From individual to collective: Post‐return agency among internationally educated Mongolian graduates

This study investigates how internationally educated Mongolian graduates pursue professional projects after returning to Mongolian higher education and how some of these projects develop from individual academic agency into collective action. It draws on semi‐structured interviews with 30 graduates trained in Japan, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Germany, Czech, Hungary, the United Kingdom and the United States, across engineering and technology, agriculture, natural sciences, health and medical sciences, social sciences and humanities. The findings identify a layered pattern of post‐return agency. Graduates first repositioned themselves as ‘local experts with international experience’ and adapted their teaching, research and professional expectations to local conditions. Some then coordinated through departmental relationships, while a smaller subset built institutional, professional and transnational alliances. The clearest collective initiatives were found among seven participants. When individual action proved insufficient, some graduates extended their agency through institutional, professional and transnational alliances, including committees, cross‐departmental networks, NGOs, professional associations and international collaborations. By illustrating post‐return academic agency as layered across individual, departmental, institutional and professional/societal spaces, this study shows how internationally shaped professional projects may remain individual, become coordinated within institutions or move beyond the institutions through professional and transnational alliances.