Web-Based Learning for Cultural Adaptation: Constructing a Digital Portal for Persian Speaking Immigrants in Finland

While the number of migrants and mobility students are increasing all over the world, most organizations’ websites are designed for the local people. Since immigrants are new in society, finding unbiased, correct, and updated information from the original sites in the host country appears to be a challenge for them. This article describes the empirical attempt for creating a website for immigrants. As the assumption, immigrants are adult learners who learn information through websites in the host country and cultural competence is the learning content. Accordingly, Human Resource Development (HRD) as andragogical theory based on Transformative Learning Theory (TLT), which describes assumptions for adult learning, along with a user-centered model of web designing are employed for creating and designing content in the portal for enhancing cultural adaptation. Due to the nationality of the main author, the context of the study is Persian speaking immigrants in Finland. The website includes the required information for immigrants, which are chosen from original Finnish websites of different organizations in Finland. The content of the website is selected based on the cultural background needs of users and is organized based on adult learning theories. During the period of one month, a remarkable number of users visited the website and sent positive feedback through the Facebook page of the site. This feedback provides an excellent guide for updating the site in/during the next phase.