Internship Reflection Paper-Bonnie

Using Intercultural Theories to Promote
International Student Engagement and

Develop A Diverse Leadership Team
May 4th, 2016
Yingfei (Bonnie) He
M.S.Ed in Intercultural Communication and Higher Education
INTERNSHIP NARRATIVE
EDUC 567 ICC Capstone Seminar
Instructor: Amy Chapman
Internship Narrative
Bonnie Yingfei He
Hey Bonnie! Hello, Bonnie [older sister]! You are Bonnie, right? Whenever I
walk on campus through Locust Walk, borrowing or returning books in the Van Pelt Library, or
passing the lounge on the first floor of the Graduate School of Education, University of
Pennsylvania (Penn GSE), I always receive these lovely greetings from my fellow international
students. Its no exaggeration to say that nearly every international student at Penn GSE has met
me or known me, or at least has seen my name. I never meant to be famous; however, my
internship made me become a renown and well-received friend of the international students at
Penn GSE. I have sent a large number of emails to all the international students at Penn GSE for
various programs, events or resources inside and outside the campus during my internship. One
of the international students said to me once that she doesn't check her email every much, but she
will immediately open my email, since she know I will bring her amazing opportunities to learn
as well as to enjoy. Students satisfaction and encouragement are the best gifts I have received
from my internship.
I.
Background
A. Abstract
I did my internship as an Intercultural Communication Fellow (ICC Fellow) in Office of
Student Affairs (OSA) in Penn GSE, with my colleague Kia Marie Lor, another ICC Fellow. As
the ICC Fellows, we designed, developed and facilitated a series of intercultural communication
programs for GSEs domestic and international students throughout the 2015-2016 academic
year. Meanwhile, we provided peer mentoring for international students and served as
intercultural advisers to committees across the university, collaborating with other student affairs
institutions, such as Career Services, Counseling & Psychological Services (CAPS), The
Graduate Student Center (GSC), Weingarten Learning Resources Center (WLRC), Greenfield
Bonnie Yingfei He
Intercultural Center (GIC), International Student and Scholar Services (ISSS) and Penn Global to
implement these programs. We developed programs on social, co-curricular, and cultural topics;
as well as provided tours and hands-on activities, to meet students identified interests and needs
during different periods of the year. Moreover, to build relationships between international
students and domestic students, and also to meet the needs of the domestic students, I developed
diverse and inclusive programs to invite domestic students to learn new cultures and to interact
with international students, as well as provided them with insightful views and hand-on skills
related to intercultural communication. Some remarkable events are: the International Student
Orientation; workshops like Your Guide to Academic Success, Transitioning to Life in the U.S.,
Philly Accent 101, Optional Practical Training (OPT)/ Curricular Practical Training (CPT)
Workshop, Pumpkin Carving and Decoration, Pumpkin Muffin Baking Workshop, GSE
International Student Career Development Series I II III, and What Kind of Cheese Workshop;
and events like the 46th International Students & Scholars Reception at Penn Museum,
Halloween Costume Party, International Student Traditional Thanksgiving Dinner, and The
Longwood Gardens Holiday Trip. Kia and I also designed and developed a comprehensive
International Student Resource Guide for all international students at Penn GSE.
According to the Table 1 below, Kia and I have designed, organized and facilitated 21
events over the 2015-2016 school year, serving more than 763 attendees. According to the
international student list serve I have, currently we have around 133 international students
registered across all divisions and degrees. Apart from the facts that domestic students attended
some of the events we had and that some students moved in or out of the list because of
graduation or enrollment, on average, roughly every international student at Penn GSE has
participated in at least 5 of our events.
Bonnie Yingfei He
#
Workshops
Date
Time
Topic
Facilitators
Attendee
Location
8/19-8/20/
Your Guide to Academic Success*2
Bonnie and Kia
50+*2
GSE
8/19-8/20
Transitioning to Life in US*2
Bonnie and Yuhong
50+*2
GSE
8/19/2015
Philly Accent 101
Bonnie, Kia, Abigail
100+
GSE
Bonnie and Kia
20
GSE Room 300
Fall 2015
August
GSE Fall Focus Group Dinner + (Advisory

September
Thur. 9/17/15 6-7:30pm
Board)
Penn Museum (46th Int'l Student & Scholars Guerdi (Kia and Bonnie in
October
Fri. 10/16/15 5-7 pm
Reception)
Orlando, FL)
Penn Museum
Fri. 10/30/15 12-1 PM
Pumpkin Carving
w/ GSC/ GSESG
20
GSC room 305
Fri. 10/30/15 7-9 PM
Halloween Costume Party
Bonnie & Kia
~70
GSC Lobby
OPT/CPT Workshop
Kate Miller
24
GSE rm 200
Thurs.
November
11/12/15
2-4:00 PM
How to bake a pumpkin/apple pie (with

Fri. 11/13/15 1-3:00 PM
Kate) + Turkey Art & Design day
Mon.
Int'l Student Traditional Thanksgiving
11/23/15
5-7:00 PM
Dinner + History of Thanksgiving
Penn Women's
Kate Ulrich
24
Center
3440 Market, 5th
w/ GSESG/ GSC
169
Floor
Longwood
December
Fri. 12/4/15
2-8:00 PM
Longwood Gardens Holiday Trip
SG & Student Affairs
38
Spring Orientation
Kia, Lois and Guerdi
10
Han Zhang
35
Gardens
SPRING 2016
January
Jan.12
GSE Int'l Student Career Development Series

Jan 29
GSE Room 120

LGBT Center
February
Fri. 2/5/16
4-6 PM
Lunar New Year Celebration
Bonnie and Kia
10
Goodhand Room
Alumni Panel
28
GSE Room 114

Fri. 2/19/16
5-7 PM
II
Bonnie Yingfei He
Inclusive Community at Penn GSE: Int'l
Student Survey
March
Tue.3/22/16
2/3/2016
II
John Tuton
15
GSC 305
What are the different types of cheese?

April
Sat. 4/2/16
Sum
Total events
Hershey Park
21
W/GSESG
Total Attendee
Hershey Park
763+
*GSESG: Graduate School of Education Student Government

