Understanding Contextual Factors Influencing Chinese Students to Study at a Hong Kong Institution's Intra-Country Branch Campus

Introduction

Over the past two decades, international branch campuses (IBCs) have emerged as a common form of cross-border or transnational higher education (TNHE) in the internationalization of higher education (HE) ‘at home’, particularly by some developing Asian countries. Notably, Mainland China has become the one of the largest importers of IBCs globally (C-BERT, 2023), and many students have decided to enroll in IBCs such as University of Nottingham Ningbo, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, New York University Shanghai, and Duke University Kunshan.

Recently, another key strategy to develop the Chinese TNHE system has been the establishment of campuses by universities that are based in Hong Kong. According to the Chinese government policy (e.g., Regulations of the People's Republic of China on Chinese-Foreign Cooperation in Running Schools), Hong Kong institutions (HKIs) are considered as ‘overseas universities’. Thus, when HKIs operate campuses in Mainland China, they are ‘international branch campuses’ rather than ‘local’ institutions. Branches of HKIs tend to be established in the Greater Bay Area (GBA), which is a megalopolis that comprises nine cities (e.g., Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Zhuhai) and two special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau) in South China. The development of GBA has become a top priority for both the Chinese and Hong Kong governments.

Meanwhile, for many HKIs, the establishment of branch campuses in the GBA and the development of partnerships with Mainland Chinese institutions have become an integral part of their strategy to internationalize HE (Postiglione et al., 2016). The examples of branch campuses that were established by HKIs in the GBA include The Chinese University of Hong Kong in Shenzhen (CUHK-SZ) and HKBU-ZH in Zhuhai, which was created in partnership with Beijing Normal University by Hong Kong Baptist University. Recently, the Chinese and Hong Kong governments have proposed several new policies, such as The 14th Five-Year National Strategic Development Plan and Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area Development Plan, to support efforts by HKIs to establish more branch campuses in the GBA or develop partnerships with Mainland Chinese universities. Consequently, more HKIs are expected to engage in intra-country cross-border education in the GBA, such as the branch campus of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in Guangzhou (HKUST-GZ), which has commenced operations in September 2022.

Previous research has addressed various issues at Western IBCs in Asia and the Middle East (e.g., Wilkins et al., 2012; Yu, 2021). While existing policies have supported the development of branch campuses by HKIs in the GBA, little research has addressed the contextual factors that have attracted students to enroll at them. Hence, this study aims to identify the key contextual factors that attract Mainland Chinese students to enroll at a HKI's intra-country branch campus in the GBA, which fills the gap in the existing cross-border education literature (Carvalho et al., 2022).

Understanding the key contextual factors that attract students to enroll at a HKI's IBC is also significant for HE policymakers and other institutions aiming to develop IBCs. Furthermore, this research is needed because we do not know yet if students who choose Chinese universities, Western IBCs or HKI IBCs have different motivations and react differently to the contextual factors. Thus, this study's research question is: ‘What are the contextual factors that attract Mainland Chinese students to enroll at a HKI's intra-country branch campus in the GBA?’.

We begin with a literature review of studies of IBCs and students’ perceptions of them. Then, due to the unique context of HKIs’ branch campuses, the notion of global-national-local imbrication is introduced as a theoretical lens to frame the study. In the third section, the research design is described. Then, an analysis of key factors attracting students and a discussion of the findings are presented in the fourth section. Finally, a summary and suggestions for future research conclude this study.

Research on International Branch Campuses in a Global Context

In the thematic field of TNHE, Kosmützky and Putty (2016) found that IBCs are one of the most commonly researched topics, often in the context of accreditation and quality issues; educational policy; program design; cultural differences and cultural awareness; as well as student attitudes and experiences. A subsequent study by Escriva-Beltran et al. (2019) counted 173 publications on IBCs. Some researchers have investigated IBCs from a macro perspective, focusing on things such as the overall developmental trend of IBCs in the global HE context (e.g., Healey, 2020; Wilkins, 2020); national higher education policies (e.g., He, 2016; Hou et al., 2018; Li et al., 2023; Ng & Tan, 2010); political and cultural issues, including neocolonialism (e.g., Jing et al., 2023; Xu, 2022); quality assurance (e.g., Kinser, 2011; Yokoyama, 2011); as well as the strategic challenge of achieving global integration and local responsiveness simultaneously (e.g., Shams & Huisman, 2012). Each of these research topics may impact directly or indirectly upon student attitudes and motivations for studying at an IBC.

