NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report
GLOBAL: US again leads world rankings
Geoff Maslen
American universities again dominate the latest Shanghai Jiao Tong rankings as they have for the past six years. Released last Friday, almost a week earlier than expected, the rankings place US universities in all but three of the top 20 spots with Harvard, Stanford and the University of California at Berkeley in first, second and third spot, and the universities of Cambridge, Oxford and Tokyo the only outsiders at fourth, 10th and 20th. The top 10 universities are unchanged this year from the rankings drawn up in 2008.
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IRAN: Misconduct prompts call for ethical standards
Wagdy Sawahel
As a result of plagiarism and academic misconduct scandals associated with the country's newly appointed Science Minister, Iranian professors in US-based universities and research centres have called on their peers at home to uphold high ethical standards, including safeguarding the integrity of the academy, curriculum, scholarly contributions and publications.
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RUSSIA: Arrest of historian sparks outcry
Nick Holdsworth
The arrest and seizure of research notes of a Russian historian investigating the wartime imprisonment of German troops and Russians of German descent has sparked outrage among academics and human rights activists. Figures from higher education internationally as well as within Russia have condemned what they see as part of a Kremlin-backed move to suppress discussion of the country's darker historical episodes. See also "Professors chafe at scholarly screening" in World Round-up
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GLOBAL: 2009 global top business school ranking
Karen MacGregor
More than 300 deans from around the world voted Harvard the best in the 2009 Eduniversal global top 1,000 business school rankings, announced at the French company's convention in Cape Town last week. London Business School earned the second highest vote and Copenhagen Business School came third. Next year Eduniversal will launch a global ranking of masters programmes.
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NEW ZEALAND: University attracts investors with bonds
John Gerritsen*
In a nation with a weak tradition of philanthropy to universities, the University of Canterbury has launched an innovative scheme to raise funds: a bond issue that gives investors the opportunity to donate to the university.
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US: Academics, not universities, own their inventions
Geoff Maslen
A Federal Circuit Court judge has ruled that US universities cannot automatically claim ownership of a researcher's federally funded invention. The judgment could protect academic inventors and students across America from being forced by universities to sign away the rights to their life's work, according to Dr Renee Kaswan, inventor of the billion-dollar drug Restasis and founder of the non-profit organisation IPAdvocate.org.
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FINLAND: Less pay but happy in their work
Ian R Dobson*
Even though Finnish academics are less well paid than their colleagues in some countries, two-thirds are satisfied with their academic life. This fact - and much more - arises from an international Changing Academic Profession survey of academics and their perceptions of their work. Finland is one of more than 20 countries participating in the survey and a seminar on the Finnish results, organised by the University of Tampere, has revealed the results.
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DENMARK: Report angers universities
Jan Petter Myklebust
A report by the international consulting firm McKinsey on Denmark's higher education system that was commissioned by the government earlier this year has attracted widespread criticism. Of particular concern was the report's querying of the fact that the country's universities spend 31% of their total resources on 'administration', thereby costing up to DKK8 billion (US$1.6 billion) a year.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Vice-chancellor faces death threat
Karen MacGregor
The vice-chancellor who was slated by South Africa's rulers for 'pardoning' four white students who filmed a racist video at the University of the Free State, last week reopened the issue for further discussion. Meanwhile, the official opposition laid a charge against a ruling party leader for saying the vice-chancellor should be "shot and killed because he is a racist".
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NIGERIA: Universities reopen after strike
Tunde Fatunde
N igerian universities have reopened after three months of paralysing strikes by unions. Three staff unions signed a memorandum of understanding with the government and called off the industrial action after weeks of complex negotiations. A stumbling block, however, may be a lack of funds to implement the core areas agreed on by the parties because of the country's economic crisis.
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EGYPT: Swine flu drives private tuition boom
Ashraf Khaled
Commerce student Ihab Lutfi stands in a queue outside a shop in eastern Cairo, waiting to have a bundle of papers he is carrying photocopied. "These are notes compiled by my private teacher to help me study business administration," said Lutfi, who admitted depending heavily on fee-paying private tuition as he has barely attended Ain Shams University since the spread of swine flu.
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NEWSBRIEFS
UK: More studying engineering and physical sciences
More students have been accepted into science and engineering-related degree courses this autumn, Britain's University and Colleges Admissions Service says. Science is also now the most popular subject at school according to a new poll of children aged five to 18.
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UNESCO: Virtual campus for Iraq
Wagdy Sawahel
The Iraqi Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research has launched a three-year Avicenna Virtual Campus project with Unesco to expand access and improve the nation's higher education system.
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FRANCE: Student job prospects
Jane Marshall
Universities are to carry out a vast survey to find out how their former students have fared finding employment. The aim is to give freshers an indication of which courses are most - and least - likely to lead to a job. Starting in December, about 100,000 graduates will be contacted by their alma maters in the inquiry ordered by the Ministry of Higher Education and Research.
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AFRICA: New AVU online education centres
The African Virtual University, in partnership with the African Development Bank, has launched a centre of online learning and distance education in Zambia, the first of 10 scheduled to open in universities throughout Africa in the next five months, reported the Agence de Presse Sénégalaise .
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KENYA: Students repay loans using cell phones
Dave Buchere
Students and graduates can now repay loans received from the Higher Education Loans Board using their cell phones. The phone option is among initiatives aimed at making repayment easier and enhancing student loan recovery.
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ALGERIA: ICT innovation start-up initiative
Wagdy Sawahel
Algeria has launched a start-up initiative to help university graduates and hi-tech entrepreneurs transfer ideas into innovative information and communications technology-based enterprises in the hope of establishing a Silicon Valley-style zone and a "Google - made in Algeria".
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ACADEMIC FREEDOM
CHINA: Academic imprisoned for criticising government
Daniel Sawney and Jonathan Travis*
A former professor at Nanjing Normal University and leader of a campaign for competitive multiparty democracy has been sentenced to 10 years in prison by Chinese authorities for alleged 'subversion of state power', the Financial Times has reported. Guo Quan was sentenced on 16 October in Suqian, a city in the eastern province of Jiangsu, four months after the case was filed with the court in June.
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SCIENCE SCENE
NEW ZEALAND: $1mllion in prizes for science
John Gerritsen*
Want to raise the status and public perception of science? Give away $1 million. That's the formula being followed by the New Zealand government, which has just announced a new suite of science prizes in a bid to attract young people into science careers and raise the sector's reputation.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Benchmark book on the state of science
Munyaradzi Makoni
South African science has come of age. It has moved from isolation during apartheid to a boom of international inclusiveness in today's world. This route - steeped in social, political and global ethos - is captured in a new book, The State of Science in South Africa, published by the Academy of Science of South Africa, ASSAf.
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EU-US: Research collaboration encouraged
The European Union hopes to strengthen links with the US and improve the research expertise of both continents with two new projects.
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INDONESIA: $29 million nanotech initiative
Wagdy Sawahel
Indonesia will spend US$29 million to foster communication between industry and universities to encourage the use of nanotechnology and improve the nation's industrial competitiveness.
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FEATURES
GREECE: Government makes education a priority
Makki Marseilles
The new soc ialist leadership at the Greek Education Ministry has exhibited more purpose, energy and willingness to come to grips with education's problems than the former conservative government showed in the last five and a half years - which bodes well for the future.
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GERMANY: It isn't just about being in work
Stephan Weidt*
The International Center for Development and Decent Work at Kassel University is one of five winners in the German competition EXCEED - Excellence for Development. Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger is the Millennium Development Goal the centre wishes to contribute to, as well as the more general millennium goal of developing a global partnership for development. For this purpose, Kassel is cooperating with institutions in India, Brazil, South Africa, Kenya, Pakistan and Mexico.
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AFRICA: Scholars, locals collaborate on environment
Louise Tickle
"There needs to be a mental shift: people need to realise that they themselves are often the cause of environmental problems," says Elsie Kariuki, 30, from Nairobi. An environmental studies graduate employed as project officer for Community-based Biodiversity Conservation Films, Kariuki is determined that training she is undertaking to create environmental film 'shorts' helps educate her fellow Kenyans to understand "that our natural resources are not infinite, that they must make a conscious effort towards their regeneration and sustainability".
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HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
US: New report on learning outcomes assessment
A national study published last week reveals that most US universities and colleges gather information about what students learn during their studies - but mostly do not use and report the results in ways that could improve student accomplishment and inform the public about institutional performance. The report from the National Institute for Learning Outcome Assessment , NILOA, based on information from more than 1,500 degree institutions, found among other things that most institutions conduct learning outcomes assessment "on a shoestring" and one in five devote less than one person to the activity.
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ARAB WORLD: Reforms key for knowledge society - Report
Arab societies need nurturing institutions and supportive policies to experience a significant boost in knowledge production and creation, according to The Arab Knowledge Report 2009. Launched on Thursday, it is the first publication of a partnership between the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation and the United Nations Development Programme. The report argues that political, institutional, cultural and intellectual reforms, as well as reform of the media and information technologies, are vital if Arab societies are to bridge the knowledge gap.
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U-SAY
From Maree Conway*
I refer to Professor Marcia Devlin's article last week and would offer a few comments. One, nowhere in this article is there a reference to the majority of staff in institutions - the professional staff - and how their roles and functions may change over the next 20 years. By then, I hope, we will have 'university staff' as the accepted terminology so there will be no more nonsensical conversations about 'academic' and 'general' staff, and who runs universities.
Full letter on the University World News site:
UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
US: DNA swab for your job
Many colleges now require criminal background checks of all new employees. But the University of Akron - in what some experts believe is a first - is not only requiring a criminal background check, but is stating that new employees must be willing to submit a DNA sample, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed.
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FACEBOOK
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WORLD ROUND-UP
RUSSIA: Professors chafe at scholarly screening
Word spread this month among faculty members of St Petersburg State University: according to a document signed on 1 October, they have to submit their work to administrators for permission before publishing it abroad or presenting it at overseas conferences, writes Ellen Barry for The New York Times.
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ISRAEL: Student planner ad warns 'anti-Israeli' dons
Haifa University's students union is distributing a daily planner containing an ad branding left-wing lecturers in universities as "anti-Israeli" and a "fifth column", writes Or Kashti for Haaretz. The full-page ad, titled "Warning! Academic fifth column! Meet the anti-Israeli lecturers in Israel", was posted by the IsraCampus organization and refers readers to its website, which monitors allegedly left-wing lecturers.
