Recontextualizing faculty development learning: a longitudinal qualitative study of educators from Laos and Vietnam

Transnational faculty development programs introduce educational approaches across institutional systems that differ in governance, resources, language, and professional roles. Existing research has described program outcomes and contextual barriers, but has provided less longitudinal evidence on how participants with different starting points reinterpret program learning before workplace implementation. This study examined how educators from Laos and Vietnam recontextualized learning during a South Korea-based faculty development program, including the role of horizontal peer comparison in that process. A longitudinal qualitative study was conducted within a bounded 10-week program cohort. The entire cohort of 12 health professions educators generated 168 pre-module and 167 post-module portfolio entries, together with two semi-structured interviews each. Template Analysis combined inductive coding with sensitizing concepts from faculty development and workplace learning. Participant-level longitudinal matrices compared heterogeneous starting points, changes and continuities, institutional conditions, positional authority, and transnational comparisons. Cross-case analysis examined variation by country, role, and prior faculty development experience. Participants entered with heterogeneous understandings. Some primarily associated teaching with lecturing and assessment, whereas others already had substantial experience of curriculum reform and organizational constraints. Three processes characterized recontextualization. First, program learning broadened or systematized educational frames by connecting classroom teaching with curriculum, assessment, accreditation, and institutional systems. Second, participants specified the conditions attached to particular practices, including preparation time, class size, facilitators, facilities, budget, workload, and faculty agreement. Third, they calibrated prospective action to their positional authority, describing changes they could make in their own teaching, changes requiring departmental support, and changes dependent on institutional or policy decisions. Interaction among participants from Laos and Vietnam also revised assumptions and provided regional reference points, although English sometimes constrained participation. Whole-cohort, module-level longitudinal data showed that faculty development learning was recontextualized through broadening, specifying, and calibrating from heterogeneous starting points. Horizontal comparison between Lao and Vietnamese participants provided an additional interpretive resource alongside host-home comparison. These processes offer a more differentiated account of pre-enactment learning in transnational faculty development, while remaining distinct from evidence of subsequent implementation or institutional change.