SPECIAL REPORT: Fees and the foreign student
Around the world, more than three million students are currently studying
outside their home countries and the number is growing year by year. So is the number of countries trying to attract fee-paying foreigners and, with so many fighting for a slice of the international student market, nations are becoming increasingly creative in marketing their education services.
Japan, among the top countries after China and India fuelling the growth in demand by international students for English language courses, is also developing them as part of its internationalisation efforts.
In almost all countries, the drive to recruit foreign students is based on the lure of money. Cash-strapped institutions faced with declining government support have turned to exporting education as a revenue-generating business. The danger is that too heavy a reliance on foreign fees can leave universities open to budgetary crises should student numbers start to fall. Our correspondents report.
US: Fees worth $18 billion to economy
Sarah King Head Only 3.7% of all students enrolled in American higher education institutions are foreigners yet they contribute nearly $18 billion a year to the US economy, according to the US Department of Commerce. Most of this income is generated by tuition and other fees.
Full report on the University World News site :
UK: Budget cuts may drive numbers down
David Jobbins
Britain is the second most popular destination for students from overseas, after the US. The UK receives more than 350,000 international students each year, more than 20% of the world's share. But university leaders fear public spending cuts over the next three years may put the strength of the higher education sector at risk.
Full report on the University World News site:
FINLAND: To fee or not to fee - that is the question
Ian R Dobson*
Only in recent times have the powers-that-be in Finnish higher education been able to bring themselves to utter the word 'fees'. In the Finnish context, the thought of charging students to study had risen only occasionally before discussions led to Finland's new Universities Act of 2009. But radical change is afoot and, from the start of 2010, it became possible for universities to charge tuition fees to students from outside the European Union, although under certain highly restrictive circumstances.
Full report on the University World News site:
CHINA: Tuition costs not high by western standards
John Richard Schrock
No country in history has ever expanded its university capacity as fast as the People's Republic of China over the last 20 years. Each year, more programmes become available at more universities for the international student considering studying there. The Chinese university system is markedly tiered and costs can be higher at the most prestigious schools in urban centres, but generally fees and housing are not expensive by Western standards.
Full report on the University World News site:
JAPAN: English courses to boost recruitment
Japan is boosting its recruitment of foreign students by increasing the number of university courses taught in English. Foreign enrolments are now estimated to exceed 133,000 - up by more than 9,000 since 2008 following an ambitious plan unveiled by the government for universities to recruit 300,000 international students by 2020.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: Influence worth more than national income
Jane Marshall
Foreigners studying in France pay the same fees as local students and, unlike in some other countries, they do not contribute vast sums to the state's exchequer. In fact, the opposite is the case: the French government expends thousands of euros on each student, regardless of nationality.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Foreign students deterred by charges
Michael Gardner
Germany is popular with overseas students and comes third in terms of recruitment from OECD countries. Where they have been introduced, tuition fees appear modest compared with many other countries. But while a number of programmes exist to support students from abroad, World University Service Germany is concerned that fees are proving a deterrent to foreigners, particularly from southern countries.
Full report on the University World News site:
DENMARK: Fees part of broader reforms
Jan Petter Myklebust
Tuition fees for foreign students from outside the European Union and the European Economic Area were introduced in 2006 and form part of a broader globalisation strategy for Danish universities as well as a desire to strengthen market mechanisms in higher education.
Full report on the University World News site:
THE NETHERLANDS: More universities charge for tuition
Maurits van Rooijen and Arnold Persoon*
Traditionally The Netherlands has maintained subsidised fees for all students, whether EU or non-EU, which means a fee of roughly -1,600 a year. But this situation is changing rapidly and since 2008 non-EU students have no longer been funded by the government. So many universities have started to charge full-cost fees to those who enrol in English-taught degree courses. There is also an emerging private sector offering nationally accredited degree courses on a full-cost basis to Dutch, EU and non-EU students.
Full report on the University World News site:
SWEDEN: Students face fees next year
Jan Petter Myklebust
Sweden will introduce application fees, and most likely tuition fees as well, for international students from outside the European Union and the European Economic Area from the autumn term in 2011. As an EU member state, Sweden cannot differentiate between its own citizens and those from other EU nations.
Full report on the University World News site:
GREECE: An expensive free education
Makki Marseilles
Education in Greece is free so no fees are paid by students or their parents. Embodied in the country's constitution is that all Greek citizens (and certain foreigners who live and work in the country) are entitled to free education.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Exporting education worth billions
Geoff Maslen
When the Australian economy was struck by galloping external debt and a poor export performance in the mid-1980s, the then Labour government decided to create an export education industry it hoped would be worth millions of dollars. A quarter of a century on, the current government claims that industry generates A$17 billion (US$15.5 billion) for the national economy.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEW ZEALAND: Foreign students a welcome income source
John Gerritsen
Fees from international students became increasingly important to New Zealand universities this decade as they sought to increase their income in the face of government control or regulation of most other forms of their income.
Full report on the University World News site:
SA: International students - big numbers, small income
Karen MacGregor
South Africa is the eighth most popular destination for international students in the world, with 2.2% of the global share, and it is the only country in Africa that receives far more students than it sends abroad. But fees from international students are not a major income stream for universities - most come from other Southern African Development Community countries and receive the same state subsidies and pay similar fees as home students.