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ISRAEL: Gaza students stuck in Strip
With the 2009-10 academic year underway, 838 Palestinian university students were still waiting for the authorisation that would enable them to leave the Gaza Strip to study overseas, reports Yaheli Moran Zelikovich for Ynet News. The Legal Centre for Freedom of Movement said on 21 October that the students had not been able to leave the Strip because of the Israeli blockade on Gaza.
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INDIA: Sibal visits US to woo leading universities
After Europe, India's Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal is reaching out to the United States to develop partnerships with universities of global repute, reports The Economic Times. In a first-of-its-kind effort, Sibal is in the US meeting members of the Obama administration, university officials and industry representatives, to build education partnerships. He will also firm up the contours of the proposed India-US Education Council.
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CHINA: Students shop for university courses abroad
More than 20,000 visitors packed the Shanghai East Asia Exhibition Hall last weekend during an annual education fair by overseas universities, writes Liang Yiwen for Shanghai Daily. More than 300 institutes from 14 countries displayed booths at the China Education Expo 2009.
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CHINA: Ministry supports formation of an 'Ivy League'
China's Ministry of Education last Monday voiced its support for the formation of C9, an academic conference comprising nine prestigious domestic universities and referred to as China's Ivy League by some experts, reports the official agency Xinhau.
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AFGANISTAN: Students lead protest over 'burnt' Koran
There were protests last weekend in the Afghan capital, Kabul, over allegations that foreign troops in the country burnt a copy of the Koran, writes Andrew North for BBC News. Hundreds of Kabul University students led the protest, burning an effigy of US President Barack Obama.
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US: Seeking tenure 'conversion'
In discussions about the use and abuse of adjunct academics, 'conversion' is a controversial topic, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. Typically it refers to a decision by an institution to convert a number of adjunct positions into a (usually smaller) number of tenure-track positions. The idea of conversion has been key to reform proposals of national faculty groups. Some colleges have bucked the trends and converted slots to the tenure track in various ways. Last week the American Association of University Professors entered the conversion debate in a significant way with a new draft policy on the treatment of adjunct faculty members.
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UK: Universities told to make fees deal with banks
Universities have been urged to strike a deal with banks to stop another rise in tuition fees for all students, writes Jessica Shepherd for The Guardian. Some university leaders want tuition fees to rise from the current cap of £3,225 (US$5,350) a year in England to more than £7,000. But the government may not be able to afford this because it subsidises loans that allow students to pay fees upfront and then repay the loan after graduation.
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SOUTH KOREA: Cloning scientist guilty of embezzlement
Disgraced South Korean cloning scientist Hwang Woo-suk was found guilty last Monday of embezzling from his stem cell research fund and illegally buying human embryos, reports Ju-min Park for the Los Angeles Times. The Seoul court also ruled that Hwang, 56, who became a national hero after he claimed to be the first to successfully clone human stem cells, had partially fabricated the results of his research.
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US: University of California to up fees, increase aid
As the University of California seeks to sharply increase student fees, its president Mark G Yudof has announced plans to soften the impact with an ambitious campaign to raise $1 billion for financial aid and a policy change widening aid eligibility for more middle-income families, reports Larry Gordon for the Los Angeles Times.
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US: Six at Harvard poisoned by tainted coffee
Six medical researchers at Harvard University were poisoned in August after drinking coffee tainted with a chemical preservative, university officials say, reports The Associated Press. In an internal memorandum, the university said the coffee came from a machine near the researchers' laboratory that later tested positive for sodium azide, a common preservative used in laboratories.
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Sunday, 1 November 2009
Sunday, 25 October 2009
University World News 0098 - 25 October 2009
SPECIAL REPORT: Women in higher education
GLOBAL: Women no longer the second sex
Philip Fine, Wagdy Sawahel and Maya Jarjour Women outnumber men in worldwide university enrolments and graduation rates, according to Unesco's 2009 Global Education Digest. The number of female students in tertiary education rose six-fold between 1970 and 2007 compared with a quadrupling of male enrolments during the same period. In terms of graduation, women outnumber men in 75 of the 98 countries, the Digest reports.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Gender divide breached
Karen MacGregor
Women have made remarkable gains in South African higher education - a situation that began in 1995, the year after first democratic elections when, for the first time, more women enrolled at university than men. Today, that has become an established trend with nearly 56% of all students female, more women postgraduates and overall they are considerably more successful in their studies, according to a new report from the Council on Higher Education.
Full report on the University World News site:
CANADA: School the cause of male minority?
Philip Fine
For the last 10 years, Canadian women have enrolled in university at a greater rate than their male counterparts. That steady climb seems to have abated slightly but their numbers are still so high questions are being asked why so many men are not enrolling.
Full report on the University World News site:
IRELAND: Engineering the last male bastion
John Walshe
The majority of Irish lawyers, pharmacists, dentists, doctors and physiother apists in the future will be women. Nursing and primary-school teaching have long been dominated by women and now other professions are heading the same way. The latest figures show that females now outnumber males 59% to 41% in Ireland's seven universities and this is the case in every discipline except engineering and science. On current trends, however, science will also have a female majority by the end of the decade.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Male decline continues
Geoff Maslen
For the past 20 years, the Australian higher education student population has been dominated by women who have increased their numerical superiority over males year by year until now they comprise nearly 58% of the total student body. A mere four of the 12 fields of university study now enrol more men than women and that could soon be reduced to two, leaving engineering and IT the only places on campus where males are in the majority.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report
UNESCO: Education a priority for new DG
Yojana Sharma
Irina Bokova, Director General-elect of the UN education, science and cultural organisation Unesco, and its first woman head, has said her priorities will be education, Africa and gender equality when she takes over on 15 November.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Top business schools to be recognised
Leah Germain
This week, Cape Town in South Africa will host representatives from the world's top business schools to receive global rankings at the second annual Eduniversal World Convention. The Paris-based education spec ialists have ranked the best 1,000 business schools from 153 different countries. Its conference, from 26-28 October, will provide an opportunity for business school deans to meet and discuss the future of business education from an international perspective.
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EUROPE: EU research programme under fire
Alan Osborn
Sharp criticism of European Union research funding has been made by the union's Court of Auditors. The court has called into question the long-term viability of research networks, the efforts made to channel funds to small and medium-sized enterprises and many of the administrative procedures.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: President suspended over 'false diplomas'
Jane Marshall
The president and two vice-presidents of the University of Sud Toulon Var have been suspended from their duties by Valérie Pécresse, Minister for Higher Education and Research, following an inspector's report that they had obstructed an inquiry into alleged trafficking of false diplomas.
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UK: Consultation begins on research assessment
Diane Spencer
Britain's funding councils are planning to change the way they decide how much money out of a yearly allocation of €1.76 billion (US$2.86 billion) universities get for their research budgets. The government flagged changes to the Research Assessment Exercise late in 2007, announcing that the 2008 RAE would be the last of its kind. Consultations have now started to formulate the Research Excellence Framework to replace it.
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GERMANY: State ministers urge Bologna changes
Michael Gardner
Germany's state education and science ministers are to put more pressure on higher education institutions to revise the structure of new masters and bachelor courses, following angry student protests last summer. Federal Education Minister Annette Schavan welcomed the move, saying it would boost the Bologna process while simultaneously creating greater acceptance of the new degrees by everyone involved.
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SOUTH AFRICA: Racist student 'pardon' sparks uproar
Karen MacGregor
Two years ago a racist video showing four white Afrikaner students humiliating black cleaners at the University of the Free State caused outrage in South Africa and abroad. Last week a move by the university's new black vice-chancellor to promote racial reconciliation and transformation by (among other bold moves) pardoning the expelled students, backfired - sparking another controversy. Students threatened to make the university "ungovernable" tomorrow, when the trial of the 'Reitz Four' is due to begin.
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INDONESIA: Discrimination against foreign students
David Jardine
A series of un-neighbourly spats that has gone on between Indonesia and Malaysia this year has extended to Indonesian higher education. A leading Indonesian university has talked openly of excluding its Malaysian students from campus in protest against an unrelated move by a Malaysian government ministry.
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NEWSBRIEFS
FRANCE: Sorbonne or not Sorbonne?
Jane Marshall
The question of who may, or should not, adopt the name of France's most celebrated university has been raised by Paris' chief education officer. Patrick Gérard has asked three institutions to "re-examine the question of the designation" of a higher education and research cluster they are jointly setting up which they propose to call La Sorbonne.
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FRANCE: Students unworried by radical reputations
John Mullen*
During the three month-long lecturer strikes and student movements last spring and summer, which seriously affected more than half of France's universities, the press and the government frequently claimed the strikes were suicidal for universities. Students, they said, would boycott universities and instead would choose private institutions that were relatively little affected by the strikes. Lecturers were shooting themselves in the foot, we were told.
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DEVELOPING WORLD: TWAS aims to boost science fund
Munyaradzi Makoni
The developing world's academy of sciences, TWAS, is looking to double its endowment fund to support more scientists and researchers. The academy, which held its 11th general meeting in the South Africa city of Durban last week, said it wants to improve its assistance for scientists in countries with poor scientific resources, SciDev.net learned.
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EUROPE: Digital library launched
Thousands of EU publications have been made available to the public for free following the launch in Frankfurt of a new digital library, the Digital Bookshop. The website hosts an electronic library containing 12 million scanned pages from more than 110,000 historical publications while a further two million pages from more recent documents are also included.
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FINLAND: Helsinki drops out of top 100
Ian R Dobson*
Finland no longer has a university in the world's top 100. The country's highest ranked university, the University of Helsinki, has slipped from 91st to 108th in the 2009 Times Higher Education-QS ranking.
Full report on the University World News site:
BUSINESS
EUROPE: Clean energy ambitions unveiled
Alan Osborn
The European Commission's recent publication proposing massive spending by the 27 European Union countries on wind and solar energy, carbon capture and nuclear power, among other things, could put billions of dollars in the hands of European universities and research institutions over the next 10 years.
Full report on the University World News site:
CROATIA: New mechatronics centre of excellence
Emma Jackson
Croatian businesses are to be helped by a new mechatronics centre of excellence that has been established with the assistance of Britain's University of the West of England in Bristol, two Croatian technical schools and funding from the European Union.