Table 1: A list of events held by ICC Fellows for the 2015-2016 academic year
In this internship narrative, I will reflect on the intercultural theories we used to frame our
work to discuss the events we organized, share the achievements we gained and the challenges
we encountered, and the problem solving strategies we took. I will also share our unique success
of having a diverse team, especially the cooperation between an international student (me) and a
domestic student (Kia). Specifically, I will achieve four objectives in my narrative: 1) I will
reflect on 16 intercultural theories and how I implemented them into practice, to design
workshops, to build teamwork, and to solve problems; 2) I will use examples to explain how I
engaged international students and domestic students, both separately and together; 3) I will
discuss my achievements (Section II), challenges (Section III) and problem-solving processes
(Section IV); 4) I will talk about how my internship reflected on and contributed to the Penn
GSE Core Values: Integrity, Well-being, Inclusive Community, & Leadership (Section V).
B. The Reasons Why I Applied For This Position And How It Relates To My Personal
And Professional Goals, Connecting To My Previous Experience
Before reflecting on my internship experience, I want to talk about the reasons why I
applied for this position and how it relates to my personal and professional goals, by connecting
it to my previous experiences.
Bonnie Yingfei He
When I saw the position opening, I was very excited about the Intercultural
Communication Fellow opportunity at Penn GSE because it is perfectly tailored to both my
background and career goals. As a current graduate student dual majoring in Intercultural
Communication and Higher Education, I am gaining advanced and insightful knowledge that I
will combine into my own career focus. Because I have benefited from various study abroad and
cross-cultural experiences, one of my career interests is to work in a university setting to advise
students on pursuing overseas exchange opportunities and to help incoming international
students adjust to the new intercultural environment.
I have received many benefits from student services both at Penn and back in China. I
have two study abroad experiences: one is a semester exchange at National Taiwan University
and the other is a summer session at Georgetown University. The staff at these institutions were
inspiring mentors that I always looked up to; and their guidance and support validated that their
careers were not only intriguing but impactful on the whole community.
My unique personal values and my experiences related to student affairs and international
education constitute my life and define who I am now and who I will be in the future. Managing
student affairs, coordinating multiple events, and seeing my hard work benefit a large group of
people give me a sense of achievement and self-satisfaction that cannot be found elsewhere.
As a student assistant in the Office of International Cooperation and Exchange in Xiamen
University, the chief leader of the Student Exchange Programs in the Taiwan region, the
organizer of the English Preparation Program for Overseas Exchange Groups around the world,
and the class advisor for the Freshmen Student Leadership Training Program at XMU, I have
assisted international students and foreign guests from countries and regions such as the United
States, Canada, and Taiwan by holding seminars and organizing workshops or webinars that
Bonnie Yingfei He
guided them in cultural exchange and language preparation for studying abroad. I have also give
advice for exchange students in the aspects of application processes, visa status, transportation
information, credit exchange rules, safety, laws, and intercultural comprehension along with
offering peer mentoring to the exchange students. In addition, I am fluent in Chinese and English
and have started to learn Japanese and Korean. Having multiple language skills helps me
communicate well in intercultural settings. Most important, learning languages gives me a better
understanding of the cultural values, national identities and social meanings associated with
linguistic forms, which helps me to understand different individuals coming from different
cultural backgrounds.
Moreover, through my various student leadership roles and active volunteer activities, I
have developed strong organizational management abilities and interpersonal communication
skills. In both middle and high school, I was the chairwoman of the Student Government. In
college, I was the Vice President of Student Government and a board member of the Student
Congress of Xiamen University, which serves over 20,000 students and faculty and has 500
members across 13 Departments and 19 Schools. We organized numerous university-level events
such as whole campus celebrations and contests, as well as teacher and student forums. During
college, I also hosted and presented a cross-cultural documentary video created and co-produced
by the Japan NHK TV station and the Shanghai TV Station, and hosted nine major college-level
events including New Year celebrations, popular teacher lecture seminars, and student forums.
I continued pursuing my interest in student affairs when I enrolled in Penn GSE. I was
the president of the International Student Career Development (ISCD) organization at Penn GSE
during 2014-2015 academic year, where I designed and held alumni mentoring online webinars
for international students for sharing job-hunting tips or personal experiences; I planned and
Bonnie Yingfei He
conducted workshops for international students on topics like educational entrepreneurship and
job searching strategies, collaborating with Career Services and International Student Inc.; and I
also developed and executed various programs to support international students attendance at
conferences and special events. I feel satisfied when seeing the events I created had meaningful
impacts on the international students and their progress towards their goals.
Considering that Penn GSE is a diverse and inclusive community of learners with a
significant number of Chinese students, as an international student from China, I have unique
strengths for the ICC fellow position. I can use the lessons learned from my own experiences to
understand and guide the incoming international students in transitioning to a new life at Penn.
My personal experience with coming to Philadelphia has shown me that transitioning to a new
environment can be challenging and stressful. There is an article that is popular in international
students circle in the U.S. in general named Do You Still Remember The First Time You Cried
After You Going Abroad? (Missingchild, 2014). I can unequivocally confirm that almost every
one of us has cried for various reasons after being placed in a new environment as a foreigner. I
bring to my work awareness and empathy for the challenges that future students will face as
newcomers. I sincerely want to share my unique experiences with the incoming international
students like me, and provide unconditional warmth and support to ease their assimilation into
the GSE community.
I maintain active involvement with on-campus student services including Career
Services, WLRC, ISSS, GSC and CAPS, by attending the workshops and making appointments
with advisors. My involvement in these student services has given me an appreciation for their
hard work and has helped me develop a strong respect for these staff, whom I aspire to be like in
Bonnie Yingfei He
the near future. Meanwhile, I have become familiar with their routines, learned how to work
collectively with them, and learned event designing skills and mentoring methods from them.
All in all, I am mentally, academically and professionally well prepared to taking this
internship role.
C. SIIC Fellow: The Pre-training Program
To talk about my role as an ICC Fellow, I need to talk about my other role as a Summer
Institute of Intercultural Communication Fellow (SIIC Fellow) first, since the SIIC Fellows
Program is the pre-training for our yearlong work as ICC Fellows in the GSE Student Affairs
Office. After having personal conversations with Nicole and Maxtla (previous ICC fellows), as
they shared their wonderful experiences of participating in the SIIC program and explained how
SIIC helped them frame their work at Penn GSE, I became inspired to join this pre-training
program.
The Summer Institute of Intercultural Communication (SIIC) conference is one grand
gathering of professionals, students, and educators in the field of intercultural communication.
SIIC creates an inclusive, diverse and supportive community for people to gain up-to-date
knowledge, explore the field, and network with others in a safe, welcoming and comfortable
environment. As part of the SIIC conference, the SIIC Fellow Program offers the fellows (chosen
from applicants with diverse backgrounds from all over the world) who work in both
international and domestic intercultural contexts, a 3-week professional development experience
every July at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. It offers an unique opportunity for fellows to
explore the field of intercultural communication, to assess career directions, to commit to a
personal intercultural practice, and to learn about intercultural team development by working
directly with other fellows, SIIC staff, and faculty.
Bonnie Yingfei He
The opportunity to attend the SIIC Fellows Program is enlightening and meaningful. I
was one of 25 applicants chosen from the entire world as SIIC Fellows. Throughout the program,
I prepared and beautified the Reed College campus for the arrival of conference faculty and
guests, and also I co-facilitated and worked with Institute faculty to ensure the smooth operation
of their workshops. Through this program, I not only gained a lot of theoretical knowledge and
an invaluable professional development opportunity to explore the field of ICC, but I also
attained great personal intercultural skills as preparation for my future career path.
As the pre-training program for us to take the ICC Fellow roles, this professional
development opportunity at SIIC prepared us to develop programs that provide meaningful
social, cultural and academic engagement opportunities for GSE international and domestic
students. We learned intercultural theories and gained many teamwork and leadership building
skills. Most importantly, as roommates, Kia and I studied, worked and lived together for three
weeks, which helped us to acknowledge our different personalities. Through this program, we
got to know more about each other and became aware of each others working styles, and thus
built a solid foundation for effective teamwork later in our internship.
II.
Internship Achievements
In this section, I will talk about the success we have achieved during our internship from
two domains: good turnouts and good teamwork. In the part of the good turnouts, I will firstly
use data I collected to demonstrate the good turnouts in detail, and also to compare them with
last years and previous years turnouts. Then, I will discuss what facts determined the good
turnouts from three aspects: 1) Theoretical-based events; 2) Successful marketing strategies; and
3) Creative and inclusive designs. In the part of the good teamwork, I will discuss the leadership
10
Bonnie Yingfei He
and support we received from the Office of Student Affairs (OSA), our collaboration with
student government, and from various offices and centers on campus, such as GSC and Career
Services to name a few. Finally, I will emphasize the importance of a diverse leadership team
made up of members with international and domestic students perspectives. Specifically, I will
focus on how our diverse leadership team helped to build effective teamwork, as Kia and I
brought our perspectives as one domestic student and one international student. We have
different cultural backgrounds and personalities, but are honest, mindful and intellectually
prepared with strong Intercultural competence.
A. The Good Turnouts
Most of our workshops had great turnouts, which met our expectations and filled the
spaces. Especially, we achieved phenomenal turnouts for the following two events. We had great
participation for the 2-day International Student Orientation (ISO); the break-out sessions each
had more than 50 participants, and the whole group session had more than 100 participants.
During first day of the orientation, the students didnt leave after lunch, and most of them stayed
until the whole days orientation finished. There were even more students for the second day,
since students who didnt participate the first day heard from classmates and friends that the
orientation was fun and useful, so they were attracted to come. We even received requests to
participate from international students outside GSE on the second day.
In addition, we also received great turnouts for the Traditional Thanksgiving Dinner
event. We got 169 participants across divisions, master's and doctoral students, domestic and
international students, which filled the biggest room on the 5th floor of 3440 Market and ended
up with our borrowing chairs and the attendees having fully consumed the food and desserts.
Students quite enjoyed the event and I received huge compliments from students and staff.
11
Bonnie Yingfei He
Moreover, comparing these two events with the ones last year and in previous years, Our
wonderful achievement this year is confirmed again. International Students Orientation (ISO)
never had international students outside GSE request to attend before. Previously, ISO usually
lost participants for the second days workshop, but this was the first time it got even more
participants for the second day. As well, it is sad to say, but last years Traditional Thanksgiving
Dinner was a big failure. Only around 10-15 people (room is prepared to 100 people) came, ate,
and left. The two presenters didnt show up, so the whole events agenda was forced to be cut in
half. The event had lots of food left and the organizer ended up asking students to take 2-3 boxes
of food to go.
Good turnouts were due to the sufficient theoretical and practical preparation we had
done for creatively and inclusively designing and organizing the events, as well as to the
marketing strategies we used to reach out to more students.
1. Theoretically Based Events
We used multiple intercultural theories directly and indirectly to guide our design and
facilitation of workshops and events. I will specifically discuss the theories we learned from our
ICC programs core courses-EDUC 593-Experiential Learning Design for Intercultural
Communication, and EDUC 676-Discursive Approaches In Intercultural Communication-, as
well as the theories and models we learned from SIIC.
Theories from EDUC 593 Experiential Learning Design for Intercultural Communication
a. Learning styles (Kolb, 1985). Concerned with learners cognitive processes, Kolb
developed a model to classify four separate learning styles, based on the four-stage
learning cycle that he created: concrete experience (feeling), reflective observation
(watching), abstract conceptualization (thinking), and active experimentation (doing).
12
Bonnie Yingfei He
Kolb created a cross axis for two continuums: the processing continuum (action
taking and approaching) and the perception continuum (emotionally feeling and
thinking), which divide the four learning styles-diverging, assimilating, converging,
and accommodating. The inventory gives the learners a chance to know their personal
learning styles by answering a series of online questions. More importantly, it shows
that people have different learning styles no matter what their original cultures are.
And generally, there are more visual learners and practical learners.
Based on the knowledge of Kolbs learning styles, Kia and I always designed
and developed our workshops with different sections to meet different learners
needs. Specifically, we incorporated more visual and hands-on activities in designing
workshops, as generally there are more learners loving to learn through watching and
doing. For example, rather than doing a lecture on what American people usually eat
for Halloween and Thanksgiving season, we designed a Pumpkin Muffin Baking
workshop instead, to give students a chance to learn from practice and to get more
familiar with the traditional ingredients that American people use to bake, such as
pumpkin and cinnamon, which are hard to find in Asian cultures.
b. Learning cycle (Pfeiffer, 1983). Pfeiffer introduced the experiential learning cycle
model developed by Pfeiffer and Jones, which divided the process of experiential
learning into 5 stages in a structured experiencing flow; they are 1) experiencing, 2)
publishing, 3) processing, 4) generalizing, and 5) applying. That is to say, a general
process of learning is: starting from experiencing the activities, to sharing and
reflecting on feelings and observations, to discussing the inner-reasons or patterns
13
Bonnie Yingfei He
behind the experiences, to thinking of real-life implications, and finally turning

