University World News 0154 - 16th January 2011

AMEEN AMJAD KHAN covers a scientific meeting in Pakistan of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, where key decisions were made affecting higher education. In Features, LINDA YEUNG interviews reformist Xiong Bingqi about problems facing universities in China, MUNYARADZI MAKONI looks at a global initiative to encourage business schools to promote responsible practices, and KATE ASHCROFT reports on progress towards a new funding formula for universities in Ethiopia. In Commentary, PHILIP G ALTBACH argues that there is no legitimate role in higher education for agents and third-party recruiters of international students and they should be abolished, ERIK BEERKENS contends that the 'McDonalisation' of global university models is not always a bad thing, and JANA FISEROVA and JOHN ANCHOR suggest that students' perceptions on the returns of going to university - rather than the actual returns - will be vital for future predictions of demand for higher education.

NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report

EUROPE: EUA warns over impact of economic crisis
Brendan O'Malley
The economic crisis has affected European higher education systems in different ways and at different stages of the crisis, but the ensuing cuts are likely to lead to sweeping changes to higher education systems around Europe, according to a report by the European University Association.
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GERMANY: Student mobility rising fast, study shows
Michael Gardner
The number of German students studying abroad doubled in 2000-08. A survey suggests that they are much more mobile than students from most other countries, with only China, India and South Korea sending more students abroad. At the same time, the number of students from other countries coming to Germany to study rose by around 250% in 11 years.
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TAIWAN: Bid to attract more overseas students
Yojana Sharma
In a major speech last week Taiwan's President Ma Ying-Jeou outlined the country's bid to become a higher education hub, and said some universities could begin to teach in English - a move that could draw students from mainland China and elsewhere in Asia away from universities in Britain, Australia and the US.
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INDIA: Long wait ahead for foreign universities
Alya Mishra
Foreign universities keen on setting up in India have a long wait ahead. The Foreign Education Providers Bill to allow foreign educational institutions to open up branch campuses in India remains stuck in parliament.
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MALAYSIA: New term dates to aid internationalisation
Honey Singh Virdee
The start of the term at all public universities in Malaysia will be changed from this year to coincide with the academic calendar of universities in the West and neighbouring countries in Asia, as part of the internationalisation of the higher education sector, the education ministry said this month.
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SWEDEN: More investment favours older universities
Jan Petter Myklebust
Sweden is bucking the trend for austerity measures in higher education by increasing investment. But the older, more established universities will get a greater share of the extra spending at the expense of newer universities, especially in research.
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MAGHREB: Student, jobless graduate protests spread
Wagdy Sawahel
While the five states of the Arab Maghreb Union in North Africa approved a plan to enhance cooperation and academic integration among universities, violence, rioting and strikes by students and jobless graduates spread across the region from Tunisia to Algeria and Mauritania.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Massive growth in post-school places
Karen MacGregor
In its push to expand participation in tertiary education, the government announced last week that opportunities for South Africans who passed school-leaving examinations in December would grow by 56% this year. And under political pressure to provide free higher education, President Jacob Zuma promised students on state loans a free final year if they graduate.
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US: More student lab time as programme extended
Alison Moodie
The University of California, Berkeley, has received a four-year, $1 million grant to extend a programme that gives undergraduate students from across the country more hands-on laboratory experience.
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IRELAND: Race to be technological first
John Walshe
Ireland's institutes of technology are scrambling to hold merger discussions to become the country's first technological university. This follows a long awaited and much leaked national strategy report which ruled out upgrading existing institutes but held out the prospect of merged institutes, over time, applying for designation as technological universities.
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ZIMBABWE: Mugabe supporters grab university land
Kudzai Mashininga
Three supporters of President Robert Mugabe have moved to grab huge chunks of land belonging to a state-run university in a matter that has since spilled into the courts. This comes a decade after the African dictator launched a ruinous agrarian reform exercise.
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ALGERIA: Problems of corruption and Bologna process
Jane Marshall
As a national conference of university managers was starting last week, La Tribune of Algiers questioned the state of affairs in "a sector corrupted by scandal". The paper also reported continuing disruption, and opposition from students and lecturers, over introduction of the Bologna process to the country's universities.
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Organisation of the Islamic Conference
University World News covered the 14th meeting of the Organisation of the
Islamic Conference's Standing Committee on Scientific and Technological Cooperation, held in Pakistan's capital Islamabad last week.

