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How do language and culture pose adjustment challenges that hinder the academic success of postgraduate international students? This article answers this question based on a thematic analysis of 55 semi-structured qualitative interviews conducted with postgraduate international students and academic and professional staff members at a Malaysian research-intensive public university. The results show that language and culture are influential in a range of academic (language, supervision, research training) and social (group work, friendship) adjustment challenges. The analysis highlights how these challenges hinder academic success as a result of limited or frustrated pathways for students' linguacultural development. We conclude that future academic research and university policy to support postgraduate international students may pay greater attention to cross-cultural, linguistic, and linguacultural issues.

Limited scholarly work has been conducted on obtaining equal opportunities to participate in employability-related programmes by international students while studying in Australia. Drawing on a qualitative study, 20 South Asian postgraduates were interviewed to explore their experiences in accessing employability-related programmes. Based on the findings, South Asian graduates have experienced unequal opportunities in accessing employability-related programmes as postgraduate international students in Australia. They are disadvantaged by generic career advice and resume assistance offered by their university career office, and companies invited to university career fairs offer internships, placements or graduate programme opportunities mostly to domestic students. As a result, South Asian graduates were unable to gain employment in their field of studies. South Asian graduates have also offered several useful recommendations to facilitate more equal chances of developing employability and thereby gaining successful employment in Australia. These include partnerships with companies in providing employment opportunities, diversification of university career office roles, and establishing connections with alumni. The paper also discusses implications for Australian higher education institutions and higher education policy and practice in Australia.

There is significant research on the motivations and migration experiences of South Asian international students in Australia and the United Kingdom (UK); however, the employability journeys of this group are not well understood. This article addresses this gap, illuminating the specific employability challenges experienced and perceived by South Asian postgraduate international students enrolled in Australia and the UK. Drawing on qualitative research comprising semi-structured interviews with 30 South Asian postgraduate international students studying at a university in Australia and in the UK, the findings highlight significant barriers to employability along four key axes: time pressures from study and adjustment issues (micro); lack of internship opportunities offered at the universities (meso); lack of culturally tailored university career services (meso) and perceptions of employers' as well as Government policy implications (macro). Acknowledging and understanding these findings are important for universities to support South Asian international student employability experiences and graduate outcomes to remain competitive in the global job market. The findings suggest recommendations to enhance the employability of South Asian students in the UK and Australia.

The literature on international students predominantly emanates from the Western perspective and offers rich insights into international students' adaptation experiences. While university services improve these experiences, limited studies have investigated the role of pre-support assistance prior to students' arrival. This paper fills that gap from a non-Anglophone perspective, using 31 semi-structured, thematically analysed interviews with postgraduate international students in a Malaysian university. As country-specific research, this paper highlights practices of pre-support services for incoming international students in order to improve their experiences at a Malaysian research university. Pre-assistance provided includes the Student Ambassador Program (SAP), pre-information provided by friends and colleagues, and academics building rapport with students prior to arrival. This has a positive impact on levels of such students' engagement, satisfaction, motivation and sense of belonging to the institution.

While China has emerged as a leading host country for international students, it reinforces its determination to build a global knowledge system by integrating Chinese and Western epistemological traditions in teaching and learning to promote epistemic justice. The study aims to explore international students' challenges to current approaches to teaching and learning in Chinese higher education institutions in relation to the internationalization of curriculum. The study employed a qualitative exploratory design and collected data using semi-structured interviews with 30 international students at two prestigious Chinese universities. Based on the thematic analysis, the results highlight that international students struggle with issues such as Chinese language-dominated instruction, lack of discussion and autonomy in the classroom, limited engagement with domestic (Chinese) students and insufficient practical or hands-on learning opportunities. These findings are analysed against common standards required for the internationalization of teaching and learning. These findings have implications for classroom pedagogy in higher education institutions in China to sustain the interest of international students.

Malaysia aspires to become a regional and international hub of higher education through an international student mobility initiative. Existing scholarly work on international students is skewed towards understanding the general challenges faced by international students, but limited work has been conducted in exploring the impact of severe supervision challenges on international postgraduate students' experiences in a Malaysian research university. Hence, this paper explores the evidence of academic failure experienced by international postgraduate students by drawing on semi-structured interviews with 33 international postgraduate students. Academic failure experiences were faced by international postgraduate students as a result of two major challenges: supervision issues, and faculty mismanagement. The experience of academic failure has impacted the students' enthusiasm, motivation and inspiration in progressing in their research work and has also impacted them psychologically. The implications for developing significant and profound strategies to assist international postgraduate students in achieving positive educational outcomes are also discussed.