Full report on the University World News site:
MALTA: Non-EU students pay high fees
Jan Petter Myklebust
In Malta, the Mediterranean island with 360,000 inhabitants, higher education is almost totally funded by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Employment. The ministry also decides on the university fee regulations through legislation and non-EU students face heavy tuition charges.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
US: Universities mobilise disaster relief for Haiti
Sarah King Head
American colleges and universities have responded overwhelmingly in their efforts to offer humanitarian support to the people affected by the Haiti earthquake.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: EUA promotes full-costing and research
Alan Osborn
Two projects aimed at improving the ability of European universities to meet the challenges posed by the EU's Lisbon Strategy for increasing the union's technical competitiveness are to be launched by the European University Association. The programmes reflect a need for new tools and methodologies if Europe's higher education sector is to play its full part in equipping the EU to compete successfully in tomorrow's world.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: Fuchs is new national research head
Jane Marshall
Chemical engineer Professor Alain Fuchs has been appointed as the new President of France's flagship research institution, the National Science Research Centre. Director of the Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Paris, Chimie ParisTech, Fuchs replaces both current President Catherine Bréchignac and Director Arnold Migus whose terms of office are coming to an end.
Full report on the University World News site:
ZIMBABWE: Fee protests land 26 students in court
Twenty-six Zimbabwean students appeared in court earlier this month for demonstrating against unaffordable fees - at a time when lawmakers were expressing fears that this year's higher education examinations might not meet standards as a result of inadequate funding.
Full report on the University World News site:
BUSINESS
IRAQ: New online museum for artifacts
Leah Germain
Google's Chief Executive Eric Schmidt has announced the creation of a virtual alternative to Iraq's national museum. The internet trailblazers will transfer four millennia of archaeological discoveries into an online version with high-resolution images, free of charge. Scholars, educators and historians will be able to use the virtual museum to examine and study some of Iraq's oldest archaeological treasures with the simple click of a mouse.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Trade in computer resources opened up
Alan Osborn
Sometimes a single computer, or even a network of computer workstations, just isn't enough for major research projects requiring lots of gigabyte muscle. Now, with EU help, a solution has been found in Germany.
Full report on the University World News site:
US: Textbooks for rent
Leah Germain
As any university graduate can attest, the process of getting a degree is often a pricey endeavour. Along with tuition fees, students find themselves shelling out for textbooks and course packs that can add up to a small fortune, an average of US$900 a year in America. But BookRenter, a web-based company in northern California, is offering students an alternative to purchasing their expensive textbooks: simply rent them.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: New marketing tools aid wine producers
Leah Germain
A European research team has developed an online course to help small wine-producing businesses boost their commercial operations and establish a better understanding of their market. Scotland's University of Glasgow has coordinated the project, with the intention of giving small wine producers a chance to promote their highest quality products.
Full report on the University World News site:
FEATURES
UK: E-learning expert urges caution and balance
John Gerritsen
It would be fair to say that Grainne Conole was an early adopter of new technologies. While completing her PhD in chemistry, Conole was using email at a time when her colleagues could not see the point - why not send a letter, they asked. She had the same experience with the internet. Although attitudes have moved on since then, the professor of e-learning at the UK's Open University is still working at the cutting edge of technology.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Managing natural resources
Kristin Mosch and Stephan Weidt*
The Centre for Natural Resources and Development at Cologne University of Applied Sciences is one of the five winners of the Exceed - Excellence for Development - competition. Since uncontrolled consumption of natural resources causes several development problems, ensuring environmental sustainability was adopted in the list of Millennium Development Goals or MDG 7. The centre is concentrating on water management, land use and biodiversity, renewable energy sources and regional management to help achieve this goal.
Full report on the University World News site:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
DENMARK: Tuition fees and private universities loom
Ard Jongsma
Students and a united political opposition are baffled by new proposals from Science Minister Helge Sander to depart from the Danish tradition of free higher education for all. Both groups seemed taken by surprise at parliamentary debates following publication last week of a discussion paper setting out the options for a partial privatisation of higher education.
Full report on the University World News site:
CHINA: Academic freedom and public intellectuals
Qiang Zha
Academic freedom has always been viewed as problematic in China. The recent academic integrity crisis on university campuses and governmental intervention have once again brought this issue to the fore. Since 2002, China's Ministry of Education has promulgated a series of policies aimed at cleaning up academic corruption on university campuses. Most recently, in March 2009, it announced severe penalties for academic misbehaviour. Then, what is the status quo of academic freedom in Chinese universities?
First published in International Higher Education.
Full report on the University World News site:
US: Will China achieve science supremacy?
Last week in Room for Debate, a New York Times blog, Chinese and American academics probed the question: how likely is it that China will become the world's leader in science and technology, and what are the impediments to creating a research climate that would allow scientists to thrive?
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UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
NORWAY: Sacked professor sues the state
Jan Petter Myklebust
Earlier this month, five days were spent in an Oslo court to hear testimonies in a case where sacked University of Oslo Professor Arnved Nedkvitne is suing the Norwegian government. Nedkvitne has demanded that he either be reinstated as a full professor in medieval history or paid financial compensation until he reaches pension age.
Full report on the University World News site:
UK: Liter8 lrnrs: Is texting valuable or vandalism?
Children who are heavy users of mobile phone text abbreviations such as LOL (laughing out loud), plz (please), l8ter (later) and xxx (kisses), are unlikely to be problem spellers and readers, a new study by a Coventry University researcher has found.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: A silly man comes under fire
Two academics at Monash University in Melbourne sent an email to the dean of their faculty after he proposed making some of their colleagues redundant. Their comments will resonate among academics in universities around the world where research apparently counts for much more than teaching.