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SWEDEN: Environmental risks of transgenic fish
Leah Germain
Environmental groups have often criticised the farming of genetically engineered fish because of the environmental risks, human health impacts and welfare of breeding certain forms of unnaturally fast-growing fish. But scientists at Sweden's University of Gothenburg are now working to determine whether these risks are outweighed by the benefits of a new strand of 'super-transgenic' fish.
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FEATURES
AUSTRALIA: Higher education in 2029
Marcia Devlin*
What will Australian universities look like in 20 years? I was asked this question recently after giving a keynote address at a conference where I outlined the federal government's agenda for higher education. It's a difficult question to answer. Twenty years from now, in 2029, I'll be in my mid-60s and still working, thanks to changes to Australian superannuation laws. My children, now entering their teens, will be in their 30s. That's hard to imagine.
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GLOBAL: Luring the foreign student
Liz Lightfoot
The commercials are ludicrous but no-one is really surprised when Foster's claims people who drink its lager can withstand hurricanes and tame violent tribesmen. The idea that "getting some Australian in you" can move mountains is considered acceptable for a national advertising campaign, despite the fact the drink is brewed in the EU and not that popular in Australia.
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HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
US: It's the learning, stupid
Jamie P Merisotis*
We live in a world where much is changing, quickly. Economic crises, technology, ideological division and a host of other factors have all had a profound influence on who we are and what we do in higher education. But when all is said and done, it is imperative that we not lose sight of what matters most. To paraphrase the oft-used maxim of the famous political consultant James Carville, it's the learning, stupid.
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UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
AUSTRALIA: Lighting Christmas tree with grass clippings
Students at RMIT University in Melbourne have designed an innovative biological fluorescent lighting system that can use garden waste to power multi-coloured Christmas tree lights. The project is as an entry in a competition running this week at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
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FACEBOOK
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WORLD ROUND-UP
PAKISTAN: Colleges and schools closed after attacks
Schools in Pakistan were shut down on Wednesday, a day after two suicide attackers struck an Islamic university in the capital Islamabad, setting off a wave of shock and panic across the country, writes Salman Masood for The New York Times. The suicide attacks ripped through the campus of the International Islamic University, killing at least six people, including three female students.
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CHINA: Army to recruit 130,000 graduates
A total of 130,000 graduates from Chinese universities and colleges are expected to join the army this winter - a record number. China wants to improve the quality of servicemen while grappling with the graduate job crisis, reports the official news agency Xinhau.
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ISRAEL: Perks for professors to stymie brain drain
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told cabinet ministers last Sunday that Israel needed to work hard to create a "vacuum" to keep academics from travelling abroad to pursue their careers or studies, writes Barak Ravid for Haaretz. During a cabinet meeting, ministers presented data on the brain drain, showing that a high number of lecturers and researchers at top universities in the US were Israeli expatriates.
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US: Online education's great unknowns
Distance learning has broken into the mainstream of higher education. But at the campus level, many colleges still know precious little about how best to organise online programmes, whether those programmes are profitable, and how they compare to face-to-face instruction in terms of quality, writes Steve Kolowich for Inside Higher Ed.
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US: Scientists hope to network Facebook-style
Cornell University and six other institutions will use a US$12.2 million federal stimulus grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop a Facebook-style professional networking system to link biomedical researchers across America, writes William Kates for The Associated Press. Participants say by making it easier for scientists to find each other, researchers will be able to improve their ongoing studies and forge collaborations that could lead to new discoveries. The new network will be called VIVOweb.
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INDIA: More foreign students for top institutes
The first Indian Institutes of Technology council meeting under the chairmanship of Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal last week was expected to frame a multi-pronged policy, including introducing scholarships and reducing fees, to attract more foreign students at postgraduate level to the institutes, reports The Hindu.
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UK: Universities could face fines as admissions soar
British universities could face multi-million pound fines after breaking a government-imposed cap on student numbers, as the number of new undergraduates rose by nearly 6% this year, figures released last Wednesday reveal, writes Jessica Shepherd for The Guardian.
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UK: Higher education rich-poor gap widening - report
The gap in educational success between Britain's rich and poor is growing, despite investment of millions of pounds each year, according to research published last week, writes John O'Leary for The Times. A report by the University and College Union (UCU) shows that the gulf between rich and poor areas in the numbers completing a degree has widened over four years.
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UK: Universities 'betraying' foreign languages
UK Universities are being forced to "dumb down" foreign language degrees because of a dramatic drop in the number of teenagers studying French and German at school, according to an official report, writes Graeme Paton for The Telegraph. Standards have been "betrayed" in recent years as institutions attempt to attract students from a rapidly "diminishing field", it is suggested.
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US: Adios to Spanish 101 classroom
After several years of experimenting with 'hybrid' Spanish courses that mix online and classroom instruction, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has decided to begin conducting its introductory Spanish course exclusively on the web, writes Steve Kolowich for Inside Higher Ed.
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US: Most expensive colleges for 2009-2010
For the second year in a row, Sarah Lawrence College is the most expensive college in the US for the 2009-2010 school year, while New York University edges out The George Washington University to come second in the CampusGrotto ranking.
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GLOBAL: Women no longer the second sex
Philip Fine, Wagdy Sawahel and Maya Jarjour Women outnumber men in worldwide university enrolments and graduation rates, according to Unesco's 2009 Global Education Digest. The number of female students in tertiary education rose six-fold between 1970 and 2007 compared with a quadrupling of male enrolments during the same period. In terms of graduation, women outnumber men in 75 of the 98 countries, the Digest reports.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Gender divide breached
Karen MacGregor
Women have made remarkable gains in South African higher education - a situation that began in 1995, the year after first democratic elections when, for the first time, more women enrolled at university than men. Today, that has become an established trend with nearly 56% of all students female, more women postgraduates and overall they are considerably more successful in their studies, according to a new report from the Council on Higher Education.
Full report on the University World News site:
CANADA: School the cause of male minority?
Philip Fine
For the last 10 years, Canadian women have enrolled in university at a greater rate than their male counterparts. That steady climb seems to have abated slightly but their numbers are still so high questions are being asked why so many men are not enrolling.
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IRELAND: Engineering the last male bastion
John Walshe
The majority of Irish lawyers, pharmacists, dentists, doctors and physiother apists in the future will be women. Nursing and primary-school teaching have long been dominated by women and now other professions are heading the same way. The latest figures show that females now outnumber males 59% to 41% in Ireland's seven universities and this is the case in every discipline except engineering and science. On current trends, however, science will also have a female majority by the end of the decade.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Male decline continues
Geoff Maslen
For the past 20 years, the Australian higher education student population has been dominated by women who have increased their numerical superiority over males year by year until now they comprise nearly 58% of the total student body. A mere four of the 12 fields of university study now enrol more men than women and that could soon be reduced to two, leaving engineering and IT the only places on campus where males are in the majority.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report
UNESCO: Education a priority for new DG
Yojana Sharma
Irina Bokova, Director General-elect of the UN education, science and cultural organisation Unesco, and its first woman head, has said her priorities will be education, Africa and gender equality when she takes over on 15 November.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Top business schools to be recognised
Leah Germain
This week, Cape Town in South Africa will host representatives from the world's top business schools to receive global rankings at the second annual Eduniversal World Convention. The Paris-based education spec ialists have ranked the best 1,000 business schools from 153 different countries. Its conference, from 26-28 October, will provide an opportunity for business school deans to meet and discuss the future of business education from an international perspective.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: EU research programme under fire
Alan Osborn
Sharp criticism of European Union research funding has been made by the union's Court of Auditors. The court has called into question the long-term viability of research networks, the efforts made to channel funds to small and medium-sized enterprises and many of the administrative procedures.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: President suspended over 'false diplomas'
Jane Marshall
The president and two vice-presidents of the University of Sud Toulon Var have been suspended from their duties by Valérie Pécresse, Minister for Higher Education and Research, following an inspector's report that they had obstructed an inquiry into alleged trafficking of false diplomas.
Full report on the University World News site:
UK: Consultation begins on research assessment
Diane Spencer
Britain's funding councils are planning to change the way they decide how much money out of a yearly allocation of €1.76 billion (US$2.86 billion) universities get for their research budgets. The government flagged changes to the Research Assessment Exercise late in 2007, announcing that the 2008 RAE would be the last of its kind. Consultations have now started to formulate the Research Excellence Framework to replace it.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: State ministers urge Bologna changes
Michael Gardner
Germany's state education and science ministers are to put more pressure on higher education institutions to revise the structure of new masters and bachelor courses, following angry student protests last summer. Federal Education Minister Annette Schavan welcomed the move, saying it would boost the Bologna process while simultaneously creating greater acceptance of the new degrees by everyone involved.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Racist student 'pardon' sparks uproar
Karen MacGregor
Two years ago a racist video showing four white Afrikaner students humiliating black cleaners at the University of the Free State caused outrage in South Africa and abroad. Last week a move by the university's new black vice-chancellor to promote racial reconciliation and transformation by (among other bold moves) pardoning the expelled students, backfired - sparking another controversy. Students threatened to make the university "ungovernable" tomorrow, when the trial of the 'Reitz Four' is due to begin.
Full report on the University World News site:
INDONESIA: Discrimination against foreign students
David Jardine
A series of un-neighbourly spats that has gone on between Indonesia and Malaysia this year has extended to Indonesian higher education. A leading Indonesian university has talked openly of excluding its Malaysian students from campus in protest against an unrelated move by a Malaysian government ministry.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
FRANCE: Sorbonne or not Sorbonne?
Jane Marshall
The question of who may, or should not, adopt the name of France's most celebrated university has been raised by Paris' chief education officer. Patrick Gérard has asked three institutions to "re-examine the question of the designation" of a higher education and research cluster they are jointly setting up which they propose to call La Sorbonne.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: Students unworried by radical reputations
John Mullen*
During the three month-long lecturer strikes and student movements last spring and summer, which seriously affected more than half of France's universities, the press and the government frequently claimed the strikes were suicidal for universities. Students, they said, would boycott universities and instead would choose private institutions that were relatively little affected by the strikes. Lecturers were shooting themselves in the foot, we were told.
Full report on the University World News site:
DEVELOPING WORLD: TWAS aims to boost science fund
Munyaradzi Makoni
The developing world's academy of sciences, TWAS, is looking to double its endowment fund to support more scientists and researchers. The academy, which held its 11th general meeting in the South Africa city of Durban last week, said it wants to improve its assistance for scientists in countries with poor scientific resources, SciDev.net learned.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Digital library launched
Thousands of EU publications have been made available to the public for free following the launch in Frankfurt of a new digital library, the Digital Bookshop. The website hosts an electronic library containing 12 million scanned pages from more than 110,000 historical publications while a further two million pages from more recent documents are also included.