Other researchers have investigated micro problems, including academics’ teaching experiences and personal development at IBCs (e.g., Cai & Hall, 2016; Dobos, 2011; Wilkins & Annabi, 2021); campus servicescape and facilities (e.g., Wilkins et al., 2022); various management issues (e.g., Healey, 2015), including institution identity development (e.g., Yang, 2022) and academic talent management (e.g., Neri & Wilkins, 2019); and the development of individual institutions over time (e.g., Hill & Thabet, 2018). Hickey and Davies (2022) identified the common characteristics of successful IBCs and proposed a framework that combines strategic, leadership, academic, financial and operational factors, which may help managers maximize campus performance. Many of the topics examined at the micro level may also impact directly or indirectly upon student attitudes and motivations for studying at an IBC.

Recently, several researchers have investigated various strategic and policy issues that are related to HE development in the GBA, such as the study by Xie et al. (2021) who undertook a policy review of the GBA development strategies and their relevance to HE. In order to meet the GBA's objective of developing an integrated, innovative, and globalized economy with a focus on entrepreneurship and high-technology service industries, it is commonly believed that a more innovative and internationalized HE needs to be offered to students, as well as a deeper level of collaboration by industry players with HE providers (Chow et al., 2020; Mok, 2022; Xie et al., 2021). Consequently, these unmet HE needs offer developmental opportunities for cross-border HE providers to establish campuses in the GBA (Tang, 2021; Xie et al., 2022). However, the establishment of an IBC is always a high-risk investment (Wilkins, 2016). In their study, Lo et al. (2022) examined some of the key strategic and operational issues that were associated with an internationalization of HE in the GBA and efforts to maintain its Chinese characteristics. Despite a proliferation of studies on HE in the GBA, a gap in the literature is attributed to a dearth of research that has addressed the attitudes of students’ toward IBCs—specifically the branch campuses that are operated by HKIs in the GBA—and their motivations for enrolling at these institutions.

Research on International Branch Campuses with a Student Focus

The literature on the HE choices that are made by students is extensive, and many studies have focused on the decision-making of international students (Abubakar et al., 2010; Bodycott, 2009). Several studies have identified factors that motivate students to enroll at IBCs (Ahmad & Buchanan, 2017; Chee et al., 2016; Fang & Wang, 2014; Sim et al., 2020). This subject deserves more attention, since some research suggests that IBC students are significantly less satisfied with their academic environment, teaching quality, and engagement than those from the home campus (Merola et al., 2022). Notably, due to the persistent influence of postcolonialism in many host countries and the widespread use of ‘world-class’ discourse, students often perceive a high-quality education that is offered by IBCs compared to domestic providers (Siltaoja et al., 2019).

In their study of student motivations for enrolling at an IBC, Wilkins et al. (2012) found that convenience (e.g., less travel time and closer proximity to family and friends) and specific country attractions (e.g., personal safety, familiar culture or lifestyle, and proximity to home country) are the strongest ‘pull’ factors. Using autoethnography and interviews in his study of Chinese students’ motivation for enrolling at an IBC that was operated by a British university, Li (2020) concluded that personal reasons (e.g., low university entry requirements), institutional image (e.g., an internationalized campus), quality of teaching and facilities, and location of IBC systematically influenced students’ choices.

Students, parents, and employers often desire that TNHE has an international outlook and is responsive to local culture and labor market needs. Drawing on Bourdieu's sociological concepts, in her investigation of Chinese students’ learning experiences in a British IBC in China, Yu (2021) discovered that it imposed Western discourse on Chinese students instead of offering them a truly international education. Consequently, conflicts between Chinese values (e.g., patriotic education) and British educational styles (e.g., more critical teaching approaches) occurred in students’ daily learning. Despite several existing concerns about the learning and teaching practices of IBCs, they are still viewed positively by many students.

Much of the extant literature on student choice has focused on Western branch campuses in developing regions (e.g., Asia and the Middle East). Although Hong Kong is a special administrative region, it has a different sociocultural and educational milieu from Mainland China. Despite the unique intra-country cross-border status of HKIs in the GBA, students’ motivations for enrolling at them are largely unknown.

Theoretical lens: Global-National-Local Imbrications in ‘Intra-Country’ TNHE

In the broader research on HE, one of the most common frameworks that is used to explain the destination and institutional choices of international students is the push-pull model, which was proposed by McMahon (1992). The push-pull model considers the push factors in the student's home country that motivate an individual's decision to study abroad (e.g., a lack of places in local HE institutions) and the pull factors that draw the individual to foreign countries and institutions (e.g., HE quality, an international curriculum, and state-of-the-art teaching methods). Since its introduction, this model has been continuously modified to explain students’ motivation issues in different contexts.

However, HKIs’ branch campuses in the GBA is a special case, with complex relationships and roles of contextual factors waiting to be elaborated. Although from a policy perspective, HKIs’ branch campuses have the same legal position as other IBCs in China, Hong Kong has unique sociocultural and political connections with the Mainland China and HKIs may also have some sociocultural and educational similarities with Chinese features, which may be different from the Western IBCs in China. When HKIs’ intra-country IBCs operate in the GBA, the global, national, and local imbrications may manifest themselves in important and complex glonacal ways (Lingard, 2021; Marginson, 2016). Therefore, compared with push-pull model, we believe that a more structured lens can be used to clarify the interweaving connections of different contextual factors in this case, and the notion of global-national-local imbrication is thus taken as the theoretical lens.

Globally, every country has developed various policies and strategies to develop its HE system and to respond the trend of HE internationalization. As Marginson and Rhoades (2002) suggested, a HE system should be understood from a ‘glonacal’ perspective that considers the influence of global, national, and local situations on educational practices and policies comprehensively. More recently, Lingard (2021) proposed the notion of global-national-local imbrications to conceptualize the interconnections of different influential factors across different contextual layers in education policy research. This concept suggests that educational practices, policies, and choices are systematically influenced by global, national, and local contexts in an interweaved way. Factors from global-national-local perspectives may have complex and comprehensive influences on educational practices, policies, and choices. The interrelationships among the three levels have become much more complicated, varied, and contested since they involve the ‘interweaving’ of global processes within national and local contexts. This concept has been used to understand international students’ learning issues. For example, by adopting this concept, Dai and Hardy (2023) systematically analyzed international students’ doctoral research journey in China and examined different contextual factors (e.g., Chinese universities’ rising global rankings, scholarships, and supervisors) influencing their choices to study in China and learning experiences.

An intra-country branch campus of a HKI in the GBA reflects complex global-national-local imbrications. Globally, HKIs are usually considered highly internationalized. The Chinese government policy also defines the HKIs’ intra-country IBCs as ‘international Sino-foreign’ institutions rather than ‘Chinese’ universities. From a national perspective, the importation of HKIs is seen as a strategy to internationalize local HE systems in the GBA and Mainland China. From the local perspective, the HKIs’ IBCs mainly focus on recruiting local Chinese students by taking advantage of its internationalized education and global connections. As ‘local’ agents, students and HKIs’ intra-country IBCs may encounter challenges and issues in the GBA, which aims to imbricate the global context with the local community as the national strategic developmental goal.

An intra-country branch campus may have features that draw students who engage in a complex global-national-local imbricated educational context. The concept of imbrication provides useful insights into recent HE reforms in China, the intersection between global HE with an internationalization of HE at the national level, and the more local aspects of individuals and institutions in the GBA. Based on the above discussion, it is considered that the notion of global-national-local imbrication offers a suitable structure to interpret the interconnections of different contextual factors in attracting students to choose HKIs’ IBCs.

Research Design

An exploratory qualitative research was used to explore contextual factors influencing students’ motivations for enrolling at a HKI's branch campus in the GBA. As a TNHE hub, the GBA serves as a case study of intra-country cross-border education. This approach allows researchers to launch a thorough investigation of participants’ experiences in a specific context (Yin, 2018). This qualitative study aims to understand the participants’ subjective views of contextual factors influencing their chocies to enroll at a HKI branch campus, since every student has a different worldview and background (Merriam, 2009). The HKI branch campus in this study was established in the early 2010s and it has become a leading TNHE institution in the GBA, especially after it was forced to raise its admission requirements due to its overwhelming popularity among applicants. This is not an unusual development, since many IBCs in China are held in high regard, and they attract only the best students (Wilkins, 2020).

Using purposeful and snowball sampling methods, potential participants who were undergraduates were recruited by the research team via their social networks. Eventually, 45 students (15 male and 30 female) who were aged between 18 to 22 years old from different years of study (10 each from the first and third years, 15 from the second year, and 5 from the fourth year) and various disciplines (e.g., Arts, Business, Economy, Engineering, and Science) volunteered for this study. All participants hailed from different provinces in Mainland China, and students from Hong Kong or other countries were excluded. The information that is collected on their attitudes and experiences can provide useful insights into intra-country TNHE and Chinese HE, which are poorly researched by the literature. Every participant was given a pseudonym in order to protect their privacy.

After this study was approved by the institutional ethics committee, semi-structured online interviews that lasted between 45 min to one hour were conducted with the students by the research team from September to December 2022. Every interview was conducted in Mandarin to enable the students to express their experiences without any language barriers. Informed by the notion of global-national-local imbrications and the authors’ previous research about IBCs, the research team designed interview questions to explore potential factors from the global, national, and local perspectives. Examples of questions include: (1) What do you understand about the internationalization strategies of this HKI, and did these strategies influence your decision to study at this branch campus? (global level), (2) From a national policy perspective, what factors attracted you to study at your HKI's branch campus in the GBA? (national level), (3) What are the advantages or benefits you receive from studying at this HKI that attracted you to study here? (local level).

Based on the students’ responses, more open-ended and probing questions were posed to them. After the interviews were transcribed and translated from Chinese to English, the participants were invited to check the transcripts, which were also reviewed by researchers who had substantial experience in qualitative data analysis. In terms of their positionality in the study, the researchers occupied in-betweener roles (Dai, 2022). On one hand, they were outsiders who did not work and study at the institution but tried to understand the participants’ motivations objectively; on the other hand, they were insiders who had considerable research experience in TNHE.

Based on the thematic analysis approach (Braun & Clarke 2006, 2019), a broad inductive approach was used to analyze the data and identify key themes. All transcripts were screened first and initial codes were identified. Examples of codes are international reputation, ranking, and familiar context. Then, key themes (factors attracting students to enroll at the HKI's IBC) were generated and reviewed. Meanwhile, based on the notion of global-national-local imbrications, a deductive analysis was used to explore the complex interweaving nature of different factors that influenced students’ motivations. After iterative rounds of coding and recoding were completed, the key factors that reflected students’ motivations to enroll at the HKI branch campus at each level were summarized. After the analysis was completed, insightful and representative descriptions of the students’ experiences were illustrated in the finding section.

Findings

Informed by the notion of global-national-local imbrication, the analysis illustrated the key factors that had influenced the students’ choice of the HKI's branch campus in the GBA. Different factors from three levels were found to systematically influence students’ motivations (Figure 1). From a global perspective, most participants were drawn to its strong brand and international outlook. At the national level, policy support and shared culture exerted a positive influence on their choice of the IBC. Finally, from the local perspective, its institutional strengths in providing high-quality education with state-of-the-art facilities held great appeal for the participants. These themes suggest that global-national-local factors were imbricated in the participants’ choice of the HKI's branch campus as their intra-country learning destination.

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Figure 1.

Global, national, and local factors influencing students’ motivation.

Discussion

This study has explored the key contextual factors attracting Mainland Chinese students to enroll at a HKI's branch campus in the GBA by using the concept of global-national-local imbrications. To address the research question, we argue that various factors in the global-national-local levels have an imbricated influence on students’ motivations to study at the intra-country branch campus.

At the global level, a strong ‘Hong Kong’ brand and an international outlook are key factors that draw many students to enroll at the HKI's intra-country branch campus, since it provides them with an opportunity to experience the Hong Kong brand. This finding suggests that compared to the geographical advantages of other branch campuses that are mentioned by previous research (see Li, 2020), the symbolic power of the ‘city’ is an important soft factor that draws many students to enroll at the HKI's branch campus. Consequently, the high-level internationalization of HKIs has drawn many students to enroll at the intra-country branch campus, which is corroborated by several studies that have demonstrated the significant appeal of IBCs in attracting potential students (Ahmad & Buchanan, 2017; Li, 2020). From a macro perspective, our findings suggest that these global factors can attract many potential students.

At the national level, policy support and shared culture exert a significant influence on student choice. As part of their national strategy, the Chinese and Hong Kong governments have introduced policies to develop the GBA. The importation of HKIs to support the development of the GBA provides many opportunities to internationalize HE, and many students are attracted to the policy bonus that allows them to work in Hong Kong after they have graduated from a HKI's branch campus. Compared to other IBCs in China and elsewhere, although governments may develop IBCs to internationalize HE locally (Hou et al., 2018; Wilkins, 2020; Yu, 2021), their efforts at the national level have rarely been identified as a key factor in drawing potential students to IBCs. This finding has offered a new insight into the relationship between IBCs with national policies, as the HKI's intra-country branch campus has become a site that imbricates global advantages (e.g., the ‘Hong Kong’ brand and an internationalized HE) with national interests in the local context of the GBA.

A shared culture that exists between Mainland China with Hong Kong also creates an imbricated educational context in the HKI's intra-country branch campus that draws many students. Unlike studying overseas or in Western IBCs, many students believe that it is much easier for them to learn and adapt to the educational environment in a HKI's branch campus. The cultural similarities that are shared between Hong Kong with Mainland China can lower many potential intercultural adjustment issues that may be faced by students. This finding differs from many existing studies that have identified cultural barriers in students’ learning experiences in transnational articulation programs and Western-operated IBCs (Dai, 2020; Yu, 2021).

Since Hong Kong has a long history of colonization under the British, HKIs have incorporated Western features into their educational practices. The HKI's branch campus has introduced these features to the GBA, which reflects an imbrication of local and global cultures. Unlike many IBCs that offer a strictly Chinese or Western learning experience, the unique features of HKIs offer their students a vastly different learning journey. This finding has revealed the creation of a culturally hybridized space by the HKI's intra-country branch campus that encourages its students to embrace a global-national-locally imbricated cultural experience.

At the local level, stringent admission requirements and function-price ratio have drawn many students to enroll at the HKI's branch campus. Previous studies (Dai, 2022; Li, 2020; Liu et al., 2021) have found that the low entry requirements of some TNHE programs and IBCs in China are often a key factor that motivates students to embark on their HE journey. However, this study has found that the HKI's intra-country branch campus has established a higher entry bar in admitting students in its effort to maintain the quality of education and learning experience for every student. This finding indicates that the HKI's intra-country branch campus has established a local reputation in HE instead of being perceived as a substitute for traditional institutions.

The high function-price ratio is another key factor that motivates some students to enroll at the HKI's intra-country branch campus. Previous studies (Healey, 2020; Wilkins, 2020) have shown that TNHE and IBCs are usually perceived as means to reap economic profits by offering a low-quality education. Although the finding of this study is subjective and may depend on the financial situation of every undergraduate, many students believed that the tuition fees that were levied by the HKI's branch campus were reasonable, particularly as it is not a highly profit-driven institution. Like other TNHE programs and IBCs (Cai & Hall, 2016; Wilkins & Annabi, 2021), the HKI's intra-country branch campus also has an international teaching faculty and state-of-the-art facilities that draw many students, suggesting that it has strategically positioned itself in the local HE sector by offering students an international education and in convincing them that they have made a reasonable and valuable investment relative to other programs and IBCs.

More importantly, this study reveals that in the global-national-local imbrications, different contextual factors are often interrelated with each other in attracting students to choose a learning destination. From the global perspective, the HKI's branch campus is considered to have a high level of HE internationalization. This global advantage is recognized at the national level and used to promote GBA's development through the corresponding policies introduced by the government, which then provides more opportunities for students and has become a national advantage. Another noticeable point is that the HKI's branch campus requires students to perform well in the university entrance examination. A higher entry bar, which is a local advantage of the HKI's branch campus, may also be connected with national factors. Specifically, the policies of the Mainland China and Hong Kong governments for GBA development imply that the HKI's branch campus should possess high academic standards and train high quality talents for the GBA. Based on this discussion, it is evident that the notion of global-national-local imbrications offers a more structured lens to clarify the interweaved relations of different contextual factors and leads us to new findings, which may not be achieved with other theoretical frameworks.

Conclusion

This study has explored the key contextual factors attracting Mainland Chinese students to enroll at a HKI's branch campus in the GBA by using the notion of global-national-local imbrications. To address the research question of this study, we argue that various factors in the global-national-local levels have an imbricated influence on students’ motivations to study at the intra-country branch campus. From a macro perspective, the Hong Kong brand—which is viewed as a reputable symbol of internationalization in HE—may draw many students to enroll at a HKI's intra-country branch campus. These global influences are often intertwined with one another and are reflected at the national level. Policy support and shared culture had influenced students to enroll at a HKI branch campus. Students also stand to gain from many potential policy benefits that may not be offered by other IBCs and TNHE programs. In order for students to be accepted by a global-national-locally imbricated branch campus, they must meet its stringent admission requirements rather than the low entry requirements that are offered by other institutions. In summary, many students believe that an undergraduate education in an intra-country branch campus represents a choice that has a reasonably high function-price ratio.

This study offers theoretical innovations that can advance an understanding of motivation issues in student mobility research. By using global-national-local imbrication as a theoretical lens to explore the contextual factors that influence students’ motivations, it has widened the scope of this study beyond the field of educational policy research (Lingard, 2021). This new paradigm offers itself as a new attempt to interpret students’ motivation issues in choosing the learning destinations and institutions. Thus, the theoretical contribution of the research is in illustrating how global-national-local imbrication may be effectively used in IHE research concerned with student motivations and decision making.

Practical implications are expected as well. For potential students, it is essential to know the features of the HKIs’ branch campuses (e.g., policy advantages, cultural environment) to inform their choice of an intra-country cross-border institution to commence their HE journey, which may differ greatly from domestic universities, Western IBCs, and overseas institutions. For the HKI branch campus in this study, it is essential to take advantage of policy support to improve its educational quality and reputation to sustain its development in the GBA. Other HKIs may learn from this institution's example, by developing their intra-country branch campuses strategically, which will deepen global-national-local imbrications in the GBA. Chinese policymakers and governments may provide further support to develop high-quality intra-country branch campuses, which will support the development of the GBA as a national goal. Other countries and institutions that have an interest in developing IBCs may take a leaf from the intra-country experience of the HKI's branch campus and develop their HE systems by imbricating global-national-local strengths.

This study has several limitations. First, it only investigated students from one HKI's branch campus. As more intra-country branch campuses are being developed, future studies may undertake a comparative analysis of these institutions. Second, the findings were based on interviews and may not be generalizable to larger samples. Future studies could deploy a quantitative approach to examine a larger sample population. Finally, the notion of global-national-local imbrications has provided a systematic way to examine the interrelationships of various contextual factors at different levels, but a more nuanced categorization is still needed to highlight individual factors. Future research may consider combining the push-pull model with the notion of global-national-local imbrications to offer a more comprehensive framework to comparatively analyze contextual and individual factors in a systematic approach.