Full report on the University World News site:
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WORLD ROUND-UP
INDIA: 44 universities to be stripped of deemed status
From an institution located inside New Delhi's National Museum to a 19-hectare campus at Faridabad in Haryana, shock waves were felt at 44 'deemed' universities after the government told the Supreme Court last Monday that they did not deserve the status, write Aparna Kalra and Santosh K Joy for LiveMint. Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal said the government would protect the interests of an estimated 200,000 students whose future had been thrown into uncertainty. The move sparked student protests.
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INDIA: Education reform bills cleared
Notwithstanding initial hiccups, the Human Resource Development Ministry's two major Bills that promise to change the face of higher education in India - accreditation of higher education institutions and setting up educational tribunals - were cleared (with minor changes) by the Group of Ministers on Thursday, writes Akshaya Mukul for The Times of India.
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UK: Postgraduate rise largely a foreign affair
British universities are rapidly expanding the recruitment of overseas postgraduates who pay higher fees, but growth in the number of domestic postgraduates is far slower, a study has found, writes John Morgan for Times Higher Education. The analysis by the Higher Education Policy Institute and the British Library, published on Thursday, urges the government to make PhDs more attractive to British students to arrest the erosion of the UK's research base.
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MALAYSIA: Major revamp for polytechnic education
Technical and polytechnic education in Malaysia will be overhauled this year in order to restore public confidence, writes Richard Lim for The Star. Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin said the move was necessary as polytechnics were currently regarded as a second chance route for weaker students and this perception had to change.
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ISRAEL: West Bank college upgraded to university
Israel has agreed to upgrade to university status a college built in a Jewish settlement in the West Bank, a move critics see as placing another obstacle in the path of US-backed efforts to resume stalled peace talks, writes Allyn Fisher-Ilan for Reuters. The decision by Defence Minister Ehud Barak formalised a 2005 cabinet ruling to that effect but also coincided with the latest visit to the region by US peace envoy George Mitchell for talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders.
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US: Controversial visa bans on academics lifted
Adam Habib and Tariq Ramadan should soon be able to enter the United States once again, ending years in which the Bush administration kept out the two prominent scholars, infuriating many academic groups, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. Several academic groups have been in a protracted legal battle with the government over the visa denials to Habib, a Deputy Vice-chancellor at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa, and Ramadan, a professor of contemporary Islamic studies at Oxford University.
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US: Professor is a label that leans to the left
The overwhelmingly liberal tilt of university professors has been explained by everything from outright bias to higher IQ scores. Now new research suggests that critics may have been asking the wrong question. Instead of looking at why most professors are liberal, they should ask why so many liberals - and so few conservatives - want to be professors, writes Patricia Cohen for The New York Times.
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US: Terrible fiscal decline for higher education
By any financial measure, this fiscal year is a terrible one for public higher education. And while that's no surprise to anyone working at a state college or university, new national data document the extent of the loss of state support, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. Total state support for higher education for 2009-10 - including federal stimulus dollars - is US$79.4 billion, which is a decline of 1.1% from the prior year and 1.7% from the year before that. This represents a dramatic shift from the three-year period of 2005 to 2008 when state support grew 24% to $80.7 billion - without federal stimulus dollars in the equation.
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US: Recession takes toll on university presidents' pay
The recession has reached the executive suites of America's public universities and colleges, putting a stop to a string of large annual pay increases for school presidents, writes Eric Gorski for Associated Press. A survey released on Monday by the Chronicle of Higher Education showed compensation packages of chief executives at public universities levelling off in 2008-09, rising a relatively modest 2.3%. One in 10 saw their pay decline. Some who did get raises or bonuses gave the money back to their institutions.
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US: More women out-earning, out-learning husbands
Bringing home the bacon is less and less a man's job in the US these days, writes Nicole Santa Cruz for The Los Angeles Times. According to a Pew Research Center study released on Tuesday, a larger share of men are married to women whose education and income exceed their own. In 1970, 4% of husbands had wives who made more money than they did. In 2007, that share rose to 22%.
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US: Survey finds more students worried about finances
Family unemployment and a growing student loan burden are making American college students increasingly anxious about finances, according to a national survey by University of California - Los Angeles researchers, writes Larry Gordon for the Los Angeles Times. Nearly 67% of freshmen at four-year colleges and universities said they had at least some concerns about paying their tuition bills, the highest percentage expressing such anxieties in a dozen years, the annual study found. And with unemployment affecting many families, about 53% of freshmen who took part in the survey last autumn said they carried student loans, up about 4% from the previous year and the highest in nine years.
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WALES: University job losses and course closures forecast
The body responsible for higher education funding in Wales has warned of job losses and the closure of courses as a result of falling funding levels, writes Matt Withers for Western Mail. Giving evidence to National Assembly Finance Committee's inquiry into further and higher education funding, the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales said it was "inconceivable" that budget restraints would not lead to cutbacks in teaching and research.