Full report on the University World News site:
FINLAND: Helsinki drops out of top 100
Ian R Dobson*
Finland no longer has a university in the world's top 100. The country's highest ranked university, the University of Helsinki, has slipped from 91st to 108th in the 2009 Times Higher Education-QS ranking.
Full report on the University World News site:
BUSINESS
EUROPE: Clean energy ambitions unveiled
Alan Osborn
The European Commission's recent publication proposing massive spending by the 27 European Union countries on wind and solar energy, carbon capture and nuclear power, among other things, could put billions of dollars in the hands of European universities and research institutions over the next 10 years.
Full report on the University World News site:
CROATIA: New mechatronics centre of excellence
Emma Jackson
Croatian businesses are to be helped by a new mechatronics centre of excellence that has been established with the assistance of Britain's University of the West of England in Bristol, two Croatian technical schools and funding from the European Union.
Full report on the University World News site:
SWEDEN: Environmental risks of transgenic fish
Leah Germain
Environmental groups have often criticised the farming of genetically engineered fish because of the environmental risks, human health impacts and welfare of breeding certain forms of unnaturally fast-growing fish. But scientists at Sweden's University of Gothenburg are now working to determine whether these risks are outweighed by the benefits of a new strand of 'super-transgenic' fish.
Full report on the University World News site:
FEATURES
AUSTRALIA: Higher education in 2029
Marcia Devlin*
What will Australian universities look like in 20 years? I was asked this question recently after giving a keynote address at a conference where I outlined the federal government's agenda for higher education. It's a difficult question to answer. Twenty years from now, in 2029, I'll be in my mid-60s and still working, thanks to changes to Australian superannuation laws. My children, now entering their teens, will be in their 30s. That's hard to imagine.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Luring the foreign student
Liz Lightfoot
The commercials are ludicrous but no-one is really surprised when Foster's claims people who drink its lager can withstand hurricanes and tame violent tribesmen. The idea that "getting some Australian in you" can move mountains is considered acceptable for a national advertising campaign, despite the fact the drink is brewed in the EU and not that popular in Australia.
Full report on the University World News site:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
US: It's the learning, stupid
Jamie P Merisotis*
We live in a world where much is changing, quickly. Economic crises, technology, ideological division and a host of other factors have all had a profound influence on who we are and what we do in higher education. But when all is said and done, it is imperative that we not lose sight of what matters most. To paraphrase the oft-used maxim of the famous political consultant James Carville, it's the learning, stupid.
Full report on the University World News site:
UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
AUSTRALIA: Lighting Christmas tree with grass clippings
Students at RMIT University in Melbourne have designed an innovative biological fluorescent lighting system that can use garden waste to power multi-coloured Christmas tree lights. The project is as an entry in a competition running this week at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Full report on the University World News site:
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WORLD ROUND-UP
PAKISTAN: Colleges and schools closed after attacks
Schools in Pakistan were shut down on Wednesday, a day after two suicide attackers struck an Islamic university in the capital Islamabad, setting off a wave of shock and panic across the country, writes Salman Masood for The New York Times. The suicide attacks ripped through the campus of the International Islamic University, killing at least six people, including three female students.
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CHINA: Army to recruit 130,000 graduates
A total of 130,000 graduates from Chinese universities and colleges are expected to join the army this winter - a record number. China wants to improve the quality of servicemen while grappling with the graduate job crisis, reports the official news agency Xinhau.
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ISRAEL: Perks for professors to stymie brain drain
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told cabinet ministers last Sunday that Israel needed to work hard to create a "vacuum" to keep academics from travelling abroad to pursue their careers or studies, writes Barak Ravid for Haaretz. During a cabinet meeting, ministers presented data on the brain drain, showing that a high number of lecturers and researchers at top universities in the US were Israeli expatriates.
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US: Online education's great unknowns
Distance learning has broken into the mainstream of higher education. But at the campus level, many colleges still know precious little about how best to organise online programmes, whether those programmes are profitable, and how they compare to face-to-face instruction in terms of quality, writes Steve Kolowich for Inside Higher Ed.
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US: Scientists hope to network Facebook-style
Cornell University and six other institutions will use a US$12.2 million federal stimulus grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop a Facebook-style professional networking system to link biomedical researchers across America, writes William Kates for The Associated Press. Participants say by making it easier for scientists to find each other, researchers will be able to improve their ongoing studies and forge collaborations that could lead to new discoveries. The new network will be called VIVOweb.
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INDIA: More foreign students for top institutes
The first Indian Institutes of Technology council meeting under the chairmanship of Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal last week was expected to frame a multi-pronged policy, including introducing scholarships and reducing fees, to attract more foreign students at postgraduate level to the institutes, reports The Hindu.
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UK: Universities could face fines as admissions soar
British universities could face multi-million pound fines after breaking a government-imposed cap on student numbers, as the number of new undergraduates rose by nearly 6% this year, figures released last Wednesday reveal, writes Jessica Shepherd for The Guardian.
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UK: Higher education rich-poor gap widening - report
The gap in educational success between Britain's rich and poor is growing, despite investment of millions of pounds each year, according to research published last week, writes John O'Leary for The Times. A report by the University and College Union (UCU) shows that the gulf between rich and poor areas in the numbers completing a degree has widened over four years.
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UK: Universities 'betraying' foreign languages
UK Universities are being forced to "dumb down" foreign language degrees because of a dramatic drop in the number of teenagers studying French and German at school, according to an official report, writes Graeme Paton for The Telegraph. Standards have been "betrayed" in recent years as institutions attempt to attract students from a rapidly "diminishing field", it is suggested.
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US: Adios to Spanish 101 classroom
After several years of experimenting with 'hybrid' Spanish courses that mix online and classroom instruction, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has decided to begin conducting its introductory Spanish course exclusively on the web, writes Steve Kolowich for Inside Higher Ed.
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US: Most expensive colleges for 2009-2010
For the second year in a row, Sarah Lawrence College is the most expensive college in the US for the 2009-2010 school year, while New York University edges out The George Washington University to come second in the CampusGrotto ranking.
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Sunday, 18 October 2009
University World News 0097 - 18th October 2009
NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report
US: Only three science Nobels were actually American
John Richard Schrock*
"USA! USA! We're number one!" From press reports last week, you would assume that eight of the nine science Nobel Prizes were swept by United States scientists - another affirmation that the American system of K-12 public education was still the best in the world, at least eight-ninths of the time. Well, count again. The press stretched the facts in making all but one of them seem American when in truth all but three received their early school education elsewhere.
Full report on the University World News site:
ISRAEL: Clamp-down on foreign academics
Helena Flusfeder
Israeli authorities' refusal to let some foreign academics enter the West Bank has had a huge impact on the development of Palestinian institutions, said a British academic recently denied entry to the West Bank and forced to cancel a lecture at Birzeit University.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Millions more for research?
Geoff Maslen
Impoverished researchers are hoping to receive a massive injection of federal money following a government decision to accept key recommendations from an inquiry into Australian research and research training. In a 22-page document released late last month, the government endorsed many of the 38 recommendations arising from a House of Representatives investigation into research in universities and institutes across Australia.
Full report on the University World News site:
SWEDEN: Plan to introduce fees creates problems
Jan Petter Myklebust
In its budget for 2010, the Swedish government has proposed introducing fees for foreign students from 2011. The Education Ministry is preparing a bill that will be presented to Parliament while universities and government officials are working out how to handle the change. A variety of complicated issues related to policy formulation, implementation and follow-up have been raised.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Rectors demand more funding
Michael Gardner
Margret Wintermantel, President of Germany's Rectors' Conference or HRK, has urged the new Christian Democrat-Free Democrat coalition to continue the previous administration's efforts to support higher education. Her organisation is pressing for further implementation of the 'Higher Education Pact', a package of measures agreed between the federal and state governments to boost university revenues between 2007 and 2020.
Full report on the University World News site:
HUNGARY: Nation's R&D in chaos
Zsolt Balla
In September 2008, the European Institute of Innovation and Technology, the EU's flagship initiative to boost Europe's competitiveness on the highly globalised battlefield of development and innovation, held its first meeting at its new headquarters in Budapest in Hungary. Since then preparations to host the agency have been far from smooth.
Full report on the University World News site:
MEDITERRANEAN: Digital education plan approved
Wagdy Sawahel
The five countries of the Arab Maghreb Union - Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Libya and Mauritania - and five European countries, France, Spain, Italy, Malta and Portugal, have agreed to cooperate to promote digital education in universities, research institutes and schools to try and bridge the 'digital gap' between Europeans and Maghreb residents.
Full report on the University World News site:
EGYPT: Controversial ban on niqab in dorms
Ashraf Khaled
Egypt's Minister of Higher Education Hani Helal has drawn angry protests and lawsuits for banning the niqab or full face veil in women-only dormitories of pubic universities in this conservative, predominantly Muslim country. "I took this decision in order to protect female students," Helal said, adding that 17 men were arrested last year disguised as face-veiled women inside women's dorms.
Full report on the University World News site:
NIGERIA: Farming alternative to unemployment
Tunde Fatunde
Economic and financial meltdown has opened up opportunities for graduates to practise organised farming as a solution to unemployment. The University of Agriculture in western Nigeria has embarked on a five-year Graduate Farming Employment Scheme, GRAFES, aimed at attracting graduates into commercial agriculture.
Full report on the University World News site:
ALGERIA: A postgraduate's lot is not a happy one
Postgraduate education in Algeria is often below the standards expected by students who are subjected to a multiplicity of problems including lack of equipment and books, overcrowding, exclusion from study trips, and effects of corruption and nepotism, claims La Tribune of Algiers in a series of articles.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: World's first Human Rights Moot Court
Munyaradzi Makoni
The adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 is being celebrated by the staging of the first World Human Rights Moot Court at the University of Pretoria, South Africa, in December. The competition is open to students from all of the world's institutions of higher learning, but is aimed at undergraduate law students.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
EUROPE: Newcomers to quality assurance register
Seventeen quality assurance agencies have now been listed on the European Quality Assurance Register, EAQR for Higher Education. In addition to nine agencies that had already been placed on the register, applications from a further eight agencies were accepted earlier this month.