learning into an action plan.
We used this fundamental framework model in designing our own workshops
during our internship. Specifically, Kia and I used experiential activities to help
explain abstract concepts like cross-cultural miscommunication to international
students. And then we deepened their understanding and form practical implications
through group debrief and discussions. Finally we helped them to form action plans to
put into practice. For example, in the Philly Accent 101 workshop, we let students
recall their experience about Philadelphian Accent. Then, we taught them 10 key
features of Philadelphia accent and informed them how to use these in daily
conversation. Finally, we gave out a role-play scenario to students in pairs and asked
them to practice using a Philly accent to order a Philly cheese steak.
c. Needs assessment (Soriano, 2012). Needs assessment refers to a well-thought-out
and impartial systematic effort to collect objective data or information that brings to
light or enhances understanding of the need for services or programs (p.5). Needs
assessments are typically conducted to use the information collected to inform
services or programs needs and then determine what action plans to undertake to
address community concerns.
Kia and I used multiple types of needs assessments, in order to find out the needs
and interests of our students in potential activities and programs. Based on the results,
we reshaped our plan for our yearlong work, trying to maximize the benefits to our
students. For example, we designed and worked on an inclusive and diverse survey
for all international students to take to find their specific needs, especially engaging
14
Bonnie Yingfei He
individual international students from the less-represented countries, other than China
and other East Asian countries. Moreover, we created a series of focus group dinners
to hear students ideas about the following events planning at the beginning of fall
2015 semester.
d. Evaluation (Brooks-Harris & Stock-Ward, 1999) The purpose of evaluation is to
learn from the past work and guide the future. Evaluations can be used to answer a
variety of questions, including, To what extent is Program X meeting its goals?
How can the program be improved? and Is Program X worth continuing or
expanding? Along with introducing the purpose of conducting evaluation, the
authors also introduce two forms of evaluation- evaluating satisfaction and objectivebased evaluation, and four strategies in evaluation- formative or summative strategies,
quantitative or qualitative strategies, and formal or informal strategies; and provided
recommendations on how to combine those strategies in order to meet different
evaluation needs.
Informed by this chapter, Kia and I used multiple ways of evaluation of the
pluses (something went well) and deltas (something might be changed) of each event
in order to serve better next time, like survey and interviews with students, as well as
self-evaluation. For example, Kia and I always evaluated the Pluses and Deltas of
every event in our field notes (see Appendix A), reported them in weekly staff
meetings and discussed lessons learnt. Through evaluations, we tried to gather student
feedback and reflect on our achievements and challenges. It helps us find problems
and solve problems.
15
Bonnie Yingfei He
e. Active listening (Weaver & Farrell, 1997) Active listening is one of the most
important skills a facilitator can possess to help him or her to be aware of the group
dynamics and to interpret what the group wants to complete in the workshop. The
active listening process contains three steps: 1) sensing: to gain information through
all of ones senses; 2) interpreting: to think through the internal meaning of the
utterances; 3) checking: based on the heard information, to try to ask the speakers to
clarity what has been said in order to get a mutual understanding of the message,
through ways of repeating, paraphrasing or reflective the statements.
I used active listening a lot in facilitating our events, specifically during focus
group dinners, when I was eager to hear what students want, and I carefully encoded
their needs into our potential services. Also, active listening helped smooth and make
the communication effective between my co-workers and me.
Theories from EDUC 676 Discursive Approaches In Intercultural Communication
a. Communicative repertoire (Rymes, 2014) Communication repertoire is the
collection of ways-including languages and other communication such as gestures,
dress, posture, and accessories -people use to effectively define themselves and to
find common ground during intercultural communication. Based on Rymess
communicative repertoire theory, we teach students that communication occurs not
only through verbal language, but also through other means, such as gestures, dress,
posture, and accessories, which are non-verbal languages. Therefore, students should
be aware of the possibility of both verbal and non-verbal communication. For
example, we wrote a note to all international students about cultural appropriation for
the Halloween Costume Party, as how your dress and your gestures are also ways of
16
Bonnie Yingfei He
communication, which might result in conflicts if they are not appropriately

addressed (See figure 1).
Dear Penn GSE Colleagues,
Halloween is a great time of the year for everyone! We get to dress up in
different costumes and participate in frightening activities. As we all prepare for
Halloween this year, let's be mindful of how we are representing ourselves and
others. We wanted to share a few things about cultural appropriation with
everyone in order to make your experience (and everyone else's experience) the
BEST HALLOWEEN EVER.
What is cultural appropriation?
In short, cultural appropriation is when someone adopts elements of someone
else's culture and use it for their benefit. Cultural appropriation typically
involves members of a dominate group exploiting the culture of less privileged
groups, with little understanding of that culture's history, experience, and
traditions.
We've gathered a few articles to share with you about why cultural appropriation
is wrong and how you can avoid it. Below are links that you may find helpful:
What's Wrong with Cultural Appropriation?
http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/06/cultural-appropriation-wrong/
Is Your Halloween Costume Racist?
http://everydayfeminism.com/2013/10/is-your-halloween-costume-racist/
Warmest,
Bonnie and Kia
Figure 1 The Halloween Costume Party Cultural Appropriation Letter We Sent
b. Cross-cultural pragmatic failure (Thomas, 1983) Thomas redefined pragmatic

failure, as a situation in which the hearer could understand the literal meaning of the
certain words that the speaker utters, but is unable to get the intention from the
speaker by only hearing the words from the speaker. Drawing on previous work, she
also further distinguished two types of pragmatic failures. One is pragmalinguistic
failure, which is a linguistic problem caused by peoples different understandings of a
17
Bonnie Yingfei He
linguistic utterance associated with certain pragmatic force. The other one is
sociopragmatic failure, which occurs when the communicative intentions placed on
the linguistic behaviors are encoded differently by the hearer because of differences
in cultural values, social norms, and beliefs of rights. I incorporated the idea of crosscultural pragmatic failure in the design of the experiential learning activity-the Tape
Activity- during the International Student Orientation, which will be discussed in
detail below.
Theories from the Summer Institute of Intercultural Communication
a. W Curve (Kim, 2005). Kim introduced the integrative theory of cross-cultural
adaptation, which is a dynamic process in which an individual develops a
relationship with the new environment, by communicating directly or indirectly. Kim
used concepts of acculturation (the acquisition of new cultural features, patterns, and
practices) and deculturation (the loss of old cultural habits, ideologies, behaviors) to
introduce the process of cross-cultural adaptation. Based on these concepts, the
stress-adaptation-growth dynamic is captured in Kims theory to describe
individuals revolutions of personal identity and personhood development in crosscultural environments.
We use Kims cross-cultural adaptation theory as the model framework to build a
W Curve to structure our event planning for 2015-2016 (see figure 2). Even though
we didn't completely follow the plan and we did make changes and revisions as time
went by, the W Curve was the initial framework to guide us in thinking about what
events are appropriate for certain periods of time. For example, the bottom of the
W Curve is a stress period (which is usually during mid-term or final examination
18
Bonnie Yingfei He
time), so we planned some easy, less academic events, like the Longwood Gardens
trip. The top of the W Curve is the growth time (between two stress time points), so
we formed a OPT/CPT workshop to encourage students to think earlier about how to
deal with their immigration statuses appropriately when studying and working in the
United States.
Figure 2: The W curve we used to plan yearlong events at the beginning of fall.
b. Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) (Hammer, Bennett & Wiseman, 2003).

Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) is created as a practical instrument in the
form of a 50-item questionnaire to measure to how interculturally sensitive and
competent people have achieved in intercultural settings. The IDI model measures the
19
Bonnie Yingfei He
intercultural sensitivity and intercultural competence of people. Intercultural

sensitivity is the ability to discriminate and experience relevant cultural difference,
which is awareness-based; while intercultural competence is the ability to think and
act in interculturally appropriate ways, which is skill-based.
We incorporate the IDI model in our events to help international students
differentiate between being aware of and behaving appropriately. Specifically,
we generated a cultural appropriation email to all participants in the Halloween
Costume Party, to help them be aware of cultural differences when choosing
costumes dressing and to encourage them to address appropriately for events attended
by students from diverse cultural backgrounds.
c. The Capital C Culture Approach (Bennett & Bennett, 2004). The Capital C
Cultural Approach is one of the approaches to practice diversity training, which
focuses on educating objective culture, involving such things as food and holidays.
We used the approach in planning events like Thanksgiving Dinner, Halloween Party,
Pumpkin Pie Baking and Lunar New Years food celebrations.
d. The Isms Approach (Bennett & Bennett, 2004). The Isms Approach is another
of the approaches to practice diversity training, which focuses on teaching people the
negative parts of racism, sexism, ageism, and homophobia. We used this approach at
Thanksgiving Dinner when we introduced the history of the Thanksgiving holiday,
and also when we wrote the letter about cultural appropriation to all students in
participating in the Halloween Costume Party.
e. Cultural marginality (Bennett, 1993). Janet Bennetts study defines two kinds of
cultural marginality, encapsulated marginality and constructive marginality.
20
Bonnie Yingfei He
Encapsulated marginality, or trapped by marginality, happens when a person is

isolated or separated from other culture groups by entering a different culture
environment, and cannot find a unified identity for himself. However, constructive
marginality occurs when a person can make his/ her own choices to successfully
create her/his new identity when entering a new culture.
With the experiential Tape Activity, we incorporated the idea of cultural
marginality, both encapsulated marginality and constructive marginality into the
Academic Success Workshop held during the International Student Orientation in
order to help the students be aware of the possible challenges they will face studying
and living in the U.S.
2. Successful Marketing Strategies
Besides using theories to guide our events, we also used multiple mass media marketing
strategies to advertise our events, keep students posted, and follow up afterward. We used
Photoshop to create attractive posters for each event, sharing details about event information (see
Appendix B). When advertising the events, we always wrote a brief description of the events and
what to expect at the events (see Appendix C). We always had food at every event as a hook. We
always had a registration link associated with each event to keep record, and to enable us to
adjust the room size and food order accordingly. We sent every events information through
email to each individual international student; we also published our events in multiple divisions
Facebook pages, as well as had them in the InsidePennGSE weekly newsletter. We sent students
who registered for the events a reminder the day before the event. I used the WeChat platform to
specifically reach out Chinese international students, by inviting them to come and by answering
their questions and addressing their concerns. At every event, we announced our next event to
21
Bonnie Yingfei He
keep students informed. After every event, we sent follow-ups as needed, if wed promised to at
the workshop.
3. Creative And Inclusive Designs
The creative and inclusive designs of events also helped to ensure great turnout this year.
We created or redesigned every event we had this year, including the Pumpkin Carving and
Decoration Event, Pumpkin Muffin Baking Workshop and the Halloween Costume Party. Our
goal was to make the events fun and interesting but also informative and useful. So we put a lot
of preparation into every event. In terms of planning events, Kia and I were mindful and creative,
always thinking as if we were in others shoes. We used the question of what do our students
want? not what can we offer? to guide our event planning. In the following paragraphs, I
give several examples of our creative and inclusive designs.
At the International Student Orientation (ISO) in August 2015, in order to help students
understand the pragmatic failures (Thomas, 1983) that could happen in cross-cultural contexts,
Kia and I facilitated an experiential learning activity as part of the topic of academic success in
U.S. classrooms. We asked three volunteers who had hair ties or shoe ties to come up front, and
untied their hair or shoes. The first time, we used tape to stick their thumbs to their palms to
make their thumbs unmovable, and then make them tie their hair or shoes. We asked the students
if there was any difference from without taping their thumbs. Most of them could still
successfully tie their hair/shoes but it took longer than it usually did and they experienced a few
problems. The second time, we bent and wrapped all their fingers together and made both of
their hands into fists. Then, we asked them to tie their hair/shoes again. No one could do it this
time and the whole class laughed loudly. We designed this activity to show that, when coming to
a new cultural environment, everyone is experiencing new linguistic forms and social norms
22
Bonnie Yingfei He
which are different from the ones they know. New students will definitely encounter language
and cultural problems and feel unable to do things theyd taken for granted before. Students need
to be aware of the possible problems caused by inappropriate behaviors in intercultural
communication.
However, rather than call this phenomenon pragmatic failure, we should actually call it
pragmatic dissonance, because pragmatic differences could not only cause problems but also
bring opportunities to learn and to engage in teamwork. So at the end of the tape activities, after
the participants hands had all been made into fists, we said they could ask for help from their
team members. Then, unsurprisingly, they could tie their hair/shoes again within several seconds.
We debriefed again and told the students, even though your English linguistic capability is
limited, and you and your classmates are from various cultural backgrounds, which could be
challenging and sometimes cause despair. Always remember we are all here to help you learn
and help you grow. So asking for help from peers, advisors and families is a great way to help
you combat with culture shock and intercultural miscommunication.
The Philly accent is a unique linguistic feature of Philadelphian. Therefore, we also
incorporated a Philly Accent 101 session during the International Student Orientation to help
new students get more familiar with Philadelphian culture and also to have something fun to do
after a long days orientation. We invited a local Philadelphian, Abby Shepherd, who works as
the Program Coordinator at Alliance for Higher Education and Democracy (PennAHEAD) and
who is also a part-time Higher Education student, to introduce the incoming international
students to the Philly Accent and to have them practice how to order a Philly cheese steak using
a Philly accent. We also used a Tony Chestnut song and dance to warm up the workshop as an
icebreaker, in order to help the students get refreshed after lunch and busy morning.
23
Bonnie Yingfei He
For the Traditional Thanksgiving Dinner, I came up with an idea to offer GSE notecards
and stamps to international students to write thank-you letters to parents, families, friends, and
whomever they want to thank. I promised that I would help them mail out all the cards. We had
letters mailed to Thailand, Germany, France, South Korea, China, and also within the States. We
soon ran out of notecards and stamps. Seeing the students write letters to the ones they loved in
another corner of the world became the most touching moment during the dinner, and one
through which I highlighted that the spirit of Thanksgiving Day is love and gratitude. We had
also prepared materials and models for gratitude trees and turkey hands; and students were able
to use the materials to show their own gratitude.
B. Good Teamwork
One of my biggest achievements during my internship is the fact that I gained good
teamwork skills. Effective team dynamics helped achieve good turnouts as well. Through
cooperating with team leaders, team members, and various offices and organizations on/off
campus, I got familiar with different working styles and developed strategies to collaborate with
others effectively and professionally. In the following section, I discuss examples of teamwork
experience during my internship and also talk about what facts enhanced teambuilding and
resulted in great team dynamics.
1. Leadership
First, I want to talk about the five ladies in the Office of Student Affairs: Lois
MacNamara, the Assistant Dean for Academic & Student Affairs; Imani Harvin, the Student
Affairs Assistant; Guerdiana (Guerdi in short) Thelomar, the Student Affairs Graduate Assistant,
who is a M.S.Ed. candidate in International Educational Development Program; and Kia and I,
two ICC fellows (See Figure 3). The five of us worked as a group and had weekly staff meetings
24
Bonnie Yingfei He
to report on our work, share personal life experiences, and ask for questions or help. We worked
like as a team, but more like a family. Imani, Guerdi, Kia and I are similar in age, ranging from
22-24, and we had Lois like our mom who cares about us and constantly gave us support. All of
us shared love, care, and considerations toward each other generously. My supervisor Lois
MacNamara is very responsible, supportive, and open-minded. She gave us trust and the freedom
to do whatever we wanted and created. She is an expert at using the art of communication and
mindfulness. She always wanted to give the students the best and gives us the best opportunity to
achieve our goals. Imani was really helpful in assisting us with the logistics of our event
planning. She is punctual and accountable. Guerdi always helped us by setting up and cleaning
up and offered endless support, even though we had different responsibilities in the office. In
fact, we all shared resources, and offered, as well as received countless favors to/from each
other.
Figure 3: Penn GSE Student Affairs 2015-2016
25
Bonnie Yingfei He
2. Collaboration With Other Offices And Individuals