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Sunday 24 January 2010
Friday 22 January 2010
University World News 0107 - 18th January 2010
NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report
HAITI: Quake devastates universities, kills academics
Karen MacGregor
Universities have been destroyed and students and academics killed in the earthquake that struck Haiti on Tuesday. Unesco urged "academia to show solidarity" and universities elsewhere to take in Haitian students. By yesterday it was known that at least three North American academics and five students had died or were still missing in the Caribbean nation.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Foiled attack spotlights foreign students
Wagdy Sawahel
The Christmas Day attempt by a N igerian student to set off a bomb on a Northwest Airlines plane flying from Amsterdam to Detroit has raised fears the incident will adversely affect foreign students, academics and researchers hoping to pursue their education in American and European universities. US President Barack Obama has ordered a comprehensive review of visa policy, including tightening regulations for N igerians - especially students and those aged between 20 and 60.
Full report on the University World News site:
INDONESIA: Cleaning up higher education
David Jardine
Indonesia's National Board for Higher Education Accreditation has announced its determination to clean up a sector riddled with bad practices. The board has set 2012 as its target for ridding universities of unaccredited undergraduate courses.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Indian murder inflames tensions
Geoff Maslen
The stabbing to death of Indian accountancy graduate Nitin Garg in Melbourne on 2 January has further inflamed tensions between India and Australia and attracted media coverage from around the world. SM Krishna, India's Foreign Minister, warned last week that continued violence against Indian students in Australia could damage relations between the two countries. Krishna called for immediate action by Australian authorities to protect Indian citizens. University World News writers comment on the implications of the continuing attacks on Indian students in the Features and Research and Commentary sections.
Full reports on the University World News site:
UK: Tories to close visa loophole
Diane Spencer
A British Conservative government would demand a £2,000 (US$3,250) bond from overseas students in a bid to tackle bogus colleges and abuses of the visa system. Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said the present student visa system represented "a huge loophole in our border controls and, despite years of promises, the government has completely failed to deal with the problem".
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: More autonomous universities
Jane Marshall
A second group of French universities became autonomous this month, bringing to 51 the number of institutions acquiring more freedom to manage their own affairs. The government's determination to encourage a 'results-based culture' in the sector is reflected in new funding criteria that take graduate employment rates and research assessments into account.
Full report on the University World News site:
THE NETHERLANDS: Too few women professors
Jan Petter Myklebust
Universities in the Netherlands have 271 full professors who are women - out of a total of 2,321, or less than 12%. A recent report reviews these statistics and discusses how to boost the proportion of new female professors.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Universities face more under-prepared students
Sharon Dell
Increased numbers of South African school-leavers eligible for university study, but with poor pass rates in mathematics and science in the 2009 national 'matriculation' examinations, mean universities will increasingly battle to provide academic support for under-prepared students.
Full report on the University World News site:
N IGERIA: Telemedicine arrives at Lagos
Tunde Fatunde
Telemedicine has finally arrived in N igeria via a pilot project recently launched at Lagos University. This interactive electronic mode of teaching, research and provision of medical services has been embraced by lecturers, students and patients. Its efficiency and cost-savings have encouraged other universities to consider partnerships with IT companies that provide telemedicine infrastructure.
Full report on the University World News site:
MALAWI: Churches try to avert university quotas
Malawian clerics have embarked on a last-minute attempt to stop a controversial university quota system from taking effect. Planned demonstrations were blocked by the police who said they were illegal, but a petition was sent to President Bingu Wa Mutharika urging him to annul the system that directs university entry to be based on place of origin and not on merit.
Full report on the University World News site:
TUNISIA: Progress in agricultural R&D
Jane Marshall
Agricultural research and development projects have been highlighted in La Presse of Tunis. The newspaper has interviewed Amor Chermiti on the activities of Inrat, the National Institute of Agronomic Research of Tunisia, of which he is Director General, and it has published reports on the Bizerte competitive research cluster and its Agri-tech business centre and the research assessment area of the Institute of Arid Regions, which became fully operative in 2009.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Hoax call to deport Zimbabwe graduates
Munyaradzi Makoni
A statement that appeared in the press calling for the repatriation of Zimbabwean graduates of South Africa's University of Fort Hare, has been dismissed as a hoax. But last week a dozen students who had presidential scholarships withdrawn by Zimbabwe's government for engaging in political activity, slammed the university for "allowing them to be victimised", London-based SW Radio reported.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
UK: VCs attack cuts to the sector
Leaders of the elite Russell Group of 20 research-intensive universities launched a scathing attack on the Labour government's cuts to the higher education budget. Writing in The Guardian Michael Arthur, chair of the group, and Wendy Piatt, its Director General, accused the government of bringing an 800-year-old world-class system to its knees.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: New website for academics and students
British parent Billy Fitzgerald noticed that his student daughter was spending too much time on Facebook and not enough on studying. So he designed a website, http://www.studentsandacademics.com, that has research and social network tools as well as ezines, videos, online newspapers, horoscope and news reports.
Full report on the University World News:
DR CONGO: Teaching assistants demand back pay
Angry teaching assistants at Unikin, the University of Kinshasa, who have not been paid for the past 10 months have threatened to down tools and take to the streets in an attempt to make ministers carry out their responsibilities, reported Digital Congo of Kinshasa.
Full report on the University World News site:
SENEGAL: Students demonstrate for grant payments
Students at UCAD, the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar, started the new year with violent demonstrations demanding back payment of their grants, reported
ACADEMIC FREEDOM
CHINA: Dissident academic jailed
Daniel Sawney and Jonathan Travis*
Chinese intellectual and dissident Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years imprisonment on 25 December for his part in drafting and signing the 'Charter 08' document, which calls for significant reforms to the Chinese political system.