ISLAMIC WORLD: Nations continue focus on Africa

Ameen Amjad Khan The 36 resolutions passed by the Organisation of Islamic Conference meeting in Islamabad last week stressed the critical and catalytic role of science, technology and higher education for development in OIC states in general and African member countries in particular.
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ISLAMIC WORLD: More science in higher education
Ameen Amjad Khan
Higher education and science and technology ministers from member countries of the Jeddah-based Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) have decided unanimously to make curricula in universities of member states more science-oriented.
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ISLAMIC WORLD: New network of virtual universities
Ameen Amjad Khan
Ministers of higher education, science and technology from member countries of Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) last week announced that they will set up a network of virtual universities, based in Iran and financially supported by the Islamabad-based OIC and the Islamic Development Bank in Jeddah.
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NEWSBRIEFS

GLOBAL: Australians top world student debating champs
Some 1,200 tertiary students from more than 60 countries and 200 universities converged on the University of Botswana for the 31st World Universities Debating Championships. Students from Australia dominated the top positions.
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MADAGASCAR: University lecturers' strike ends
The long strike in Madagascar by university lecturers and researchers ended on Monday, following negotiations between their union, SECES, and the Minister of Higher Education, Athanase Tongavelo.
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FEATURES

CHINA: Universities still have problems
Linda Yeung
A staunch advocate for higher education reform in China, Xiong Bingqi drew widespread attention in 2004 with the publication of his first book Universities Have Problems. Now China wants to build world-class universities and attract foreign faculty. But universities still have problems, particularly with party officials intervening in academic affairs, Xiong said in a frank interview.
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GLOBAL: Business schools promote responsible leaders
Munyaradzi Makoni
'Social responsibility' has assumed new meaning in the international business vocabulary: it is now about corporations moving from being the best in the world, to being best for the world. There is also growing implementation of the notion, thanks to a UN-sponsored global initiative to encourage business schools to promote responsible commercial practices.
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ETHIOPIA: Final steps to a funding formula
Kate Ashcroft
Ethiopia came a major step closer to implementing a fully functioning funding formula for teaching and learning in higher education, at a conference held in Addis Ababa last month. Participants overwhelmingly endorsed the principles of a funding formula and recommended that the Ethiopian government give it the go-ahead very soon.
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COMMENTARY

GLOBAL: Abolish agents and third-party recruiters
Agents and third-party recruiters are one of the results of the commerc ialisation of international higher education. In this article published in the latest edition of International Higher Education, PHILIP G ALTBACH argues that they have no legitimate role in higher education, are unnecessary and sometimes less than honest and should be abolished.
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ASIA: The global university - McDonaldisation?
Universities are becoming part of a global community, not just of students, but also of leaders, managers and administrators. The diffusion of global university models is sometimes seen as Westernisation or even the McDonaldisation of institutions. With reference to universities in Malaysia and Indonesia, ERIC BEERKENS looks at how the notion of the global service-oriented research university has spread and whether it is a bad thing.
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GLOBAL: Perceived returns of higher education
Jana Fiserova and John Anchor*
Will students be put off applying to university if tuition fees are raised? Most research has focused on what the actual returns of going to university are for students, rather than on their perceptions of those returns. The latter will be vital for future predictions of demand for higher education.
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SCIENCE SCENE

GLOBAL: Largest image of sky ever made
Astronomers at the 217th meeting of the American Astronomical Society released the largest digital image of the sky ever made last week. A mosaic created from millions of 2.8 megapixel images recorded over the past decade, the images were produced by the giant Sloan Digital Sky Survey and map the universe in more detail than any others ever achieved.
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AFRICA: Fruit farmers to use ants for pest control
Munyaradzi Makoni
Three universities will spearhead the training of African fruit and nut growers to use weaver ants to control pests. Farmers incur huge financial losses as their crops are attacked by insects, and this form of pest control will reduce losses while opening doors to world organic food markets.
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UK: Seeing the body from within and without
A new study led by Dr Manos Tsakiris from Royal Holloway, University of London, suggests that the way we experience the internal state of our body may also influence how we perceive our body from the outside, as for example in the mirror.
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GLOBAL: International Year of Chemistry
Eminent scientists from the world of chemistry, including several Nobel Prize winners, will participate in a colloquium on 27-28 January at the Unesco headquarters in Paris to launch a year-long programme of events celebrating chemistry and the vital role it plays in human and social development.
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UNI-LATERAL

