Increasing intercultural competence among psychology students using experiential learning activities with international student partners.

Intercultural competence, with its three domains (knowledge, skills, and awareness), is an important priority for international and domestic college students and the institutions they represent. However, most college students do not organically and purposefully openly engage with people from other cultural groups. The Crossing Borders program is a course-based, experiential learning approach that intentionally pairs international and domestic students for a series of shared cultural experiences and dialogues. Over an 8-year span, we investigated the potential of Crossing Borders to influence intercultural competence score changes for U.S. American college students at a Midwestern campus over the course of an academic semester. With a total sample of 207 college students, we determined that student knowledge and identity scores were significantly higher after the semester-long program than before, with increases in complexity of knowing for White students and those who had never studied abroad and additional increases in social interactions for White students. Supplemental narrative analyses from a subsample of students indicated important themes of increased self-awareness, awareness of others, and breaking down barriers and comfort zones. We discuss practical implications for programs like ours, offering them as an essential component and complement for campus internationalization efforts, offering glocal options for students who cannot or will not choose immersive programs like study abroad and study away.