposes, and the pursuit of seeking ways to increase competitiveness. But learning English itself is not sufficient, as the students discovered, to meet their goals. They had to prove their English proficiency by writing the ielts test, and achieve the gate-keeping thresholds in their path of learning in Canada. Therefore, their English learning has been largely constrained and shaped by the ielts test, taking the form of ielts test preparation in both countries.

The findings show that the current learning practice (in and out of mu) of the participants in Canada was also greatly constituted by their expectations, and their imagined futures formed in China. The student narratives show the flows of ideoscapes, mediascapes and financescapes influencing their life choices, and their imagined futures. Their learning experiences in the Pathway Program and the disciplinary courses were different, and that participants applied the concept of good instructors in China to compare the instructors in these two settings. They performed as agentive actors in deciding their investment/divestment in their learning in different social spaces. The findings also show that the participants went through a complicated process of identity negotiation and construction; they demonstrated identities as Chinese, as Chinese international students, and as transnationals. They were constructed and constituted by the ideologies regulating the practice in different social spaces that they resided in, and the ideologies guiding them in the process of learning transnationally.

Although exploring experiences of this test was not included in the original design of this study, stories of the participants on Gaokao and how it has become the most critical factor in their decision making in the pursuit of international education in Canada were compelling. But even for those fortunate to realize an international education in Canada, the “sanctuary” that they invested in so heavily was a mirage that disappeared as they settled into their Canadian environment: they had to write the ielts test, very often multiple times, to get enrolled in a college or university in Canada; they encountered academic barriers with English in and out of classrooms in their pursuit of university credentials, and their social lives were more marked by difficulty and pain rather than their imagined lives as international students. Their pursuit of sanctuary from Gaokao turned out to be “another battle” (source) from which they had little chance of refuge.

The benefits of going abroad as an alternative to taking Gaokao have been exaggerated, gilded, and romanticized. Interestingly, discussions on going abroad for international higher education as an ideal option to escape Gaokao usually stop after the students leave the country. This reflects the blind acceptance of international education in China. What Chinese international students experience in their international education in the host countries is not usually talked about, nor the fact that it is only accessible to those who can afford it. In the rare cases when such experiences are discussed, it is usually the bright side that is shared, that the experience is simple and easy and that students can achieve their goals as long as they work hard. The scant, sometimes misleading, description of the learning experiences of Chinese international students is limited in its value, especially considering that China has become the top sending country of international students around the world. Running away from Gaokao by going abroad, in this study, turned to be a passive solution to the systematic contradiction as presented in the education system in China.