Full report on the University World News site:
UK: Digitised newspapers go online
Unique insight into international news has been made available for the first time after two million digitised pages of 19th century British newspapers were put online. Researchers, academics and genealogists, regardless of their location, can explore newspaper pages from 49 national and regional UK titles.
Full report on the University World News site:
MALAWI: Entrance quotas back - again
The government intends to reintroduce a controversial university entrance quota system that was outlawed last year, Minister of Education, Science and Technology George Chapomba has confirmed.
Full report on the University World News site:
TUNISIA: Five-year strategy for higher education
Wagdy Sawahel
Tunisia has announced a five-year higher education, science and technology strategic plan aimed at promoting scientific research and technology-based industry. The plan covering 2009 to 2014 was presented on 11 October by President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali at the launch of the campaign for presidential and legislative elections to be held this month.
Full report on the University World News site:
ACADEMIC FREEDOM
PERU: Human rights academic receives death threats
Daniel Sawney and Jonathan Travis*
Dr Salomon Lerner Febres, a leading academic and President of the Institute for Democracy and Human Rights at the Catholic University of Peru, has received death threats, according to Human Rights Watch.
More Academic Freedom reports on the University World News site:
SCIENCE SCENE
GLOBAL: Brito to head Unesco science
Linda Nordling
Lidia Brito, Mozambique's former Science Minister, will be the next head of the science policy division at Unesco, SciDev.net has revealed. Brito is expected to take up the post in Paris in December. She replaces Mustafa El Tayeb who has led the organisation's science policy work since 1996.
Full report on the University World News site:
AFRICA: New study of HIV prevention
An international study aimed at establishing if it is possible to reduce a woman's risk of acquiring HIV using a vaginal gel or an oral tablet containing an antiretroviral drug, has been launched at the University of Zimbabwe. A statement from the Macrobicide Trials Network said 5,000 women would be enrolled for the research in South Africa, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Full report on the University World News site:
EU: Single European fleet of research vessels
Work has begun on an EU-funded initiative to link Europe's research vessels into a single fleet. Dubbed Eurofleets, the four-year project has been allocated EUR7.2 million (US$10.75 million) under the EU's Seventh Framework Programme for research.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Spanish flu remedy kills swine flu virus
Wagdy Sawahel
To overcome a shortage of Tamiflu - the World Health Organization's drug of choice for treating people infected with the H1N1swine flu virus - and the controversial swine flu vaccine, Chinese and Egyptian scientists have turned to a herbal remedy used to combat the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.
Full report on the University World News:
UK-CHINA: Flying dinosaur "missing link" discovered
British and Chinese researchers last week announced the discovery of a missing link in the evolution of flying dinosaurs - an animal that not only bridges the gap between long-tailed and short-tailed flying reptiles but also reinforces a controversial evolutionary theory.
Full report on the University World News:
FEATURES
US: Online education's outrageous fortune?
Sarah King Head
Imagine training to become a Certified Professional Midwife online. You can at Aviva Institute of Duluth, Minnesota. Opportunities like this may seem promising, especially in the context of economic uncertainty or when full-time, on-campus study is not an option. But should traditional brick-and-mortar universities be concerned?
Full report on the University World News site:
AFRICA: Maths institute AIMS for NextEinstein
Munyaradzi Makoni
There is no question Africa desperately needs development. Science and technology are powerful forces for progress in a global society and the global economy and, if the continent is to benefit fully from these forces, it needs to build a strong indigenous capacity in both. This is exactly what the African Institute of Mathematical Science has been striving for - and achieving - for the past six years.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Virtual simulation in classroom
Leah Germain
For many healthcare educators, finding new and innovative ways to relay information to their students has become an essential way to stay current in the classroom. In many of these scenarios, technology is the key that links the teacher with their student and bridges the gap of understanding. But some nursing universities and colleges are taking technology in the classroom to a whole other level. The development of virtual reality training using virtual worlds such as the current market leader, Second Life, is attracting interest from the healthcare education community.
Full report on the University World News site:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
NORTH AMERICA: Are tenured faculty slackers?
James Soto Antony and Ruby Hayden*
The word tenure, when used as a search term on ratemyprofessor.com, results in more than ratings for professors. It also showcases pervasive ideas regarding this historical method of ensuring academic freedom.First published in Academic Matters
Full article on the University World News site:
US: New book probes PhD programmes in the humanities
A new book from Princeton University Press, Educating Scholars: Doctoral education in the humanities, finds that not all is well with doctoral programmes in the United States. "The content of graduate programmes has undergone major changes, while high rates of student attrition, long times to degree and financial burdens prevail," according to the abstract.
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U-SAY
GLOBAL: It isn't capitalism
From Steve Forster:
In regard to the article, GLOBAL: The global crisis of capitalism, I lost track of how many times the word "capitalism" was used but each one was jarring because each one was inaccurate.
Read the full letter on the University World News site:
UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
EUROPE: Italian competition discriminatory, says commission
The European Commission is taking legal action against Italy because one of its provinces organised a competition for university students to access low rent apartments based on what it claims are two discriminatory conditions: being an Italian national and having resided in the province for the preceding five years.
Full report on the University World News site:
US: Six scams that target students
Operating on the theory that it takes a thief to steal from a thief, a group of internet scammers has been targeting students who illegally download music, books, and video, writes Kim Clark for US News & World Report.
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FACEBOOK
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higher education worldwide. More than 1,330 readers have joined. Sign up to the University World News Facebook group to meet and communicate directly with academics and researchers informed by the world's first truly global higher education publication. Click on the link below to visit and join the group.
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WORLD ROUND-UP
IRAQ: Government suspends university after protests
Iraq's prime minister suspended classes and banned political activities at one of Baghdad's top universities following student protests on campus, a government spokesman said last week, writes Sameer N Yacoub for Associated Press. Iraq also banned the student union at Mustansiriyah University, raising questions over Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's commitment to free speech.
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UK: Overseas students prop up university finances
Overseas students are propping up UK universities' finances, with some paying fees of more than £20,000 (US$32,500) a year, data compiled for The Guardian revealed last week, writes Jessica Shepherd.
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INDIA: Student visas to the US drop by 25%
The number of visas issued by the US to students from India has dropped by 25% in the past year, writes Ishani Dutta Gupta for The Times of India. Experts felt the decline in numbers of Indian students choosing to study in the US was because of a fall in financial aid offered by institutions rather than visa structures.
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US: Real-world research wins economics Nobel
The Nobel Prize in economics was awarded last Monday to two scholars whose research shed new light on how groups of people cooperate, honouring work that is grounded in the real world over more abstract mathematical models, writes Neil Irwin for The Washington Post.
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US: Organised against labour
In the last few years, a conservative legal organisation has filed complaints and extensive information requests to at least 11 colleges and universities with regard to labour centres that conduct research about and offer programmes for unions, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. The American Association of University Professors, which has tracked the complaints, has issued a statement charging that they are an attempt to violate the academic freedom of the academics who work in these programmes.
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YEMEN: Minister threatens to close private universities
Yemen's private universities only have preliminary licences and these could be withdrawn if institutions fail to comply with legal requirements, Higher Education and Scientific Research Minister Saleh Ali Ba Surrah warned last weekend, writes Abdul-Aziz Oudah for the Yemen Observer.
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PAKISTAN: World Bank loan to improve higher education
The World Bank last month approved two projects totalling US$300 million to help the government of Pakistan strengthen social safety nets and improve higher education, the Bank said in a press statement.
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TAIWAN: Education Ministry to subsidise top research
Taiwan's Education Minister Wu Ching-chi said last week that the country's second five-year NT$50 billion (US$1.6 billion) programme to upgrade the nation's universities into top academic research centres, will focus on subsidising top-notch, single-field academic research, reports Taiwan News.
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US-AFRICA: Utah colleges help Mali university
Talatou Abdoulaye came to Utah for an advanced college degree but had no idea the classes would be so different from the ones offered in his home country of Mali, writes Wendy Leonard for Deseret News. The one and only university in the West African country serves 70,000 students with little more than 700 faculty members and does very little to encourage creativity, Abdoulaye said last week during a ceremony commemorating a new partnership involving four Utah colleges and universities and the University of Bamako in Mali.
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US: Slain student memorialised by Yale
The Yale University graduate student who was found murdered a month ago on what was to be her wedding day was remember last Monday as a "model student" at a memorial service for the university community, reports Pat Eaton-Robb for Associated Press.
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CHINA: More women students from Africa promised
China's universities will enrol more African women students, raising the proportion sponsored by the Chinese government from the current 26.5% to more than 30%, the official Xinhua news agency reports.
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US: Only three science Nobels were actually American
John Richard Schrock*
"USA! USA! We're number one!" From press reports last week, you would assume that eight of the nine science Nobel Prizes were swept by United States scientists - another affirmation that the American system of K-12 public education was still the best in the world, at least eight-ninths of the time. Well, count again. The press stretched the facts in making all but one of them seem American when in truth all but three received their early school education elsewhere.
Full report on the University World News site:
ISRAEL: Clamp-down on foreign academics
Helena Flusfeder
Israeli authorities' refusal to let some foreign academics enter the West Bank has had a huge impact on the development of Palestinian institutions, said a British academic recently denied entry to the West Bank and forced to cancel a lecture at Birzeit University.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: Millions more for research?
Geoff Maslen
Impoverished researchers are hoping to receive a massive injection of federal money following a government decision to accept key recommendations from an inquiry into Australian research and research training. In a 22-page document released late last month, the government endorsed many of the 38 recommendations arising from a House of Representatives investigation into research in universities and institutes across Australia.
Full report on the University World News site:
SWEDEN: Plan to introduce fees creates problems
Jan Petter Myklebust
In its budget for 2010, the Swedish government has proposed introducing fees for foreign students from 2011. The Education Ministry is preparing a bill that will be presented to Parliament while universities and government officials are working out how to handle the change. A variety of complicated issues related to policy formulation, implementation and follow-up have been raised.
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Rectors demand more funding
Michael Gardner
Margret Wintermantel, President of Germany's Rectors' Conference or HRK, has urged the new Christian Democrat-Free Democrat coalition to continue the previous administration's efforts to support higher education. Her organisation is pressing for further implementation of the 'Higher Education Pact', a package of measures agreed between the federal and state governments to boost university revenues between 2007 and 2020.
