Disrupted or sustained? Chinese international students’ perceptions of transnational hybrid learning amid politics and pandemic

Impacted by the global COVID-19 crisis and its sociopolitical shockwaves, pre-existing physical mobility patterns and traditional study-abroad experiences have been thoroughly disrupted and transformed. US higher education institutions have utilized the practices of transnational hybrid learning to sustain the quality and progress of international higher education. This article focuses on a study programme that integrates online and offline learning in Shanghai, China, coordinated by a non-profit international higher education exchange agency in partnership with eight US universities and one Chinese university from August 2020 to June 2021. Through semi-structured interviews with 32 Chinese students, this article finds that transnational hybrid learning offers students greater geographical and time flexibility, room for self-paced learning and controls on health risks while ensuring face-to-face interactions and physical activities. In addition, the localization of international education might motivate Chinese students to consider their career development that balances their interests and career prospects in response to political and economic uncertainties. However, the communication and learning gaps, weakened intercultural communication, sustained sociocultural alienation and contradictions of two sociocultural contexts render the overall programme experience less desirable. In sum, this article identifies the potential of virtual mobility beyond geographical and policy constraints in transforming and reimagining the practices of transnational higher education in a post-pandemic world.