INDIA: 'Working class' university on the cards
There may soon be a university for artisans and craftsmen where they get formal degrees - from bachelors to doctorate - to show for their skills, reports The Times of India.
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UK: Obesity linked to insecurity in rich nations
People in wealthy countries with 'free market' economies are more likely to become obese, an Oxford University study says, reports the BBC. Money stresses in countries like the UK and US could explain their higher obesity levels, compared with countries such as Norway and Sweden.
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WORLD ROUND-UP

ISRAEL: Academics boycott settlement university
Some 155 university and college faculty members have signed a petition calling for an academic boycott of the Ariel University Centre, writes Or Kashti for Haaretz. In the petition, the lecturers state their "unwillingness to take part in any type of academic activity taking place in the college operating in the settlement of Ariel".
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VENEZEULA: Government scraps university law
Venezuela's national assembly has officially scrapped a controversial education reform law that would have increased government control over universities, reports the BBC.
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US: Far from border, foreign students detained
Six miles north of the University of Maine's flagship campus, on the only real highway in these parts, students and professors traveling south might encounter a surprise: a roadblock manned by armed Border Patrol agents, backed by drug-sniffing dogs, state policemen, and county sheriff's deputies, writes Colin Woodard for The Chronicle of Higher Education.
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US: Universities shift focus away from Japan
More and more US universities are apparently giving up on Japan as a target for recruiting students, as a survey showed that the number of US universities taking part in publicity events in Japan has sharply dropped in recent years, reports Yuji Yoshikata and for The Daily Yomiuri.
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CANADA: Professor's lecture prompts FBI call
A University of Victoria professor of indigenous studies says the FBI called her after she gave a lecture in the United States about Native American land rights, reports CBC News.
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TAIWAN: Some courses off-limits to Chinese students
The Ministry of Education last week published a set of guidelines stipulating that Chinese students are prohibited from enrolling in university departments related to national security, reports Focus Taiwan.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Free State wins global award
The University of the Free State has won the World Universities' Forum award for best practice in higher education during 2010, reports Sipho Masondo for The Times.
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AUSTRALIA: New body to rank rankers
University rankings are likely to proliferate and become more spec ialised, creating the need for a new kind of meta-ranking service that sorts and rates comparative data, writes Julie Hare for The Australian.
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IRELAND: Students face hefty debts under loan plan
College graduates would have to repay a debt of at least -25,000 (US$32,825) under a student loan scheme being considered by the Department of Education, writes Seán Flynn for The Irish Times.
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SCOTLAND: EU students 'exploit' local universities
Scottish ministers claim that thousands of European students are exploiting Scotland's free university system to avoid paying escalating fees in their home countries. Latest admissions figures show the number of students from other EU countries taking up places at Scottish universities has nearly doubled in a decade to almost 16,000 last year, at a cost of nearly £75 million (US$118,83), writes Severin Carrell for The Guardian.
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INDIA: Women engineering student numbers soar
Women have more than doubled their number across the country's engineering colleges over the past decade, pushing against one of the most resilient glass ceilings in Indian academia, writes Charu Sudan Kasturi for The Hindustan Times.
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US: California cuts 'imperil culture of innovation'
California's culture of innovation, which propelled the growth of Silicon Valley and Hollywood, was built on a public higher-education system that spawned 56 Nobel Prize winners and is home to one campus that produces 1,000 engineers a year, writes Oliver Staley for Bloomberg. Now, Governor Jerry Brown's proposed 16% cut in the higher education budget means that the elite University of California system may no longer be able to guarantee admission to the top 12.5% of the state's high school seniors.
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US: University takes aim at campus gun law
The University of Utah's president asked school trustees last Tuesday to help thwart possible legislation allowing the open display of firearms on campus, a move that could reopen a contentious debate between educators and lawmakers over gun policies, writes Brian Maffly for The Salt Lake Tribune.
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