In addition to collaborating with our teammates with in the Office of Student Affairs, Kia
and I also collaborated with various offices and student organizations on campus, such as GSE
Student Government (GSESG), GSC, and Career Services. Without collaborating with them, we
could never have achieved such huge success. Specifically, I co-developed and co-facilitated a
Transitioning to life in the U.S. workshop with CAPS counselor Yuhong He at the International
Student Orientation. We worked together to create 3 scenarios on topics of personal identity and
career concerns, romantic relationship, and school performance, which based on my own
experience and Dr. Hes previous experience of counseling international students at Penn, we
considered the most important three aspects of cross-cultural transitioning the students will
encounter. We discussed possible problems and solutions to solve the issues. The workshop went
well and students enjoyed the interactive activities with real scenarios, and they preferred those
to listening to lectures. In the middle of last semester, I received several messages from students,
who had attended the workshop, expressing thankfulness for the information wed given them in
the orientation because they had encountered the issues wed discussed in the scenarios and they
found the solutions wed offered to be helpful.
Moreover, we collaborated with the student government on Longwood Gardens Trip and
the Hershey Trip. In addition to splitting the cost of renting buses, helping adverting events, and
coordinating those trips, this year, we also founded a committee with GSESG leaders, senates,
and ICC fellows. We had full body meetings every month to update each other on our work and
also to seek ways to cooperate.
In addition, we invited Kate Miller Syoum, an International Student & Scholar Advisor
from International Student and Scholars Services (ISSS) to give a speech on OPT/CPT. For the
26
Bonnie Yingfei He
second workshop of our International Student Career Development Series, we collaborated with
ISHD division to organize an international alumni panel. For the third workshop of our
International Student Career Development Series, we invited John Tuton, a Career Advisor from
Career Services to give us a workshop on international students job search strategies. We also
collaborated with the Penn Museum for its 46th International Students and Scholars Reception
by offering sponsorship. We collaborated with GSC, Penn Womens Center (PWC), and LGBT
center by borrowing their spaces for events.
Besides, collaborating with official offices and organizations, we also invited our peers or
colleagues to help with facilitations. For example, Abby Shepherd from Higher Education
programs helped facilitate the Philly Accent 101 workshop as a local Philadelphian and Kate
Ulrich from the Intercultural Communication program facilitated the Pumpkin Muffin Baking
Workshop, as she is a baking lover. Further, we also invited alumni to come back and share their
work experiences with current students and gave job opportunities, such as Han Zhang. Han
came for the first workshop of the International Student Career Development Workshop Series,
giving a presentation on Advice From A GSE International Alumnus: Job Hunting Tips & Secrets
About The Education Industry In China. Not only did we work with the people wed already
known or we are familiar with, but we also reached out to off-campus organizations to seek
cooperation opportunities. For instance, we also reached out to Di Bruno Bros on the cheese
workshop that we planned but would be held in Fall 2016.
3. A Diverse Leadership Team With Different Perspectives: My Co-Worker And I
Its no exaggeration to say that I did nearly every tiny piece of my work during my
internship with my lovely co-worker Kia, who always said, Bonnie and Kia are sisters from
different mothers, which is actually really true. Kia and I were both as short Asian girls with
27
Bonnie Yingfei He
yellow skins, both wear short black hairs with similar hair styles, were both born in April (Kia is
9 days order than me). And most importantly, we are all positive, friendly, mindful and honest to
each other. Without each other, we couldnt have such great achievements in our internship.
Both of us believe the collaboration of two of us in taking this role is a major reason for our
success. Therefore, I will give more detailed discussion on how Kia and I worked together by
supporting each other, and the importance of a diverse leadership team with different
perspectives.
Figure 4: Kia and Bonnie, Best Co-workers Forever!
Kia and I are two ICC fellows and we worked together for the whole year (See figure 4).
However, before us there was only one domestic student taking this role every year. This year,
28
Bonnie Yingfei He
Lois believed Kia and I were both indispensable and we could work well by collaborating with
each other. Finally, two of us worked together to achieve our goals by bringing an international
students perspective and a domestic students perspective, and also achieved a rare and
remarkable relationship, both professionally and personally.
Through the three weeks pre-training at SIIC, Kia and I had worked as teammates and
also lived as roommates, from which we recognized the differences in our personalities and
cultural backgrounds and developed a mutual understanding of each others personalities through
team building and theoretical works. By sharing personal stories and believes of values, we
started to build our close and tight friendship.
In the team building of SIIC fellows, both of us took the tests and discussion of
Enneagram (Baron & Wagele, 2009). The Enneagram is a study introducing nine different
personality types among people from all different cultural backgrounds, through defining certain
traits associate with specific personalities. The nine different personality types are: 1) the
perfectionist, 2) the helper, 3) the achiever, 4) the romantic, 5) the observer, 6) the questioner, 7)
the adventurer, 8) the asserter, and 9) the peacemaker. This model gives specific examples about
what is hard or easy to people in each personality type, and what each kind of person does when
they are taking certain roles in life; it also provides practical instructions about how to get along
with the each type of person. It helps people to know what personality they have and to find
reasons for certain behaviors or emotions. By taking the test, we found out that I am a
perfectionist and Kia is a peacemaker. According to the theory and our personal experiences, I
am the kind of person who always searches for what is wrong and tries to fix it; while Kia is the
type of person who likes to be nonjudgmental and accepting, and being able to care for the
others. Therefore, I always said words like I don't think it will turn out good. Shall we do this
29
Bonnie Yingfei He
instead? Shall we move this part? I think we need to change it, while Kia always
responded with sentences like, Yep, I agree with you. Lets do that. Okay, thats fine with
me. It is lucky that our personalities matched well and we gained a mutual understanding of
each others working styles and most importantly, felt comfortable about working with each
other.
Honesty and mindfulness helped us to solve conflicts and communicate with each other
effectively. Kia and I are both Aries. If you believe the constellations like us, our personal traits
are alike from these aspects like- honesty, positivity and braveness, and most important,
directness. Therefore, Kia and I had an agreement naturally to communicate to each other
honestly and directly. For example, I like to state out things as soon as possible when the ideas
come to my mind, otherwise I am easily to forget them. So sometimes, I am more likely to
interrupt others when they are still talking. So I expressed this to Kia and hoped she could
understand. Like this, we shared our feeling, emotion and thoughts authentically, as we already
had founded a mutual trust between us. Our mutual understanding helped build our personal
relationship, which made our collaboration easier and more effective.
Moreover, as both ICC students and SIIC fellows, we used theories and models we learnt
from classes and the conference to prepare ourselves intellectually and build up our intercultural
communication competence.
a. Personal Leadership (PL) & Critical Moment Dialogue (CMD) (Schaetti, Ramsey
& Watanabe, 2008). The authors created a framework of Personal Leadership (PL) to
help people to interact effectively across cultural differences and in times of change
and uncertainty. PL is a framework combined with 2 principles-Mindfulness and
Creativities- and 6 practices: 1) Aligning with vision; 2) Engaging Ambiguity; 3)
30
Bonnie Yingfei He
Cultivating Stillness; 4) Attending to judgment; 5) Attending to emotion; and 6)