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FEATURES
AUSTRALIA: Indian attacks raise diplomatic problems
Dale Down
The international higher education sector in Australia has been developing rapidly in recent years and going through some interesting changes, as well as facing new challenges. Difficult financial conditions around the world and the threats of pandemics such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and swine flu have had their effects on the numbers of students undertaking tertiary studies in Australia. But perhaps the most difficult challenge to the industry in recent times has been, and continues to be, the appalling number of attacks on Indian students. Working through this issue will mean walking a very fine and diplomatically delicate line.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Saving the world's water
Sabine Hellmann and Kristin Mosch*
Water is one of the 21st century's key development issues. Worldwide, 1.2 million people have no access to clean drinking water while around three billion have to make do without sanitary facilities or wastewater disposal.
Full report on the University World News site:
THE UWN INTERVIEW
US: Human cloning - solely a medical issue?
John Richard Schrock*
Dr Panayiotis Zavos is recognised worldwide as a leading researcher and authority in the areas of male reproductive physiology, gamete physiology, male infertility and other assistive reproductive technologies. Zavos' team was the first to create human cloned embryos for reproductive purposes. In this interview, he discusses the controversial issue of cloning humans.
Full report on the University World News site:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
GLOBAL: International student security
Simon Marginson*
I want to take up an issue that goes to the heart of higher education, especially research universities, around the world. It is about global mobility, especially the mobility of human subjects. It also highlights the implications of changes in higher education for the larger world: that issue is the human security of international students, by which I mean people who cross national borders for the purposes of formal study.
Full report on the University World News site:
CANADA: Why Twitter matters
Camille Rutherford*
In the past year the popularity of the micro-blogging/social network site Twitter has exploded as the media grabbed hold of this once relatively obscure site and launched it into the stratosphere by anointing it as the place to be for techies, politicians, news junkies, and Hollywood stars. First published by Academic Matters.
Full report on the University World News site:
ETHIOPIA: The dilemmas of higher education expansion
Liz Reisberg and Laura E Rumbley*
Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world. More than three-fourths of the nation's primary economic activity involves small-scale agriculture, not only highly inefficient but extremely vulnerable to variations in climate and international market prices. To move from an agrarian to a modern economy, Ethiopia requires citizens with more education. This necessity is especially critical in a country with the 15th-largest population on the planet and a median age of barely 17 years. Accordingly, the government has expanded the higher education system while growing enrolment, both at breakneck speed. First published in International Higher Education.
Full report on the University World News site:
UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
US: Etching found at university may be a Rembrandt
Soon after becoming president of Catholic University, the Very Reverend David M O'Connell went in search of paper towels in his bathroom cabinet, writes Jenna Johnson for The Washington Post. Something on the bottom shelf caught his eye. Under a pile of junk, he found an old frame. In the frame was a tiny etching of an old man with an unruly beard and billowing hat, composed of thousands of fine lines. His eyes are tired. His head nods toward his chest. The piece is signed 'Rembrandt'.
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GLOBAL: Dolphins second brightest on planet
Dolphins have been declared the world's second most intelligent creatures after humans, with scientists suggesting they are so bright that they should be treated as "non-human persons", writes Jonathan Leake for the London Sunday Times.
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WORLD ROUND-UP
IRAN: Remote-controlled bomb kills nuclear physicist
A remote-controlled bomb killed a Tehran University physics professor near his home early on Tuesday in what Iranian authorities called an assassination backed by Western powers, including the US and Israel, write Farnaz Fassihi and Chip Cummins for The Wall Street Journal. The victim was identified as 50-year-old Masoud Ali Mohammadi.
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CANADA: Palm scanning for students raises fears
In a move that has prompted at least three complaints to Canada's privacy czar, a growing number of professional programmes such as medicine and business now require students to give a digital print of their finger, thumb or even veins in their palm to write the high-stakes entrance tests designed and run out of the United States, writes Louise Brown for The Star.
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CHINA: Foreign status faked to access universities
Students born, raised and educated in China are using fake foreign passports to get into top universities, which have higher entrance standards for domestic candidates, state media said last week, reports AFP. Fake foreign passports can be bought in eastern China for around 200,000 yuan (US$29,300 dollars), the Global Times said of the bogus enrolment scam.
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CHINA: Record numbers flock to postgraduate exam
China's three-day national postgraduate examination attracted 1.4 million registered applicants, a record number since 2001 and a 13% increase over 2009, the official Xinhua news agency reports. The candidates competed for 465,000 seats, which means around one in three examinees will succeed.
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US-CHINA: Chinese gift to Yale sparks outrage at home
When Zhang Lei, a Chinese fund manager who earned an MBA at Yale's School of Management, agreed to donate $8,888,888 to his American alma mater, it's a safe bet that he didn't expect it would make people angry, reports The Wall Street Journal. But the announcement of his gift - the business school's largest ever from one of its graduates - has triggered a fiery debate in China over national loyalties.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Ethnic campus clubs on the rise
Many things would surprise South African student activists of the '70s and '80s if they were to go back to the universities in which they studied, writes Dinga Sikwebu for The Sunday Times. Not only would they discover a changed landscape in terms of student composition, and the reconfiguration of institutions of higher learning, they would also be surprised at how universities are now run like businesses with strong cost-management programmes. But nothing is likely to shock them more than posters advertising meetings for Zulus, Pedis, Xhosas, Tswanas, Sothos, Vendas and Shangaans.