Given the exponential growth of international students in China, understanding the advantages of studying there is under-researched. This paper investigates benefits of such study, using 30 semi-structured qualitative interviews with international students from Asia, Africa and Western countries enrolled at two prestigious universities in Beijing and Hubei Province. The analysis identified three sets of mutually inclusive economic-, social-, cultural- and educational-related benefits: employment prospects, learning Mandarin, and building knowledge, skills and experiences. The analysis illustrates the interplay of individual and external benefits, especially the contribution to the home country, through the employability lens. The paper contributes to new insights into important nuances of the key benefits of international education relating to career and employment opportunities in home and host countries, learning Mandarin for future trade dealings and acquiring business knowledge, investment skills and management experience to benefit countries of origin.

Purpose: This paper aims to investigate the perceived sustainable supervisory relationships between supervisors and postgraduate international students at a research university in Malaysia. Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on a qualitative study based on semi-structured interviews with 33 international postgraduate students and 10 academic staff at a Malaysian research university. Findings: Perceived sustainable supervisory relationships were perceived by both stakeholders in terms of future employment rapport, further research collaborations upon graduation and global engagement via networking initiatives. Originality/value: This paper contributes to the supervision literature by establishing novel nuances in the nature and lived experiences of the sustainable supervisory relationships beyond graduation. The implications of developing significant and profound relationships beyond graduation at micro and macro levels are also discussed.

In previous studies, scholars have noted that challenges experienced by international students have an impact on their academic success. However, limited research has been conducted on how international students overcome the challenges they face in non-Western countries, such as Malaysia. This paper aims to fills this gap by investigating essential resilience strategies adopted by international students in overcoming academic obstacles, thus contributing to the literature regarding international student development. To achieve this, it adopts a qualitative approach based on 33 semi-structured interviews with postgraduate international students that were analyzed thematically. The results reveal that international students develop resilience strategies through group assignments, in classroom settings, and by seeking university and personal support services. Understanding the resilience strategies adopted by postgraduate international students in Malaysia has imperative implications for all universities as it influences the manner in which they develop guidelines to promote international students' resilience strategies and help them cope with academic adversity and difficulties.

The student engagement concept has been revolutionised so that students play an active role alongside staff members in determining their student learning experiences. Although the development of student--staff partnerships enhances student engagement and experience, empirical research on partnerships in Malaysia is scant. This paper contributes to the growing scholarly literature on such partnerships -- in particular, exploring postgraduate international students and staff members' partnership dimensions in extra-curricular activities at a research university in Malaysia. This qualitative study interviewed 33 postgraduate international students, 10 academic staff and 12 professional staff members. Based on the findings, the student-staff partnership model is well integrated into the extra-curricular activities: international students are invited to co-design and implement adjustment programmes for newly arrived international students. This paper also explores the multi-layered benefits of partnerships for postgraduate international students and for staff members. The implications of such partnerships for the university, international students and staff members are discussed.

This paper investigates the benefits of overseas tertiary education for international postgraduate students enrolled at a research-intensive university in Malaysia, an emerging yet under-researched Asian education hub. The study is based on 55 semi-structured qualitative interviews with international students and academic and professional support staff. Our analysis identified three sets of benefits linked to specific economic, educational, social and cultural pull factors: academic success, building knowledge and skills, and contributing to home country on return. Our analysis illustrates the interplay between macro and meso-level actors and policies in shaping the micro-level experiences of international students. The paper contributes new insights into vital nuances in the nature and lived experience of the key benefits of international education relating to academic success and time, language learning and friendship, and employability and 'giving back'.

The scholarly bias toward Western and English-speaking settings in the study of international education overlooks the experiences of international students in emerging education hubs in Asia. To redress this imbalance, this article offers insights into the crucial role of place in the study destination choices of a group of international postgraduate students currently enrolled at a Malaysian university. Findings from semi-structured qualitative interviews conducted with 33 students indicated that place--and specifically the pull factors of the country of Malaysia--had a primary role in their choice of overseas university. More significant than the individual attributes of any one higher education institution, key social and cultural pull factors included the sense of Malaysia as a safe environment, shared cultural values with the students' own background, the financial benefits derived from low tuition fees and low cost of living, proximity to the students' home country as well as access to culturally important items such as halal and other dietary requirements. Understanding the significance of such national-level pull factors in study destination choice has important implications for the Malaysian government's strategy of competing in the global market for international students.

International education is sought after by students primarily for career development. However, very little is known about other meaningful educational outcomes of students pursuing international education in a Malaysian university system. This paper investigates how international students perceive their meaningful contributions to society upon study completion in one research university in Malaysia. Semi-structured interviews were conducted in the university with 33 international students, mainly from Nigeria, Pakistan and China. Findings show that postgraduate international students not only want to contribute to their home society through research and teaching at higher education institutions but also to their host-country and third-country communities. The analysis illustrates the interplay between macro internationalisation of higher education policies and factors shaping the micro-level experiences of international students. This study contributes new insights into vital nuances of the international educational outcomes relating to meaningful contribution to society and community development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]