Attending to physical sensation. Based on the framework of PL, a model of Critical
Moment Dialogue (CMD) is created, which added several questions for people to
answer when using each of the 6 practices of PL. CMD is a practical tool to help
people reflect critically about certain situation or experiences, especially in
interpersonal problem solving.
We learned Personal Leadership (PL) and used Critical Moment Dialogue
(CMD) as a tool to demonstrate PL at SIIC as a fundamental training teamwork and
personal development for us. PL helped me to be more mindful when communicating
to co-workers and students, by engaging the personal and cultural understanding and
leap out of culturally based conclusions.
b. Active Listening (Weaver & Farrell, 1997) helped smooth and created effective
communication between my co-workers and me, showing mindfulness and
respectfulness.
c. Development Model on Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS) (Bennett, 1993). Bennett
proposes a new cognitive Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS),
drawing from previous developmental models of intercultural sensitivity and
competency. The model is a framework to explain how peoples reactions change in
cross-cultural settings when their interactions get deeper and more complex. It
describes 6 stages through which people pass when increasing their intercultural
sensitivity. The first three DMIS stages (Denial, Defense, and Minimization) are
ethnocentric, which means people are viewing their own cultures as the centric, to
avoid acknowledging difference from other cultures; the second three DMIS stages
31
Bonnie Yingfei He
(Acceptance, Adaptation, and Integration) are ethnorelative, meaning that people

experience their own cultures through the understanding of the others, in order to
embrace difference.
As the fundamental framework of the intercultural communication field for
the past few decades, the DMIS provided Kia and me with a solid academic and
theoretical framework of the cognitive development of international students
(including myself), when they are entering a new environment. Also, I am able to
reflect certain behaviors and attitudes of my students to evaluate what stages they are
and offer specific help.
d. The Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) (Hammer, Bennett & Wiseman,
2003). The IDI model gave us a more concrete understanding of our intercultural
sensitivity and intercultural competence and helped us keep developing ourselves to
engage international students and become better intercultural education specialists.
e. Cultural Marginality (Bennett, 1993) provided us with strong footing in our work,
which helped us recognize the identity challenges in the life of our international
students entering a completely new cultural environment. Also, I was developing my
own identities at Penn GSE, changing from encapsulated marginality to
constructive marginality, which helped me better understand the study as well as
offer students more concise and personal advises.
f. Pyramid Model Of International Competence (Deardorff, 2006). Deardorff
introduced a pyramid model of intercultural competence that contains four stages of
development. The first stage is Requisite Attitudes, namely, respect, openness,
curiosity and discovery. The second stage of Knowledge & Comprehension, include
32
Bonnie Yingfei He
such concepts as cultural self-awareness, deep understanding and knowledge of

culture, culture-specific information and sociolinguistic awareness; and Skills,
namely, the skills of listening, observing, interpreting, analyzing, evaluating, and
relating. The third stage is Desired Internal Outcomes, which are adaptability,
flexibility, an ethnorelative viewpoint, and empathy. The final stage is Desired
External Outcome, that is to say, one is able to behave and communicate effectively
and appropriately in intercultural settings. This model gives details and practical
examples of peoples intercultural competence through different development stages.
This model gave us a tool to identify and assess intercultural competence of
students and ourselves. We used these four stages of intercultural competence
building to reflect on our professional development.
III.
Internship Challenges
We have achieved great success, but also we have encountered challenges as well. In this
section, I will discuss the challenges we haved encountered in 6 aspects: 1) the complaints from
the ISO survey; 2) some events being less popular than others; 3) difficulty in cooperation with
other offices; 4) need to be more inclusive; 5) logistical problems; and 6) cost. In the next section
(Section VI), I will discuss how we used various theories and tools to overcome these challenges
and solve problems.
A.
The Complains From The ISO Survey
We sent out a survey in the middle of last semester to evaluate the International Student
Orientation results. Most of the feedback was great, however, we also received several bad
words. We have received comments like I had already lived in the states for undergraduate, so a
33
Bonnie Yingfei He
lot of it didn't apply to me, I do not like the Philly Accent session, Please shorten the
childish games in the survey (See Appendix D). It was heartbreaking, but also worthwhile for
us to reflect and think what we could do better next time.
B.
Some Events Were Less Popular
Some events were less popular than the others, for example, the Longwood Gardens trip
and the Lunar New Year celebration. We collaborated with GSESG in co-organizing the
Longwood Gardens Trip. We ordered two buses and we sold out all the tickets. However, only
half of the students showed up for the trip. One of the buses only served 5 students, with another
40 seats empty. On the day, no representative from student government showed up except
Laronnda, the president of GSESG, so we faced an embarrassing situation to handle everything
but we didnt expect to. The bus driver lost temper that day and took 30 minutes to fix the
handicapped elevator and seats. There were reasons caused the challenge. For example, the time
for the trip was during finals season, while fewer students could have time to show up. Also, we
lacked communication with our partners in GSESG, and we both assumed the other would take
the role in organizing the event. Overall, we didn't know each others plans and expectations and
didn't ask ahead of time.
Another example of less successful turnouts was that only around 10 people showed up
for the Lunar New Year celebration. Even though the students who came still enjoyed the event,
a lot of accidents happened for that workshop, which made it less successful than the ones
before. I analyzed and summarized several reasons why this event became less successful: 1)
There were too many similar events happening at the same time. For example, during the 2-week
period of time including before and after Chinese New Year, other than our Lunar New Year
celebration, Chinatown had Lion Dance and celebration, Teaching Chinese @ Penn had similar
34
Bonnie Yingfei He
making dumplings event, and the Chinese Student and Scholar Association at Penn (CSSAP)
also had a Chinese New Year party. A great number of similar events split the flow of
international students. 2) The Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender (LGBT) Center locates too far
away from campus and is not easy to find, as well as is less known to international students. A
couple of student came on the events were late and got lost before it was so hard to get to the
space. It was in a cold winter day, and it was far to get to a place where international students are
not familiar with, all of which reduced the motivation of the students to get out of warm rooms to
attend the event. 3) Available spacious spaces on Campus with kitchens for us to do this kind of
cooking workshop are limited. As I know, there are only the Penn Womens Center, Greenfield
Intercultural Center and LGBT Center, which are qualified to offer this kind of spaces. However,
during that time period, these spaces were almost booked, so we could only use the space from
3:30-5:00pm on Friday at LGBT Center, which made us end up being kicked out without
finishing the workshop.
C.
Difficulty In Cooperation With Different Centers
We had experienced a lot of difficulties in cooperation with different centers, because of

