Designing the Conceptual Framework of the Islamic International University: A Qualitative Study

The purpose of this study is to design a conceptual framework of the Islamic International University.
The research method was qualitative and ten academic experts were selected in a purposeful and network manner and identified through deep interviews, codes, concepts, and categories of the Islamic International University through the theme analysis method.
The results indicated that 66 codes were extracted based on the conceptual similarity of the code and classified according to their distribution in the form of 12 concepts and 2 main categories and finally, by using the results of past steps, the conceptual framework of the International Islamic University was designed based on Iran’s ecosystem.
The conceptual framework of the Islamic International University consists of two main categories: (1) Out-of-university category: refers to mechanisms that are not under the control of university bosses and administrators, and exert pressure on internationalization outside the academic environment. 2) In- university category: refers to mechanisms that are a part of the inherent functions of the university and are under the control of university administrators and can lead the university to internationalization by strengthening, improving and monitoring them.