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UK: HIV-Aids deniers land radical journal in trouble
It has published papers on everything from ejaculation as a treatment for nasal congestion to why modern scientists are so dull, but the future of Medical Hypotheses is hanging in the balance after a host of complaints from high-profile researchers, writes By Zoë Corbyn for Times Higher Education.
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US: Top universities criticised over financial aid to wealthy
Many of America's top public universities are giving millions of dollars in financial aid to students from relatively wealthy families instead of to those who urgently need it, resulting in campuses that are often less diverse than those at elite private schools, a new report says, writes Jenna Johnson for The Washington Post.
More on the University World News site:
US: Circular ratings
New research raises additional questions about the 'reputational' survey that is worth 25% (more than any other factor) on the US News & World Report rankings of colleges, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. What the research found is that the reputational scores don't correlate with changes in factors such as resources or graduation rates, but correlate with the previous year's rankings. In other words, the way you get a good reputational score - and in turn a good ranking - is to already have a good ranking.
More on the University World News site:
US: Israel in the American classroom
Supporters of Israel have worried of late that much of the campus discussion about the country has taken place in rallies and counter-rallies on the quad, and not in the classroom, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. But a study released on Wednesday found significant growth in the past few years in the number of courses focused on Israel. Further, these courses are appearing in a wider range of disciplines than in the past and do not focus exclusively on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the military history of Israel.
More on the University World News site:
US: When tenure means nothing
Clark Atlanta University violated the rights of 55 faculty members - 20 of them with tenure - when it eliminated their jobs without faculty consultation or due process, and without regard to whether or not they had tenure, according to a report issued on Wednesday by the American Association of University Professors. The AAUP called the dismissals, covering a quarter of the faculty, "outrageous" and "especially egregious", writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed.
More on the University World News site:
US: Suit settled over Kindle navigation by the blind
The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind have settled a lawsuit against Arizona State University over its plan to deploy the Kindle DX among students, writes Jacqui Cheng for Ars Technica. The settlement involves no monetary damages, but the university agreed to use devices that are more accessible to the blind if it chooses to deploy e-book readers in the coming years. If Amazon wants to be part of that deployment, it had better up its accessibility game.
More on the University World News site:
UK-INDIA: Sibal visits to strengthen education ties
UK Business Secretary, Lord Mandelson was among the British delegation meeting the Indian Minister for Human Resource Development, Kapil Sibal, last week for discussions about the broad range of UK-India cooperation, reports the official The Gov Monitor.
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HAITI: Quake devastates universities, kills academics
Karen MacGregor
Universities have been destroyed and students and academics killed in the earthquake that struck Haiti on Tuesday. Unesco urged "academia to show solidarity" and universities elsewhere to take in Haitian students. By yesterday it was known that at least three North American academics and five students had died or were still missing in the Caribbean nation.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Foiled attack spotlights foreign students
Wagdy Sawahel
The Christmas Day attempt by a N igerian student to set off a bomb on a Northwest Airlines plane flying from Amsterdam to Detroit has raised fears the incident will adversely affect foreign students, academics and researchers hoping to pursue their education in American and European universities. US President Barack Obama has ordered a comprehensive review of visa policy, including tightening regulations for N igerians - especially students and those aged between 20 and 60.
Full report on the University World News site:
INDONESIA: Cleaning up higher education
David Jardine
Indonesia's National Board for Higher Education Accreditation has announced its determination to clean up a sector riddled with bad practices. The board has set 2012 as its target for ridding universities of unaccredited undergraduate courses.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Indian murder inflames tensions
Geoff Maslen
The stabbing to death of Indian accountancy graduate Nitin Garg in Melbourne on 2 January has further inflamed tensions between India and Australia and attracted media coverage from around the world. SM Krishna, India's Foreign Minister, warned last week that continued violence against Indian students in Australia could damage relations between the two countries. Krishna called for immediate action by Australian authorities to protect Indian citizens. University World News writers comment on the implications of the continuing attacks on Indian students in the Features and Research and Commentary sections.
Full reports on the University World News site:
UK: Tories to close visa loophole
Diane Spencer
A British Conservative government would demand a £2,000 (US$3,250) bond from overseas students in a bid to tackle bogus colleges and abuses of the visa system. Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said the present student visa system represented "a huge loophole in our border controls and, despite years of promises, the government has completely failed to deal with the problem".
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: More autonomous universities
Jane Marshall
A second group of French universities became autonomous this month, bringing to 51 the number of institutions acquiring more freedom to manage their own affairs. The government's determination to encourage a 'results-based culture' in the sector is reflected in new funding criteria that take graduate employment rates and research assessments into account.
Full report on the University World News site:
THE NETHERLANDS: Too few women professors
Jan Petter Myklebust
Universities in the Netherlands have 271 full professors who are women - out of a total of 2,321, or less than 12%. A recent report reviews these statistics and discusses how to boost the proportion of new female professors.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Universities face more under-prepared students
Sharon Dell
Increased numbers of South African school-leavers eligible for university study, but with poor pass rates in mathematics and science in the 2009 national 'matriculation' examinations, mean universities will increasingly battle to provide academic support for under-prepared students.