fund allocations and house rules. Here I will use Graduate Student Center (GSC), LGBT Center
and Penn Womens Center (PWC) as examples.
First, it is a university-wide problem when it comes to cross-collaboration, because
different centers have funds targeting different groups of students or dependents. For instance,
GSC is funded for all graduate students from all the schools, but our event-The Halloween
Costume Party- was exclusively for GSE students; even though we had participants from other
schools, we only advertised to GSE students. If we didn't agree to advertise the event to all
graduate students, we were not eligible to use their space for free, which cost us $450 to use the
35
Bonnie Yingfei He
first floor for 2 hours events plus paying for setting up and cleaning up time. Moreover, it was an
unhappy experience of using GSCs space for the event. They had so many space rules and the
fellow at GSC just monitored us for everything and kept letting us know we couldnt do
anything, which made Kia and me feel as though we were being babysat.
Second, It was really challenging to borrow others spaces for events, since we had to
follow house rules, while different centers had different complicated house rules. For example,
the kitchen in the PWC is a green kitchen, which means we shouldnt use any disposable
materials, like plastic plates and paper cups. However, for the Pumpkin Muffin Baking event, we
ordered tea with paper cups for drinks, which violated the house rules. Beside, the LGBT Center
I mentioned above has to close right at 5:00pm, so we were forced to cut the workshop really
short.
D.
Need To Be More Inclusive
We received complaints from non-Asian international students, who said our events were
only planned for Chinese or East Asian international students. But actually, none of our events
was only planned for Asian students, except the Lunar New Year event (we purposefully didnt
call it Chinese New Year, and we combined Chinese dumplings with Vietnamese spring rolls to
help the event to be more inclusive). Actually, we didnt do anything specifically for students
from certain regions.
We thought about there probably were preconceived notions giving the students this
unreal idea. Kia and I have Asian-look, and also our events did have more Asian participants as a
result of school demographics. If people didnt know Kia well, they could easily assume she is
Chinese American, but actually she is Hmong American, and I am Chinese, so they would
assume that we are undeniably working for Chinese population. Also, obviously the school
36
Bonnie Yingfei He
demographic contains more Asian students, particularly from China, South Korea and Japan,
than other ethnic student groups. Therefore, the majority of the participants should be Asian
students, which gave a preconceived notion to non-Asian students that the events were planned
only for Asian students. Moreover, we didn't intentionally reach out to a diverse group of
international students. We just bunched all the international students together, while Chinese
students are the majority. In addition, the students from other nations could hardly find peers
from their countries, compared to Chinese students, which even made them feel lonely, excluded
and unwelcomed.
There was a rumor for this years Student Affairs, which said Asian ICC fellows, Black
Student Government. This brought our attention to the facts that we had never done anything on
race, and we only did programs on some visible cultures, like food or holidays. We need to
compare culture and race and have a deeper thought on what we can do to teach international
students about this American specific issue, with collaboration with the newly created role of
Inclusion And Diversity Fellow.
E.
Logistic Problems
There were several emergencies associated with logistics popped up in some events. For
example, the bus driver for the Longwood Garden Trip didn't know how to use the elevator for
disabled students, which caused the whole bus to wait for him around 30 minutes to an hour to
figure it out. He was anxious all the time, expressing his negative energy to the students. On the
way to the Longwood Garden, there even was an iron bar dropping from the ceiling of the bus,
almost hitting a student. Luckily, we arrived the Longwood Garden safely and Imani called the
bus company to change a driver to get us back to the school. The second example of emergency
was happened before a focus group dinner that was after working time at 6pm. The pro-card
37
Bonnie Yingfei He
information left by Imani got denied one hour before the scheduled food delivering time from
Axis Pizza, while the event would happen soon. Imani and Lois all couldnt be gotten in touched
with at that time, but luckily we borrowed a credit card from a senior leader at GSE who helped
us solve this problem.
F.
Cost
We spent money, which we could avoid, on some occasions. For example, we spent a
certain amount of money in booking GSCs space for Halloween Costume Party, which could be
avoided if we use Houston Hall instead. Besides, for catering, we always had many food
leftovers for events. Sometimes, miscommunication in types of catering also caused a lot of
money. In addition, we paid an almost empty bus for the trip to the Longwood Gardens.
IV.
Problem Solving
Facing these challenges, we used multiple strategies to solve problems. Taking the
positive attitude to face and solve conflicts and then make progress, we were open to
constructive criticism and welcomed feedback. We were willing to acknowledge our
shortcomings, and took efforts to make a difference. And still, we also reflected on what we
hadnt but should have been used to solve problems as a lesson for future ICC fellows or
Intercultural educators.
A. What We Have Used To Solve Problems
1. Theories I Used When Facing The Problems
When facing problems, I used a couple of several intercultural theories to understand the
conflicts and keep a good attitude to deal with conflicts and think critically.
38
Bonnie Yingfei He
a. Personal Leadership (PL) & Critical Moment Dialogue (CMD) (Schaetti, Ramsey
& Watanabe, 2008) I used the approach of Personal Leadership (PL) in the first stage
of facing conflicts. By going step by step of the Critical Moment Dialogue (CMD),
from aligning to my vision, engaging ambiguity, cultivating stillness, attending to
judgment, attending to emotion, attending to physical sensation, I could at least
control my emotion and calm myself down in thinking of causes and solutions, but
not immerse myself with bad emotions or cause more problems because I lost my
temper. For example, when hearing the words from non-Asian students that Kia and I
only plan events for Asian students, I got mad at first and tried to defend myself.
However, CMD helped me not to lose temper but focus on problem solving. I
cultivated stillness to calm myself down and attended to their judgments and mine. I
tried to analyze and understand the reason why they got this judgment on us and
started to think what we can do to help solve this issue.
b. Metacommentary (Rymes, 2014). Through students explicit metapragmatic
discourses and implicit metapragmatic functions, which known as metacommentary,
we became aware of the issues existing and try to solve problems. From students
direct feedback in the International Student Orientation survey, and their indirect
metacommentary delivered by other people, we heard their voice and ideas, which
helped us to understand their demands and incorporate their needs in our program
planning.
c. Co-Membership and Affinity Spaces (Rymes, 2014). Within the different cultural
groups, people try to find connections, namely, to find co-memberships with same
demographic aspects and participatory cultures between each other, who have share
39
Bonnie Yingfei He
affinity spaces such as shared interests, goals, standards. From the ideas of comembership and affinity spaces, I understood why the minority international students
would feel excluded, even though we didnt intentionally isolate them. Because
within different cultural groups, people try to find connections, namely, to find comemberships, with people who share same demographic aspects and participatory
cultures between each other. They also attend to share affinity spaces such as shared
interests, goals, and standards within the group. Therefore, since Asian international
students occupied the majority of international student demographics at Penn GSE,
the non-Asian international students easily felt isolated.
d. Face Negotiation (Ting-Tooney, 2005). Ting-Tooney developed the FaceNegotiation Theory, which discusses conflict negotiation through impression (face)
management. The theory differentiated the strategies of communication and conflict
negotiation between collectivistic cultures and individualist cultures, and between
small power distance cultures and large power distance cultures. In collectivist
cultures, group face is more important than individual face, while it is the opposite in
individualist cultures. In small power distance cultures, people believe individualism
is highly valued, power is equally distributed, and authority is earned; while in large
power distance cultures, people believe the group is highly valued, power is from the
top to the bottom, and authority is inherited. In my internship, we are serving
international students from all over the world; some are from collectivist
cultures/larger power distance cultures, such as most East Asian countries, like China
and Japan; while some are from individualist cultures/small power distance cultures,
such as most Western countries, like France and Germany.
40
Bonnie Yingfei He
By using the Face negotiation theory, I was able to understand the
difference in communication and conflict negotiation in collectivistic cultures

versus individualist cultures and small power distance cultures versus large power
distance cultures. I realized the students who complained most are from
individualist cultures, while I am from the collectivist culture. So after feeling
unfairly judged at first, I calmed myself down to think from their perspectives
with empathy and mindfulness.
2. Instruments We Used As Solutions
We took multiple methods of evaluation and assessments as instruments to
find problems and analyze problems.
a. Focus group/climate Survey/Needs assessment (Soriano, 2012). In the
beginning of each semester, we conducted a focus group dinner, inviting
international students to come to tell us what kind of events they are
interested. Meanwhile, we also asked their feedback on our plans for the
following semester. After receiving the complaints about inadequate inclusion
of our events, we processed a Diverse and Inclusive Survey for all
international students. Specifically, we interviewed some of the students from
less-represented countries to share with us their ideas.
B. What We Should Use To Solve Problems
After analyzing problems, we also reflected on what we should, but havent done
yet, as effective ways to solve problems.
1. Timing. We should make a strategic plan or timeline to engage students at
certain time of the school year. Even though we had used the W Curve
41
Bonnie Yingfei He
as the guiding framework for our events, we still need to pay more
attention to timing, trying to avoid having events when everyone is busy
with finals or mid-terms (like the Longwood Garden Trip); or when the
same kind of events is happening elsewhere on campus (like the Lunar
New Year event).
2. Collaboration. We didnt solve the collaboration problem with GSC

really well. We just came back and expressed our confusion and conveyed
the unwillingness to collaborate again to the team. But further
communication is needed. We should follow up with GSC fellows or the
leadership at GSC, express our confusion and mistreatment honestly, and
then try to find if there are miscommunication existing.
3. Budget. We should create a more detailed budget for the year of
programming, control and reduce the cost.
4. Location. In the current situation, we have been in conflicts of booking
places for a couple of times. Due to the inadequate spaces on campus,
fellows should plan the semesters events, even the yearlong events ahead
of time, and try to book spaces as soon as possible. It is actually a
university-wide problem. Hopefully, after the Perry World House opens in
September, there will be more places available for international events.
5. Race. We should consider the importance of race education in
international student services. We should educate international students
about the issue of racism here in the States and how to respond to it.
Beginning with a series of student protests at the University of Missouri in
42
Bonnie Yingfei He
the fall of 2015, and continuing with responses to a string of race-related
incidents on campuses across the country, a nation-wide wave of student
activism arose, drawing the publics attention to racial injustice in
postsecondary education. According to the list complied by
WeTheProtesters (2015), students from at least 77 higher education
institutions across the nation participated in this wave and expressed their
demands on an end to systemic and structural racism on campus. After
the campus unrest, race in education became a hot topic in postsecondary
institutions. Penn GSE also has been putting considerable effort into
creating an environment of inclusion. A staff, faculty and students open
dialogue on Racism on College Campuses in the 21st Century: A
Conversation was held on November 17, followed by a series of
workshops and conversations, like How Do I Respond in Racialized
Situations organized by the student organization Students Confronting
Racism and White Privilege (SCRWP), and training in Racialized Stressor
in Education & Human Services by student government. In the middle of
November, the Office of Student Affairs (OSA) launched an Inclusive and
Diversity Advisory Board including staff and students with bi-weekly
meetings to discuss practical solutions of these issues. I joined as a board
member taking my ICC Fellow perspective to support the group. In
meetings every other week, we discussed each board members work and
gived feedback. Currently, OSA is working on creating a cultural inclusive
video, adding a Diversity and Inclusion Annual Award, holding student
43
Bonnie Yingfei He
focus groups, creating a Diversity and Inclusion Orientation for new
students, and a climate survey for all current students, in order to develop
an inclusive community at Penn GSE. As it is a domestic content, we
decide the necessity in incorporating a workshop on racism in higher
education and how to respond to it in the international student orientation,
to help them be aware of this phenomenon and behave appropriately.
VI. How My Internship Reflected The Penn GSE Core Values

