International education refers to a dynamic concept that involves a journey or movement of people, minds, or ideas across political and cultural frontiers. It is facilitated by the globalization phenomenon, which increasingly erases the constraints of geography on economic, social, and cultural arrangements. The concept involves a broad range of learning, for example, formal education and informal learning (e.g. training, exchange programs, and cross-cultural communication). It could also involve a reorientation of academic outlook such as the pursuit of "worldmindedness" as a goal so that a school or its academic focus is considered international. For example, the National Association of State Universities prescribes the adoption of "proper education" that reflects the full range of international, social, political, cultural, and economic dialogue. International educators are responsible for "designing, managing, and facilitating programs and activities that help participants to appropriately, effectively, and ethically engage in interactions with culturally diverse people and ideas."
The emergence of international education as a discipline may be attributed to the international and intercontinental initiatives of the past, which aimed to achieve education, learning, and intellectual exchange. This is demonstrated in the formalized academic relations between countries in the form of bilateral and scientific agreements. Here, international education is considered a mechanism of international cooperation and, in some cases, it stems from the recognition that different cultures offer different outlooks and styles of learning and teaching in addition to the transfer of knowledge.
There are scholars who associate the development of international education with comparative education, which is concerned with the evaluation and scrutiny of different educational systems in various countries for the purpose of developing an education and educational structures that are global in scope and application.