2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Undergraduate participation in research provides opportunities for students to develop their research and technical skills, network with other students/professors, raise their awareness of graduate studies, and understand the social context of research. While undergraduate students are often able to participate in research at their own institution or nationally in the US (through available Research Experiences for Undergraduates sites), it is also possible for undergraduates to complete research internationally.

In addition to the domestic benefits of research experiences, this provides an opportunity to network with international students/professors, learn about a different country and culture, and learn new perspectives on how professionals from other countries approach research. In support of this mission an International Research Experiences for Undergraduates (IRES) site is providing 12-week summer research experiences for students from the University of Alabama at the Brno University of Technology in the Czech Republic.

To evaluate the effect of this international research experience on the intercultural communication competence of the participations, the second cohort of students (N=8) completed the Intercultural Sensitivity Scale (ISS) immediately before and immediately after their 12-week research experience in the Czech Republic. The ISS is a survey with 24-items across five factors: interaction engagement, respect for cultural differences, interaction confidence, interaction enjoyment, and interaction attentiveness.

This work provides an overview of the elements in the IRES site, students responses to the ISS before and after their participation, and analysis of which factors had significant changes before and after the program. These details are expected to help evaluate how students intercultural communication competence is (or is not) altered from participation in this specific program and inform recommendations for site revisions for future iterations.