Full report on the University World News site:
N IGERIA: Telemedicine arrives at Lagos
Tunde Fatunde
Telemedicine has finally arrived in N igeria via a pilot project recently launched at Lagos University. This interactive electronic mode of teaching, research and provision of medical services has been embraced by lecturers, students and patients. Its efficiency and cost-savings have encouraged other universities to consider partnerships with IT companies that provide telemedicine infrastructure.
Full report on the University World News site:
MALAWI: Churches try to avert university quotas
Malawian clerics have embarked on a last-minute attempt to stop a controversial university quota system from taking effect. Planned demonstrations were blocked by the police who said they were illegal, but a petition was sent to President Bingu Wa Mutharika urging him to annul the system that directs university entry to be based on place of origin and not on merit.
Full report on the University World News site:
TUNISIA: Progress in agricultural R&D
Jane Marshall
Agricultural research and development projects have been highlighted in La Presse of Tunis. The newspaper has interviewed Amor Chermiti on the activities of Inrat, the National Institute of Agronomic Research of Tunisia, of which he is Director General, and it has published reports on the Bizerte competitive research cluster and its Agri-tech business centre and the research assessment area of the Institute of Arid Regions, which became fully operative in 2009.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Hoax call to deport Zimbabwe graduates
Munyaradzi Makoni
A statement that appeared in the press calling for the repatriation of Zimbabwean graduates of South Africa's University of Fort Hare, has been dismissed as a hoax. But last week a dozen students who had presidential scholarships withdrawn by Zimbabwe's government for engaging in political activity, slammed the university for "allowing them to be victimised", London-based SW Radio reported.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
UK: VCs attack cuts to the sector
Leaders of the elite Russell Group of 20 research-intensive universities launched a scathing attack on the Labour government's cuts to the higher education budget. Writing in The Guardian Michael Arthur, chair of the group, and Wendy Piatt, its Director General, accused the government of bringing an 800-year-old world-class system to its knees.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: New website for academics and students
British parent Billy Fitzgerald noticed that his student daughter was spending too much time on Facebook and not enough on studying. So he designed a website, http://www.studentsandacademics.com, that has research and social network tools as well as ezines, videos, online newspapers, horoscope and news reports.
Full report on the University World News:
DR CONGO: Teaching assistants demand back pay
Angry teaching assistants at Unikin, the University of Kinshasa, who have not been paid for the past 10 months have threatened to down tools and take to the streets in an attempt to make ministers carry out their responsibilities, reported Digital Congo of Kinshasa.
Full report on the University World News site:
SENEGAL: Students demonstrate for grant payments
Students at UCAD, the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar, started the new year with violent demonstrations demanding back payment of their grants, reported
reported Wal Fadjri of Dakar.
Full report on the University World News site:ACADEMIC FREEDOM
CHINA: Dissident academic jailed
Daniel Sawney and Jonathan Travis*
Chinese intellectual and dissident Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years imprisonment on 25 December for his part in drafting and signing the 'Charter 08' document, which calls for significant reforms to the Chinese political system.
More Academic Freedom reports on the University World News site:
FEATURES
AUSTRALIA: Indian attacks raise diplomatic problems
Dale Down
The international higher education sector in Australia has been developing rapidly in recent years and going through some interesting changes, as well as facing new challenges. Difficult financial conditions around the world and the threats of pandemics such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and swine flu have had their effects on the numbers of students undertaking tertiary studies in Australia. But perhaps the most difficult challenge to the industry in recent times has been, and continues to be, the appalling number of attacks on Indian students. Working through this issue will mean walking a very fine and diplomatically delicate line.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Saving the world's water
Sabine Hellmann and Kristin Mosch*
Water is one of the 21st century's key development issues. Worldwide, 1.2 million people have no access to clean drinking water while around three billion have to make do without sanitary facilities or wastewater disposal.
Full report on the University World News site:
THE UWN INTERVIEW
US: Human cloning - solely a medical issue?
John Richard Schrock*
Dr Panayiotis Zavos is recognised worldwide as a leading researcher and authority in the areas of male reproductive physiology, gamete physiology, male infertility and other assistive reproductive technologies. Zavos' team was the first to create human cloned embryos for reproductive purposes. In this interview, he discusses the controversial issue of cloning humans.
Full report on the University World News site:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
GLOBAL: International student security
Simon Marginson*
I want to take up an issue that goes to the heart of higher education, especially research universities, around the world. It is about global mobility, especially the mobility of human subjects. It also highlights the implications of changes in higher education for the larger world: that issue is the human security of international students, by which I mean people who cross national borders for the purposes of formal study.
Full report on the University World News site:
CANADA: Why Twitter matters
Camille Rutherford*
In the past year the popularity of the micro-blogging/social network site Twitter has exploded as the media grabbed hold of this once relatively obscure site and launched it into the stratosphere by anointing it as the place to be for techies, politicians, news junkies, and Hollywood stars. First published by Academic Matters.
Full report on the University World News site:
ETHIOPIA: The dilemmas of higher education expansion
Liz Reisberg and Laura E Rumbley*
Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world. More than three-fourths of the nation's primary economic activity involves small-scale agriculture, not only highly inefficient but extremely vulnerable to variations in climate and international market prices. To move from an agrarian to a modern economy, Ethiopia requires citizens with more education. This necessity is especially critical in a country with the 15th-largest population on the planet and a median age of barely 17 years. Accordingly, the government has expanded the higher education system while growing enrolment, both at breakneck speed. First published in International Higher Education.
