If you are an international student, you may find this post worth reading.

Let me start with an anecdote.

My first class in an American university was not fun. It was on Thursday evenings, 7-10pm. Week after week, I failed to understand why the teacher wouldn’t teach! She would come to class, sit on the table, then ask, “so, what do you think?” And an older man in the back would start speaking. As someone who had not only studied but also taught a similar course back home, I had a significant amount of knowledge on the subject. This made it worse. The gentleman would continue to share his thoughts and responses and opinions and ideas but without much reference and (honestly) understanding of the text; there were two women who took occasional turns, but they didn’t contribute any depth either. But the teacher would just shake her head, and add more questions. One hour, two hours, almost three hours, and she would not start teaching. Three hours, the class is over, without her teaching anything. The other two courses I was taking were not so bad, but this one, I was totally lost.

After a few weeks, a light went off in my head. This approach to teaching was far better than what I knew before: lecturing forever. Theoretically, I definitely knew about the “student-centered” approach to teaching. But I had never thought that you could really put it into practice to the point of almost “not teaching” at all! Continue reading

“Most international graduate students accepted into U.S. universities,” says author Virginia Gonzalez, “are the cream of the crop from their home countries. Nevertheless, their adaptation to the new academic culture in the U.S. can be an arduous task.”

Indeed, the very fact that international students get selected by US universities is most often a proof that they are among the best students in their home countries. Continue reading