Full report on the University World News site:
HUNGARY: Nation's R&D in chaos
Zsolt Balla
In September 2008, the European Institute of Innovation and Technology, the EU's flagship initiative to boost Europe's competitiveness on the highly globalised battlefield of development and innovation, held its first meeting at its new headquarters in Budapest in Hungary. Since then preparations to host the agency have been far from smooth.
Full report on the University World News site:
MEDITERRANEAN: Digital education plan approved
Wagdy Sawahel
The five countries of the Arab Maghreb Union - Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Libya and Mauritania - and five European countries, France, Spain, Italy, Malta and Portugal, have agreed to cooperate to promote digital education in universities, research institutes and schools to try and bridge the 'digital gap' between Europeans and Maghreb residents.
Full report on the University World News site:
EGYPT: Controversial ban on niqab in dorms
Ashraf Khaled
Egypt's Minister of Higher Education Hani Helal has drawn angry protests and lawsuits for banning the niqab or full face veil in women-only dormitories of pubic universities in this conservative, predominantly Muslim country. "I took this decision in order to protect female students," Helal said, adding that 17 men were arrested last year disguised as face-veiled women inside women's dorms.
Full report on the University World News site:
NIGERIA: Farming alternative to unemployment
Tunde Fatunde
Economic and financial meltdown has opened up opportunities for graduates to practise organised farming as a solution to unemployment. The University of Agriculture in western Nigeria has embarked on a five-year Graduate Farming Employment Scheme, GRAFES, aimed at attracting graduates into commercial agriculture.
Full report on the University World News site:
ALGERIA: A postgraduate's lot is not a happy one
Postgraduate education in Algeria is often below the standards expected by students who are subjected to a multiplicity of problems including lack of equipment and books, overcrowding, exclusion from study trips, and effects of corruption and nepotism, claims La Tribune of Algiers in a series of articles.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: World's first Human Rights Moot Court
Munyaradzi Makoni
The adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 is being celebrated by the staging of the first World Human Rights Moot Court at the University of Pretoria, South Africa, in December. The competition is open to students from all of the world's institutions of higher learning, but is aimed at undergraduate law students.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
EUROPE: Newcomers to quality assurance register
Seventeen quality assurance agencies have now been listed on the European Quality Assurance Register, EAQR for Higher Education. In addition to nine agencies that had already been placed on the register, applications from a further eight agencies were accepted earlier this month.
Full report on the University World News site:
UK: Digitised newspapers go online
Unique insight into international news has been made available for the first time after two million digitised pages of 19th century British newspapers were put online. Researchers, academics and genealogists, regardless of their location, can explore newspaper pages from 49 national and regional UK titles.
Full report on the University World News site:
MALAWI: Entrance quotas back - again
The government intends to reintroduce a controversial university entrance quota system that was outlawed last year, Minister of Education, Science and Technology George Chapomba has confirmed.
Full report on the University World News site:
TUNISIA: Five-year strategy for higher education
Wagdy Sawahel
Tunisia has announced a five-year higher education, science and technology strategic plan aimed at promoting scientific research and technology-based industry. The plan covering 2009 to 2014 was presented on 11 October by President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali at the launch of the campaign for presidential and legislative elections to be held this month.
Full report on the University World News site:
ACADEMIC FREEDOM
PERU: Human rights academic receives death threats
Daniel Sawney and Jonathan Travis*
Dr Salomon Lerner Febres, a leading academic and President of the Institute for Democracy and Human Rights at the Catholic University of Peru, has received death threats, according to Human Rights Watch.
More Academic Freedom reports on the University World News site:
SCIENCE SCENE
GLOBAL: Brito to head Unesco science
Linda Nordling
Lidia Brito, Mozambique's former Science Minister, will be the next head of the science policy division at Unesco, SciDev.net has revealed. Brito is expected to take up the post in Paris in December. She replaces Mustafa El Tayeb who has led the organisation's science policy work since 1996.
Full report on the University World News site:
AFRICA: New study of HIV prevention
An international study aimed at establishing if it is possible to reduce a woman's risk of acquiring HIV using a vaginal gel or an oral tablet containing an antiretroviral drug, has been launched at the University of Zimbabwe. A statement from the Macrobicide Trials Network said 5,000 women would be enrolled for the research in South Africa, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Full report on the University World News site:
EU: Single European fleet of research vessels
Work has begun on an EU-funded initiative to link Europe's research vessels into a single fleet. Dubbed Eurofleets, the four-year project has been allocated EUR7.2 million (US$10.75 million) under the EU's Seventh Framework Programme for research.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Spanish flu remedy kills swine flu virus
Wagdy Sawahel
To overcome a shortage of Tamiflu - the World Health Organization's drug of choice for treating people infected with the H1N1swine flu virus - and the controversial swine flu vaccine, Chinese and Egyptian scientists have turned to a herbal remedy used to combat the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.
Full report on the University World News:
UK-CHINA: Flying dinosaur "missing link" discovered
British and Chinese researchers last week announced the discovery of a missing link in the evolution of flying dinosaurs - an animal that not only bridges the gap between long-tailed and short-tailed flying reptiles but also reinforces a controversial evolutionary theory.
Full report on the University World News:
FEATURES
US: Online education's outrageous fortune?
Sarah King Head
Imagine training to become a Certified Professional Midwife online. You can at Aviva Institute of Duluth, Minnesota. Opportunities like this may seem promising, especially in the context of economic uncertainty or when full-time, on-campus study is not an option. But should traditional brick-and-mortar universities be concerned?
Full report on the University World News site:
AFRICA: Maths institute AIMS for NextEinstein
Munyaradzi Makoni
There is no question Africa desperately needs development. Science and technology are powerful forces for progress in a global society and the global economy and, if the continent is to benefit fully from these forces, it needs to build a strong indigenous capacity in both. This is exactly what the African Institute of Mathematical Science has been striving for - and achieving - for the past six years.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Virtual simulation in classroom
Leah Germain
For many healthcare educators, finding new and innovative ways to relay information to their students has become an essential way to stay current in the classroom. In many of these scenarios, technology is the key that links the teacher with their student and bridges the gap of understanding. But some nursing universities and colleges are taking technology in the classroom to a whole other level. The development of virtual reality training using virtual worlds such as the current market leader, Second Life, is attracting interest from the healthcare education community.
Full report on the University World News site:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
NORTH AMERICA: Are tenured faculty slackers?
James Soto Antony and Ruby Hayden*
The word tenure, when used as a search term on ratemyprofessor.com, results in more than ratings for professors. It also showcases pervasive ideas regarding this historical method of ensuring academic freedom.First published in Academic Matters
Full article on the University World News site:
US: New book probes PhD programmes in the humanities
A new book from Princeton University Press, Educating Scholars: Doctoral education in the humanities, finds that not all is well with doctoral programmes in the United States. "The content of graduate programmes has undergone major changes, while high rates of student attrition, long times to degree and financial burdens prevail," according to the abstract.
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U-SAY
GLOBAL: It isn't capitalism
From Steve Forster:
In regard to the article, GLOBAL: The global crisis of capitalism, I lost track of how many times the word "capitalism" was used but each one was jarring because each one was inaccurate.
Read the full letter on the University World News site:
UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
EUROPE: Italian competition discriminatory, says commission
The European Commission is taking legal action against Italy because one of its provinces organised a competition for university students to access low rent apartments based on what it claims are two discriminatory conditions: being an Italian national and having resided in the province for the preceding five years.
Full report on the University World News site:
US: Six scams that target students
Operating on the theory that it takes a thief to steal from a thief, a group of internet scammers has been targeting students who illegally download music, books, and video, writes Kim Clark for US News & World Report.
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higher education worldwide. More than 1,330 readers have joined. Sign up to the University World News Facebook group to meet and communicate directly with academics and researchers informed by the world's first truly global higher education publication. Click on the link below to visit and join the group.
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WORLD ROUND-UP
IRAQ: Government suspends university after protests
Iraq's prime minister suspended classes and banned political activities at one of Baghdad's top universities following student protests on campus, a government spokesman said last week, writes Sameer N Yacoub for Associated Press. Iraq also banned the student union at Mustansiriyah University, raising questions over Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's commitment to free speech.
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UK: Overseas students prop up university finances
Overseas students are propping up UK universities' finances, with some paying fees of more than £20,000 (US$32,500) a year, data compiled for The Guardian revealed last week, writes Jessica Shepherd.
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INDIA: Student visas to the US drop by 25%
The number of visas issued by the US to students from India has dropped by 25% in the past year, writes Ishani Dutta Gupta for The Times of India. Experts felt the decline in numbers of Indian students choosing to study in the US was because of a fall in financial aid offered by institutions rather than visa structures.
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US: Real-world research wins economics Nobel
The Nobel Prize in economics was awarded last Monday to two scholars whose research shed new light on how groups of people cooperate, honouring work that is grounded in the real world over more abstract mathematical models, writes Neil Irwin for The Washington Post.
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US: Organised against labour
In the last few years, a conservative legal organisation has filed complaints and extensive information requests to at least 11 colleges and universities with regard to labour centres that conduct research about and offer programmes for unions, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. The American Association of University Professors, which has tracked the complaints, has issued a statement charging that they are an attempt to violate the academic freedom of the academics who work in these programmes.
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YEMEN: Minister threatens to close private universities
Yemen's private universities only have preliminary licences and these could be withdrawn if institutions fail to comply with legal requirements, Higher Education and Scientific Research Minister Saleh Ali Ba Surrah warned last weekend, writes Abdul-Aziz Oudah for the Yemen Observer.
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PAKISTAN: World Bank loan to improve higher education
The World Bank last month approved two projects totalling US$300 million to help the government of Pakistan strengthen social safety nets and improve higher education, the Bank said in a press statement.
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TAIWAN: Education Ministry to subsidise top research
Taiwan's Education Minister Wu Ching-chi said last week that the country's second five-year NT$50 billion (US$1.6 billion) programme to upgrade the nation's universities into top academic research centres, will focus on subsidising top-notch, single-field academic research, reports Taiwan News.
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US-AFRICA: Utah colleges help Mali university
Talatou Abdoulaye came to Utah for an advanced college degree but had no idea the classes would be so different from the ones offered in his home country of Mali, writes Wendy Leonard for Deseret News. The one and only university in the West African country serves 70,000 students with little more than 700 faculty members and does very little to encourage creativity, Abdoulaye said last week during a ceremony commemorating a new partnership involving four Utah colleges and universities and the University of Bamako in Mali.
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US: Slain student memorialised by Yale
The Yale University graduate student who was found murdered a month ago on what was to be her wedding day was remember last Monday as a "model student" at a memorial service for the university community, reports Pat Eaton-Robb for Associated Press.
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CHINA: More women students from Africa promised
China's universities will enrol more African women students, raising the proportion sponsored by the Chinese government from the current 26.5% to more than 30%, the official Xinhua news agency reports.
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Sunday, 11 October 2009
University World News 0096 - 11th October 2009
NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report
GLOBAL: US dominance in rankings erodes
John Gerritsen*
Harvard University has maintained its number one placing in the annual Times Higher Education-QS World University Rankings but British institutions dominated the peak group in this year's league table. Cambridge University leapfrogged Yale University to take second place and British institutions were placed fourth (University College London) and fifth equal (Imperial College London and Oxford University), meaning the UK accounts for four of the top six institutions in the world. Last year only Cambridge and Oxford were in the top five, with Imperial College sixth.
Full report on the University World News site:
Also see US: New rankings - US decline or a flawed measure? in this weeks's Round-Up section
GREECE: A triumph, a defeat - and another scandal
Makki Marseilles
An unexpected landslide victory to the Greek soc ialist party in last week's elections has raised high expectations among the academic community, especially as new Prime Minister George Papandreou was Education Minister on two previous occasions. Although in Opposition Papandreou was in favour of reforming article 16 of the Constitution, which would allow establishment of private universities in direct contradiction to his own party's policy and the majority of the academic community, he also declared his unequivocal support for strong and well-financed state higher education.
Full report on the University World News site:
VIETNAM: US$50 million World Bank loan
Dale Down
The World Bank has approved a US$50 million loan for its higher education development policy programme in Vietnam, the first time the bank has injected money into the sector. Rather than allocating the money to what would normally be the most needy areas, such as construction of schools, teacher training and curriculum development, the bank decided to place the money with the government because of its efforts to boost higher education.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Who owns IP, university or researcher?
Neil Brown*
The question whether a university or its academics own the intellectual property in inventions has been the subject of many disputes and judicial decisions around the world. Having lost two court cases over an intellectual property claim to an invention by one of its medical professors, the University of Western Australia has appealed to the High Court. In our Feature section this week, Melbourne QC Neil Brown discusses the way an academic's contract of employment can be crucial in such cases.
AUSTRALIA-US: Alarm lessens over foreign invaders
Geoff Maslen
Alarm bells sounded in Australian university marketing departments four years ago when they learned that one of America's largest for-profit education organisations was planning a dramatic expansion of its overseas operations by linking up with universities across Asia, Europe and Australia. Now Kaplan is planning to set up its first international university campus in Adelaide.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Leaders emphasise global connections
David Jobbins
European university leaders fear the Bologna process is being seen as a mechanism to make Europe "too Europe-centred". At the European University Association's autumn conference in Giessen last week, the leaders were anxious that Europe be viewed by the rest of the global academic community as outward looking and ready to engage with those beyond its shores.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Call to scrap Erasmus
Jan Petter Myklebust
Franck Biancheri, President of the trans-European political movement Newropeans, has proposed scrapping the EU Commission's Erasmus student exchange programme, claiming it is outdated. His voice could carry some weight as he actively participated in its establishment.
Full report on the University World News site:
FINLAND: Changing academic profession
Ian Dobson*
The Changing Academic Profession survey is an ambitious study of the attitudes of academic staff in more than 20 countries. The largest and most extensive survey of academics yet undertaken, it sought to assess the characteristics of academic staff and their work. Speakers from 10 countries presented country-specific and comparative findings at the LH Martin Institute for Higher Education Leadership and Management international conference held in Melbourne. Dr Timo Aarrevaara of the University of Helsinki presented findings from the Finnish survey.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Institute makes changes - after criticism
Alan Osborn
The official inauguration of the new European Research Council Executive Agency last month marks a new step in the ERC's bid to shake off the managerial problems that have blighted the first years of its existence.
Full report on the University World News site:
SPECIAL REPORT: Manuel Castells
Manuel Castells is one of the world's five most cited social scientists. He
has published 23 books, co-authored 21 and had 11 books written about his work. He has been an adviser to the presidents of 11 countries, is a professor of sociology at the Open University of Catalonia in Barcelona, and an emeritus professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where he taught for 24 years. He is also a professor of communication at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, a distinguished professor of technology and society at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a visiting professor of internet studies at Oxford.
Castells was recently in South Africa as a visiting fellow and guest of the Cape Higher Education Consortium, the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study and the Centre for Higher Education Transformation. He was interviewed about his latest book, Communication Power, recently published by Oxford University Press, and delivered lectures on capitalism, higher education and development that are reported in this special report.
PROFILE: Theorist of power
John Higgins* Born in 1942 into the repressive society that was Franco's Spain, Manuel Castells - the leader of a radical student movement in Barcelona - had to flee the country at the age of 20 and completed his studies in the heady atmosphere of New Wave Paris. Come May 1968, when students joined workers in an attempt to bring down the government, Castells was at the barricades. Come 2009, he is one of the world's leading social theorists, consulted by governments for his understanding of global trends in communication and economy, and dividing his time between academic appointments in Los Angeles, Barcelona and Oxford. His latest book, Communication Power, has just been published.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: The global crisis of capitalism
Karen MacGregor
The global crisis of capitalism, fully revealed in 2008, has been brewing for some time and is a structural crisis of 'informational capitalism' because it affects the heart of the system - the global and all interdependent financial markets. It will not bring down capitalism, according to renowned scholar Manuel Castells, "but is going to change it fundamentally".
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Revolutionising higher education
Universities need to transform in various ways if they are to respond effectively to the socio-economic and technological demands of today's world, according to internationally respected scholar Manuel Castells. But despite the many challenges and opportunities facing universities, many "continue to be corporatist and bureaucratic", rigid in their functioning and primarily concerned with defending their own and professors' interests.
Full report on the University World News site:
AFRICA: Higher education and development
Karen MacGregor
Several countries have linked higher education to economic development with great success, including Finland and South Korea. Africa, where an upcoming study of university systems across eight countries has unearthed contradictory notions of the role of the university, could draw on international best practice to encourage more flexible, differentiated, networked and development-focused higher education systems better placed to support economic growth.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Strengthening PhDs in social sciences
Trish Gibbon*
Can the social sciences meet what appears to be an increasing demand for PhD graduates? Is existing supervisory capacity sufficient? Is quality being compromised? Where does the demand originate and where do the graduates go? These are some of the questions raised in a seminar with Manuel Castells on strengthening doctoral scholarship in the social sciences in South Africa.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
GLOBAL: OECD World Forum in Busan
Assessing the progress and failings of our societies requires a far broader set of measures than just economic indicators. This is why international experts in fields as diverse as the environment, development, business and social affairs will be meeting in Busan, South Korea from 27-30 October to discuss and develop the statistics needed in a range of areas affecting quality of life.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: Higher education and research a priority
Jane Marshall
Higher education and research remain next year's chief priority in the French budget, totalling just over -29 billion (US$42.5 billion), an increase of 5.3% on 2009. The high allocation is in keeping with President Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 election promise to increase the sector's funding by -1.8 billion annually over five years until 2012, in an effort to make France succeed in the "worldwide battle for intelligence".
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Rise in research appeal
Corina Ulshöfer
More than 360 US students are taking advantage of the summer holidays to do research internships in Germany, funded via Rise, the Research Internships in Science and Engineering Programme coordinated by the German academic Exchange Service, DAAD.
Full report on the University World News website:
FRANCE-AUSTRALIA: New study and internship options
An agreement signed between French and Australian universities in Canberra last Wednesday will provide mutual recognition of each country's education qualifications and periods of prior study.
Full report on the University World News website:
GLOBAL: Exceptional community outreach programmes
The MacJannet Foundation and the Talloiresnetwork have called for nominations for the second annual MacJannet Prize for Global Citizenship. The prize recognizes exceptional university-based programmes around the world that demonstrate active citizenship and student leadership.
Full report on the University World News website:
BUSINESS
EUROPE: Tax incentives help but changes needed
Alan Osborn
An international conference of European vocational training and taxation experts in Brussels has found considerable scope for tax incentives to cover a greater share of investment in education and training than they do today. But this will only work if the incentives are used in a mix with other measures such as grant and loan schemes, subsidies, learning accounts and training funds.
Full report on the University World News website:
UK: New cyber-security centre to fight online crime
Leah Germain
The role of universities in the fight against cyber-crime - a key problem for businesses worldwide - has been illustrated by the opening last week by Queen's University Belfast in Northern Ireland of a centre for secure information technologies. The £30 million (US$48 million) state of the art research institute is, claims Queen's, to be the UK's principal centre for the advancement of technology designed to counter cyber-attacks.
Full report on the University World News website:
CANADA: Student journal republished - 40 years on
Leah Germain
Two medical students at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver have resurrected the UBC Medical Journal, a periodical that had been not been published since 1968. After a four decade long hibernation, the first edition of the new UBC MJ - which was published in September in print and online, carries original research, reviews on medical trends, clinical reports and commentaries on the principles and practices of medicine.
Full report on the University World News website:
FEATURE
GLOBAL: Who owns IP, university or researcher?
Neil Brown*
The question whether a university or its employees own the intellectual property in inventions is not a new one. It has been around for a long time, has been the subject of many disputes and judicial decisions, and with the increasing commerc ialisation of universities, the involvement of several institutions in one project and the hunger for research funds and venture capital, it is not going to become any easier.
Full report on the University World News website:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
AUSTRALIA: Re-moralising the university
Steven Schwartz
The central ethical premise of universities has changed fundamentally. The discovery and dissemination of knowledge has been replaced by the desire to exploit it. Can anyone today imagine a university giving a valuable vaccine away? Hardly likely. In fact, the government encourages universities to do just the opposite - to patent our discoveries and capitalise on our intellectual property. One famous university has just spent a large amount of money on lawyers trying to prove to a court that it owned the rights to a successful drug.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Preparing Europe for a new Renaissance
Raise R&D spending in Europe to a gargantuan 5% of gross domestic product by 2030. Triple the share of the European Union's budget spent on science, and triple national outlays on higher education within Europe as well. And while we're at it: double the percentage of the EU population with a tertiary education. Those are some of the ambitious - and some say unrealistic - targets a European science policy panel laid out for the next 20 years in a report last week, writes Martin Enserink for ScienceInsider.