Full report on the University World News site:
UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
US: Etching found at university may be a Rembrandt
Soon after becoming president of Catholic University, the Very Reverend David M O'Connell went in search of paper towels in his bathroom cabinet, writes Jenna Johnson for The Washington Post. Something on the bottom shelf caught his eye. Under a pile of junk, he found an old frame. In the frame was a tiny etching of an old man with an unruly beard and billowing hat, composed of thousands of fine lines. His eyes are tired. His head nods toward his chest. The piece is signed 'Rembrandt'.
More on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Dolphins second brightest on planet
Dolphins have been declared the world's second most intelligent creatures after humans, with scientists suggesting they are so bright that they should be treated as "non-human persons", writes Jonathan Leake for the London Sunday Times.
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WORLD ROUND-UP
IRAN: Remote-controlled bomb kills nuclear physicist
A remote-controlled bomb killed a Tehran University physics professor near his home early on Tuesday in what Iranian authorities called an assassination backed by Western powers, including the US and Israel, write Farnaz Fassihi and Chip Cummins for The Wall Street Journal. The victim was identified as 50-year-old Masoud Ali Mohammadi.
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CANADA: Palm scanning for students raises fears
In a move that has prompted at least three complaints to Canada's privacy czar, a growing number of professional programmes such as medicine and business now require students to give a digital print of their finger, thumb or even veins in their palm to write the high-stakes entrance tests designed and run out of the United States, writes Louise Brown for The Star.
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CHINA: Foreign status faked to access universities
Students born, raised and educated in China are using fake foreign passports to get into top universities, which have higher entrance standards for domestic candidates, state media said last week, reports AFP. Fake foreign passports can be bought in eastern China for around 200,000 yuan (US$29,300 dollars), the Global Times said of the bogus enrolment scam.
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CHINA: Record numbers flock to postgraduate exam
China's three-day national postgraduate examination attracted 1.4 million registered applicants, a record number since 2001 and a 13% increase over 2009, the official Xinhua news agency reports. The candidates competed for 465,000 seats, which means around one in three examinees will succeed.
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US-CHINA: Chinese gift to Yale sparks outrage at home
When Zhang Lei, a Chinese fund manager who earned an MBA at Yale's School of Management, agreed to donate $8,888,888 to his American alma mater, it's a safe bet that he didn't expect it would make people angry, reports The Wall Street Journal. But the announcement of his gift - the business school's largest ever from one of its graduates - has triggered a fiery debate in China over national loyalties.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Ethnic campus clubs on the rise
Many things would surprise South African student activists of the '70s and '80s if they were to go back to the universities in which they studied, writes Dinga Sikwebu for The Sunday Times. Not only would they discover a changed landscape in terms of student composition, and the reconfiguration of institutions of higher learning, they would also be surprised at how universities are now run like businesses with strong cost-management programmes. But nothing is likely to shock them more than posters advertising meetings for Zulus, Pedis, Xhosas, Tswanas, Sothos, Vendas and Shangaans.
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UK: HIV-Aids deniers land radical journal in trouble
It has published papers on everything from ejaculation as a treatment for nasal congestion to why modern scientists are so dull, but the future of Medical Hypotheses is hanging in the balance after a host of complaints from high-profile researchers, writes By Zoë Corbyn for Times Higher Education.
More on the University World News site:
US: Top universities criticised over financial aid to wealthy
Many of America's top public universities are giving millions of dollars in financial aid to students from relatively wealthy families instead of to those who urgently need it, resulting in campuses that are often less diverse than those at elite private schools, a new report says, writes Jenna Johnson for The Washington Post.
More on the University World News site:
US: Circular ratings
New research raises additional questions about the 'reputational' survey that is worth 25% (more than any other factor) on the US News & World Report rankings of colleges, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. What the research found is that the reputational scores don't correlate with changes in factors such as resources or graduation rates, but correlate with the previous year's rankings. In other words, the way you get a good reputational score - and in turn a good ranking - is to already have a good ranking.
More on the University World News site:
US: Israel in the American classroom
Supporters of Israel have worried of late that much of the campus discussion about the country has taken place in rallies and counter-rallies on the quad, and not in the classroom, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. But a study released on Wednesday found significant growth in the past few years in the number of courses focused on Israel. Further, these courses are appearing in a wider range of disciplines than in the past and do not focus exclusively on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the military history of Israel.
More on the University World News site:
US: When tenure means nothing
Clark Atlanta University violated the rights of 55 faculty members - 20 of them with tenure - when it eliminated their jobs without faculty consultation or due process, and without regard to whether or not they had tenure, according to a report issued on Wednesday by the American Association of University Professors. The AAUP called the dismissals, covering a quarter of the faculty, "outrageous" and "especially egregious", writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed.
More on the University World News site:
US: Suit settled over Kindle navigation by the blind
The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind have settled a lawsuit against Arizona State University over its plan to deploy the Kindle DX among students, writes Jacqui Cheng for Ars Technica. The settlement involves no monetary damages, but the university agreed to use devices that are more accessible to the blind if it chooses to deploy e-book readers in the coming years. If Amazon wants to be part of that deployment, it had better up its accessibility game.
More on the University World News site:
UK-INDIA: Sibal visits to strengthen education ties
UK Business Secretary, Lord Mandelson was among the British delegation meeting the Indian Minister for Human Resource Development, Kapil Sibal, last week for discussions about the broad range of UK-India cooperation, reports the official The Gov Monitor.
More on the University World News site:
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