In this session, I will talk briefly about how my internship reflects on and
contributes to the Penn GSE Core Values: Integrity, Well-being, Inclusive Community, &
Leadership.
A. Integrity
The Office of Student Affairs team has strong moral principles in work. We are
honest to ourselves, students and other people, by conveying our thoughts and feelings
directly. We are mindful, thinking of what students need but not what we can offer. Every
time, we plan events with careful consideration of students availability and preference.
We are vulnerable, open to different ideas and challenges, and willing to make changes.
B. Well-being
We insist on supporting each other and our students in gaining well-being both
mentally and physically. We planned Longwood Gardens trip for our students during the
finals season when students are usually stressed out and need relax and fresh air. GSE
Staff members work out together for Yoga classes. We did staff lunch retreats twice, one
for each semester, to chat and show appreciation for our hard work. We scheduled time to
44
Bonnie Yingfei He
hangout for movies and happy hours after work. We gave each other emotional support
generously, when something bad happened to someone; we also shared private news to
each other to seek mutual understanding and co-membership. We also took care of each
other by offering help. We gave out birthday gifts and surprises to celebrate our
friendship. For instance, we prepared birthday balloon, cards and photos for Imanis
birthday, had a movie and happy hour celebration for Guerdis birthday, and had a lunch
celebration for Kia and my birthdays.
C. Inclusive Community
The programs and events we prepared are for international and domestic students,
for international students from nations all over the world, and for master's students and
doctoral students regardless of degrees and divisions inclusively. We always welcomed
students from outside GSE, staff members, family members and friends of our students to
come and join the events with us.
D. Leadership
In the team, we were team members working together but also sometimes we
were leaders as well who led the others doing separate projects. Even within a project led
by someone else, we were still leaders when taking responsibility of certain parts of the
job.
After finishing this masterpiece in reviewing my one-year wonderful internship

experience as an ICC fellow, I already have tears rolling in my eyes and couldnt stop
going back to read it again and gain. Sitting in my little cubicle, looking at the familiar
45
Bonnie Yingfei He
place around me with our photos on the wall (see Figure 5), I feel that I so much enjoyed
being here and am too sad to say good-bye. Could anything be happier than doing what
you love and loving what you are doing? I think I am the happiest person.
Figure 5: Photo wall at Bonnie, Kia and Guerdis Cubicle
46
Bonnie Yingfei He
Reference:
EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING DESIGN
Brooks-Harris, J. E., & Stock-Ward, S. R. (1999). Workshops: Designing and facilitating
experiential learning. CA: Sage. Chp.8: Workshop Evaluations: Strategies, Variables, &
Plans.
Kolb, David (1985). Learning styles inventory. USA.
Pfeiffer, J. William and John E. Jones. Reference guide to handbooks and annuals (1983
Edition). San Diego: University Associates
Soriano, F. I. (2012). Conducting needs assessments: A multidisciplinary approach, 68.
Weaver, R., & Farrell, J. (1997). Active listening: The most important facilitation skill. In
Managers as facilitators: A practical guide to getting work done in a changing
workplace. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler.
INTERCULTURAL THEORIES
Baron, R., & Wagele, E. (2009). The Enneagram made easy. Harper Collins.
Bennett, M. J. (1993). Towards ethnorelativisim: A development of intercultural sensitivity. In
R.M. Paige (Ed.), Education for the intercultural experience (21-71). Yarmouth, ME:
Intercultural Press.
Bennett, J. M. (1993). Cultural marginality: Identity issues in intercultural training. In R.M.
Paige (Ed.), Education for the intercultural experience (109-135). Yarmouth, ME:
Intercultural Press.
Bennett, J. M., & Bennett, M. J. (2004). Developing intercultural sensitivity: An integrative
approach to global and domestic diversity. Handbook of intercultural training, 147-165.
47
Bonnie Yingfei He
Deardorff, D. K. (2006). Identification and assessment of intercultural competence as a student

outcome of internationalization. Journal of studies in international education, 10(3), 241266.
Hammer, M. R., Bennett, M. J., & Wiseman, R. (2003). Measuring intercultural sensitivity: The
intercultural development inventory. International journal of intercultural relations,
27(4), 421-443.
Kim, Y. Y. (2005). Adapting to a new culture: An integrative communication theory. In W.B.
Gudykunst (Ed.), Theorizing about intercultural communication (75-400). Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage.
Rymes, B. (2014). Communicating beyond language: everyday encounters with diversity. New
York: Routledge.
Schaetti, B.F., Ramsey, S.J., & Watanabe, G, C. (2008). Making a world of difference, personal
leadership: A methodology of two principles and six practices. Seattle, WA: FlyingKite
Publications.
Thomas, J. (2006). Cross-cultural pragmatic failure. World Englishes: Critical concepts in
linguistics, 4(2), 22.
Ting-Tooney, S. (2005). The matrix of face: An updated face-negotiation theory. Theorizing
about intercultural communication. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
MISCELLANEOUS
Missingchild. (2014). Do you still remember the first time you cried after going abroad?
Douban. Retrieved March 1, 2016 from https://www.douban.com/group/topic/64010756/.
48
Bonnie Yingfei He
WeTheProtesters. (2015, December 8). Across the nation, students have risen up to demand an
end to systemic and structural racism on campus. Here are their demands. Retrieved March
13, 2016, from The Demands Organization, http://www.thedemands.org/
Appendix A Samples of Plus and Delta Evaluation

Appendix B Samples of Posters
Appendix C Samples of Invitation Letters
Appendix D
Appendix E Field Notes As ICC Fellows
Appendix F Field Notes From SIIC
Appendix G Bonnie And Kias Hour Log
Appendix H Photos For Some of Our Events (Photo credits to Darryl W Moran)
The Thanksgiving Dinner: https://www.flickr.com/photos/penngse/sets/72157661529656022
The Halloween Costume Party:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/penngse/sets/72157658393777653
The International Student Orientation:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/penngse/sets/72157657236654678
49

Internship Reflection Paper-Bonnie

Caricato da

Informazioni sul documento

Descrizione originale:

Titolo originale

Copyright

Formati disponibili

Condividi questo documento

Condividi o incorpora il documento

Opzioni di condivisione

Hai trovato utile questo documento?

Questo contenuto è inappropriato?

Copyright:

Formati disponibili

Internship Reflection Paper-Bonnie

Caricato da

Copyright:

Formati disponibili

Using Intercultural Theories to Promote

International Student Engagement and

Your Guide to Academic Success*2

Bonnie and Kia

Transitioning to Life in US*2

Bonnie and Yuhong

Philly Accent 101

Bonnie, Kia, Abigail

Bonnie and Kia

GSE Room 300

GSE Fall Focus Group Dinner + (Advisory

Thur. 9/17/15 6-7:30pm

Fri. 10/16/15 5-7 pm

Fri. 10/30/15 12-1 PM

GSC room 305

Fri. 10/30/15 7-9 PM

Halloween Costume Party

Bonnie & Kia

How to bake a pumpkin/apple pie (with

Kate) + Turkey Art & Design day

Int'l Student Traditional Thanksgiving

Dinner + History of Thanksgiving

Longwood Gardens Holiday Trip

SG & Student Affairs

Kia, Lois and Guerdi

GSE Int'l Student Career Development Series

GSE Room 120

Lunar New Year Celebration

Bonnie and Kia

GSE Room 114

GSE Int'l Student Career Development Series

What are the different types of cheese?

*GSESG: Graduate School of Education Student Government

behind the experiences, to thinking of real-life implications, and finally turning

communication, which might result in conflicts if they are not appropriately

b. Cross-cultural pragmatic failure (Thomas, 1983) Thomas redefined pragmatic

b. Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) (Hammer, Bennett & Wiseman, 2003).

intercultural sensitivity and intercultural competence of people. Intercultural

Encapsulated marginality, or trapped by marginality, happens when a person is

Figure 3: Penn GSE Student Affairs 2015-2016

2. Collaboration With Other Offices And Individuals

Figure 4: Kia and Bonnie, Best Co-workers Forever!

Cultivating Stillness; 4) Attending to judgment; 5) Attending to emotion; and 6)

(Acceptance, Adaptation, and Integration) are ethnorelative, meaning that people

such concepts as cultural self-awareness, deep understanding and knowledge of

The Complains From The ISO Survey

Some Events Were Less Popular

Difficulty In Cooperation With Different Centers

We had experienced a lot of difficulties in cooperation with different centers, because of

Need To Be More Inclusive

difference in communication and conflict negotiation in collectivistic cultures

2. Collaboration. We didnt solve the collaboration problem with GSC

VI. How My Internship Reflected The Penn GSE Core Values

After finishing this masterpiece in reviewing my one-year wonderful internship

Figure 5: Photo wall at Bonnie, Kia and Guerdis Cubicle

Deardorff, D. K. (2006). Identification and assessment of intercultural competence as a student

Appendix A Samples of Plus and Delta Evaluation

Potrebbero piacerti anche