Bridging the gap - SinoOz: business education position paper

To say that there is a mismatch between Australian and Chinese thinking is self evident. Identifying the two landscapes and looking for points where a bridges can be constructed becomes an imperative if collaboration is seen as desirable by both people groups. Personal experience has shown the range of difficulties that exist and it is a very fine line between success and failure when measured by mutual success and bilateral cooperation. When reading this paper it is necessary to consider a number of participants and the paper is limited to higher education. Participants include: Universities (chancellery, teacher, students, and administrators); Education Agents and Intermediaries; Governments (ministries of education, immigration, etc.). These are the tangible participants but we also need to consider intangibles including: Enculturation; Systems; Policies and Agencies (i.e. drivers of changes +ve and -ve); etc. To consider each in detail in this paper is not plausible but awareness is important. We will briefly highlight that any lasting bridge (i.e. value and emphasis of long term mutual relationship networks) between universities, and associate service groups, within the two nations requires two core aspects that rarely see the light of day in what would normally be master-servant business relationships - i.e. trust and equity - not seeking undue advantage or exploitation. We are also introducing in this position paper the concept of International Learning Complementation which we will define and discuss. When considering your own experiences in the light of this paper: firstly, describe your own practice - good, bad, uncertainties, etc. then reflect upon what 'bridging the gap' would look like relative to what you are about to read. Such an exercise will show where we all can gain when observations are communicated - in our case at the 2nd International Forum of Business Education - 2007, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia.