April 15, 2006 

E-learning:   A Strategic Career Management Tool for American Expat Women  

      Many American women experience significant challenges restarting their careers following a move abroad.  These difficulties, particularly in the context of dual career couples, have been widely recognized by the U.S. Dept. of State and by the Global Relocation field.  A large number of private citizen American women have also experienced problems in this area although these accounts have tended to be more anecdotal.  In addition to new-to-expat life professional challenges, career change and exploration have also been difficult areas to negotiate by American expat women living abroad as long-term residents.  In today’s global work environment, continuing education and learning have taken on a new significance that applies to all American expat women.  In this context, women launching careers abroad as well as more seasoned professionals and/or entrepreneurs need to stay current with what is referred to as “workforce technology skills”, i.e., computer programs and multimedia applications.  It’s fair to say these technology-based skills represent an essential element in an American woman’s expat career toolkit for both private sector and nonprofit/philanthropic work abroad. 

E-Learning boosts career in Venezuela 

      My motivation to formally explore distance learning/E-learning in the context of a Master’s program developed from my personal experience living and working abroad in Caracas, Venezuela for over ten years.  Like many expat women, I was very familiar with the difficulties of restarting a career abroad as well as career management issues.  Through my participation in local expat organizations, I had observed that many women were struggling with similar issues.  Many of us were unable to locate appropriate continuing education/professional training opportunities on a local basis in Venezuela.  In the early 1990’s, the Venezuelan government privatized the telecommunications sector and began to implement a number of projects to overhaul the country’s out-dated communications   infrastructure.  As a result, new services were made available to consumers beginning with dial-up internet access followed by high-speed/broadband internet a year or so later. 

High-speed internet access opened a new door for me with respect to accessing a universe of online learning opportunities from Venezuela.  At the same time, however, I experienced frustration working with the vast informational resources of the web to identify training and educational opportunities pertinent to my needs.  Over the years, I have been able to put together an online learning “toolkit” tailored to my professional needs that I update on a regular basis.  Based upon my experience, E-learning can play a very important role with respect to career management from abroad.  In my case,

E-learning has made it possible for me to access a wide variety of educational opportunities not available on a local basis in Venezuela, enabled me to stay current with prevailing trends in my field, and afforded me the opportunity to explore new career interests from abroad. In addition, E-learning computer training has made it possible for me to keep my computer skills up-to-date, and to learn new multimedia applications.  In particular, I have been very impressed by the number of high-quality online

skills-training opportunities accessible from abroad on a non-cost basis from U.S. based non-profit organizations.   

      Between March and November 2005, I explored the distance learning experiences and perspectives of American expat women worldwide for my thesis project.  The scope of research included several projects with nonprofit expat organizations including The Federation of American Women’s Clubs Overseas, Inc. (FAWCO), and the Newcomers organization in Venezuela.  I was also very fortunate to have the opportunity to interview women affiliated with innovative programs sponsored by the Family Liaison Office (FLO) at the U.S. Dept. of State.  My research also included the findings from the e-mail distribution of a distance learning questionnaire with American Citizens Abroad (ACA), face-to-face interviews, informal meetings, and E-learning training seminars I presented in the U.K. and in Caracas, Venezuela.   
 

My research findings on distance learning/E-learning, summarized as follows, were based upon the opinions and perspectives of approximately 60 expat American women residing in 25 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and in Latin America/Caribbean:  

• High level of interest, but little direct experience of online/E-learning

 

• More curious about E-learning skills training than degree-granting programs

 

• Key motivating factor to explore E-learning was lack of training opportunities on a local basis in resident country

 

• No technology impediments:  broad-based access to high-speed internet in resident countries

 

• Federal civilian women generally better informed regarding online learning environment and degree-granting programs than private citizen women

 

• Unclear where to locate information regarding online learning opportunities

 

• High usage e-mail;  little relative use of other computer programs;  interest in learning other computer programs

 

• Keen interest in entrepreneurial online skills (business start-up, e-commerce, etc.) training particularly expat boomer age group

 

• Curious – regarding E-learning accreditation/credentializing issues

 
 
 

Conclusions 

E-learning represents a potentially useful tool to expat American women in managing professional challenges abroad on a short and long-term basis.  With the exception of a relatively small number of Federal civilian women affiliated with innovative programs sponsored by the U.S. Dept. of State as well as those American women eligible for particular corporate spouse programs abroad, the majority of private citizen expat women are currently unfamiliar with the range of E-learning opportunities available particularly non-cost learning options.  This can be attributed to several factors including the absence of formal assistance to this group of women abroad with respect to continuing education and professional development.  In particular, few informational resources currently exist targeted to the needs of the large community of American expat women. 

Author:  Leila Heron is ACA Country Contact Venezuela.  Leila is currently working on developing resources for American expat women worldwide highlighting non-cost online learning opportunities to jumpstart and/or manage careers abroad in a wide variety of fields.