Mobilidade internacional estudantil: uma via de desenvolvimento de habilidades transversais

Abstract

This investigation, whose research line is framed in history and memories in the context of Vocational and Technological Education, has the growing internationalization of knowledge as its backdrop. It brings to the academic debate the implications of international student mobility for human training in the Integrated High School. Therefore, the general objective was to analyze the contributions and the challenges of the international exchange and internship actions promoted by the Federal Institute of Mato Grosso do Sul (IFMS), based on the students' perception of the development of soft skills. The literature review included the following themes: the integral education; the soft skills; and the international student mobility. This research, of qualitative approach, was applied with ten students from the Integrated High School, who participated of the international mobility. The research data were collected from the participants by means of a questionnaire and an interview, and treated according to the content analysis method. The results were based on the students' perceptions and the connection to the theoretical basis of the research. It showed that the international mobility experience contributed greatly to the expansion of the social responsibility, the independence, the capacity for realism, and the control of impulsiveness of the investigated students. The students' main challenges were with their ability to communicate, to organize, and to adapt, demonstrating a gap in relevant skills for integral formation and for the demands of the labor world. The research presents an Educational Product as a video documentary that contemplates the students' perceptions about the contributions and the challenges of that experience, and it aims to compose the history and the institutional memory. In the end, we conclude despite the research limitations, it represents a subsidy to strengthen the internationalization activities of the Federal Institute of Mato Grosso do Sul, as well as to generate reflections on the social impact of these actions.