Foreign-Educated Academics: Assessing Teaching Quality and Exploring Teaching-Related Challenges

Returned academics who have doctoral education abroad, a fast-growing group in developing countries, are seen favorably in producing quality academic outcomes. However, academic performance and barriers are also important to learning mobility benefits and ensuring optimal outcomes motivated by the absence of research in the native context. The explanatory sequential embedded mixed-methods study aimed to evaluate the teaching quality of returned doctorates compared with their local compatriots and explore teaching-related challenges at public sector universities in Punjab, Pakistan. A multilevel sequential mixed-methods sampling design was used to select 814 students and six academics from the six universities (three top and three medium-ranked higher education institution) of central Punjab. The researchers developed two research instruments: (a) Student Evaluation of Teaching Quality Scale (SETQS) and (b) Semi-Structured Interviews Protocol for Returnees (SSIP-R). The psychometric properties of quantitative measure (SETQS) were ensured through factor analysis, while an expert panel review validated the qualitative measure (SSIP-R). Inferential statistics were applied to quantitative data, while a thematic analysis technique was applied to qualitative data to find complementarity among results. The findings revealed that returnees and non-returnees were similar in a few teaching aspects. However, returnees performed relatively better in interpersonal behavior, subject mastery, instruction, and learning resources. Teaching performance differed slightly by discipline and largely by university ranking. Further, returnees' capacity to perform was impacted by various academic challenges. Explored challenges and relevant solutions correspond to Bronfenbrenner system theory's microsystem, exosystem, and macrosystem levels. Higher education authorities and universities need to address academic challenges. In turn, this may lead to smooth, professional reintegration of the returnees into the local system, leading to enhanced teaching performance.