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UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
GLOBAL: Which country claims the Nobel prize?
Melanie Mahoney*
Nobel Prizes are a big honour not only to their winners but to the country the winner is from. The news that Tasmanian-born Professor Elizabeth Blackburn, with two other researchers, won the Nobel Prize for medicine gives Australia - and the US - something to boast about.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: The whole truth and nothing but - sometimes
Lauraine McDonald*
Organisational research has created a new way to generate repeat business - training staff to 'appear' to be telling the truth. Most people are not good at detecting lies and research has found in 80% of cases, customers believed they were being lied to when actually they were told the truth.
Full report on the University World News site:
US: Students will work for beer
A new study suggests that the cliché of a full-time college student working a low-wage job to pay her tuition and getting lower grades than she'd have if she wasn't working is more fiction than fact, writes Jennifer Epstein for Inside Higher Ed. If the student works fewer than 20 hours a week, she may, in fact, have a higher grade point average than her jobless peers and be spending her pay on 'beer money' or other non-tuition expenses.
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FACEBOOK
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higher education worldwide. More than 1,300 readers have joined. Sign up to the University World News Facebook group to meet and communicate directly with academics and researchers informed by the world's first truly global higher education publication. Click on the link below to visit and join the group.
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WORLD ROUND-UP
US: New rankings - US decline or a flawed measure?
Most higher education leaders say that institutional rankings are highly questionable, given the many intangibles in what make a college or university 'best' for a given person or course of study, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. But what about national trends? Can international rankings of universities provide a picture of the relative rise and fall of nation's universities? The Times Higher Education-QS rankings suggest there are national patterns that can be discerned - and the picture is one of decline for American institutions.
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UK: Oxford University's global standing at risk
Oxford University faces "grave" risks and needs more than £1 billion (US$1.6 billion) investment in the next decade to bring its "unfit for purpose" facilities up to a world-class standard, the institution's outgoing vice-chancellor warned last week, reports Rachel Williams for The Guardian. The university slipped from fourth into joint-fifth place in the just-published Times Higher Education-QS world university rankings.
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PAKISTAN: Students barred from UK in visa snarl-up
The British home secretary, Alan Johnson, arrived in Islamabad last week to try to defuse a row with the Pakistani government over a huge visa snarl-up that could cost thousands of students their places at top British universities, writes Declan Walsh for The Guardian.
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US: International 'leapfrogging'
In 1970, 29% of the world's college students were enrolled in the United States, which had 6% of the world's population, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. But in 2006, the US enrolled only 12% of the world's students. The United States actually grew in enrolments, but other parts of the world - especially China - experienced surges far beyond the totals in the US.
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CHINA: Spending on universities rises during recession
The year 2009 probably will be remembered as one of the worst in terms of higher education financing in the US, writes Cong Cao for UPI Asia. Contrary to this miserable scenario, institutions of higher education on the other side of the Pacific have seen their financial situation improving despite the crisis. Hao Ping, China's Vice Minister of Education, announced this at a news conference to showcase educational achievements on the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
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SAUDI ARABIA: King fires critic of university
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah has removed a top cleric who criticised gender mixing of students at a new university, reports Voice of America. The king issued a royal order last Sunday relieving Sheikh Saad al-S hithri of his position on a top council of religious scholars.
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IRAN: Authorities arrest 18 students
Iranian authorities arrested 18 student leaders in Tehran on 2 October in a crackdown on demonstrations, which flared up at two universities as classes resumed this week, writes Nazila Fathi for The New York Times.
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GLOBAL: Women and Nobel prizes
Only 39 Nobel Prizes have been handed out to women, and that includes this year's three female winners and both of Marie Curie's awards, writes Amber Bellaire for The Globe and Mail. Considering that the Nobel Foundation was founded in 1900, Ada Yonath, Elizabeth H Blackburn and Carol W Greider were nothing short of ecstatic on the announcement of their awards this week.
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ISRAEL: Nobel prize "the fruits of past investments"
Professor Ada Yonath's shared Nobel prize for chemistry has raised Israeli hopes for additional honours, writes Yaheli Moran Zelikovich for Ynet News. But heads of the higher education system warn that ongoing budget cuts are shifting the Jewish state away from similar achievements in the future.
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UK: Earlier A-levels could ease university entrance
Britain's exams watchdog has backed an overhaul of the university applications system that would enable teenagers to sit A-levels immediately after Easter and to get their results before the end of the summer term, writes Joanna Sugden for The Times.
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UK: Tories - 10% off for early student loan payments
Graduates in England would be offered a 10% discount on early repayments of their student loans under Conservative Party plans to raise an emergency fund to expand universities and prevent a repeat of this year's admissions crisis, writes Polly Curtis for The Guardian.
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MALAYSIA: More scientists and researchers needed
Malaysia is in dire need of more scientists, researchers, innovators and pioneers in science and technology, Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said last week, reports Bernama. He said the target under the Ninth Malaysia Plan was to have 60 researchers, scientists and engineers per 10,000 of the workforce, but to date, the country had achieved only 18% of the desired number.
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MALAYSIA: In pursuit of excellence
To cement Malaysia's status as a global education hub, plans are afoot to improve the nation's higher education scene and the private sector is set to change in a big way, writes Richard Lim for The Star.
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THAILAND: Universities fear return of state control
Leaders of Thailand's 13 autonomous universities say that draft regulations giving political office-holders power to appoint spec ialists to evaluate each university and decide subsidies mark an unacceptable increase in government control, reports Chuleep orn Aramnet for The Nation.
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MALTA: Higher education legislation is drafted
Draft legislation on further and higher education is being prepared by Malta's Education Ministry, reports the Times of Malta. It will include legislation to fully regulate private provision by creating structures to license, accredit and quality assure further and higher education.
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GLOBAL: US dominance in rankings erodes
John Gerritsen*
Harvard University has maintained its number one placing in the annual Times Higher Education-QS World University Rankings but British institutions dominated the peak group in this year's league table. Cambridge University leapfrogged Yale University to take second place and British institutions were placed fourth (University College London) and fifth equal (Imperial College London and Oxford University), meaning the UK accounts for four of the top six institutions in the world. Last year only Cambridge and Oxford were in the top five, with Imperial College sixth.
Full report on the University World News site:
Also see US: New rankings - US decline or a flawed measure? in this weeks's Round-Up section
GREECE: A triumph, a defeat - and another scandal
Makki Marseilles
An unexpected landslide victory to the Greek soc ialist party in last week's elections has raised high expectations among the academic community, especially as new Prime Minister George Papandreou was Education Minister on two previous occasions. Although in Opposition Papandreou was in favour of reforming article 16 of the Constitution, which would allow establishment of private universities in direct contradiction to his own party's policy and the majority of the academic community, he also declared his unequivocal support for strong and well-financed state higher education.
Full report on the University World News site:
VIETNAM: US$50 million World Bank loan
Dale Down
The World Bank has approved a US$50 million loan for its higher education development policy programme in Vietnam, the first time the bank has injected money into the sector. Rather than allocating the money to what would normally be the most needy areas, such as construction of schools, teacher training and curriculum development, the bank decided to place the money with the government because of its efforts to boost higher education.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Who owns IP, university or researcher?
Neil Brown*
The question whether a university or its academics own the intellectual property in inventions has been the subject of many disputes and judicial decisions around the world. Having lost two court cases over an intellectual property claim to an invention by one of its medical professors, the University of Western Australia has appealed to the High Court. In our Feature section this week, Melbourne QC Neil Brown discusses the way an academic's contract of employment can be crucial in such cases.
AUSTRALIA-US: Alarm lessens over foreign invaders
Geoff Maslen
Alarm bells sounded in Australian university marketing departments four years ago when they learned that one of America's largest for-profit education organisations was planning a dramatic expansion of its overseas operations by linking up with universities across Asia, Europe and Australia. Now Kaplan is planning to set up its first international university campus in Adelaide.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Leaders emphasise global connections
David Jobbins
European university leaders fear the Bologna process is being seen as a mechanism to make Europe "too Europe-centred". At the European University Association's autumn conference in Giessen last week, the leaders were anxious that Europe be viewed by the rest of the global academic community as outward looking and ready to engage with those beyond its shores.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Call to scrap Erasmus
Jan Petter Myklebust
Franck Biancheri, President of the trans-European political movement Newropeans, has proposed scrapping the EU Commission's Erasmus student exchange programme, claiming it is outdated. His voice could carry some weight as he actively participated in its establishment.
Full report on the University World News site:
FINLAND: Changing academic profession
Ian Dobson*
The Changing Academic Profession survey is an ambitious study of the attitudes of academic staff in more than 20 countries. The largest and most extensive survey of academics yet undertaken, it sought to assess the characteristics of academic staff and their work. Speakers from 10 countries presented country-specific and comparative findings at the LH Martin Institute for Higher Education Leadership and Management international conference held in Melbourne. Dr Timo Aarrevaara of the University of Helsinki presented findings from the Finnish survey.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Institute makes changes - after criticism
Alan Osborn
The official inauguration of the new European Research Council Executive Agency last month marks a new step in the ERC's bid to shake off the managerial problems that have blighted the first years of its existence.
Full report on the University World News site:
SPECIAL REPORT: Manuel Castells
Manuel Castells is one of the world's five most cited social scientists. He
has published 23 books, co-authored 21 and had 11 books written about his work. He has been an adviser to the presidents of 11 countries, is a professor of sociology at the Open University of Catalonia in Barcelona, and an emeritus professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where he taught for 24 years. He is also a professor of communication at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, a distinguished professor of technology and society at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a visiting professor of internet studies at Oxford.
Castells was recently in South Africa as a visiting fellow and guest of the Cape Higher Education Consortium, the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study and the Centre for Higher Education Transformation. He was interviewed about his latest book, Communication Power, recently published by Oxford University Press, and delivered lectures on capitalism, higher education and development that are reported in this special report.
PROFILE: Theorist of power
John Higgins* Born in 1942 into the repressive society that was Franco's Spain, Manuel Castells - the leader of a radical student movement in Barcelona - had to flee the country at the age of 20 and completed his studies in the heady atmosphere of New Wave Paris. Come May 1968, when students joined workers in an attempt to bring down the government, Castells was at the barricades. Come 2009, he is one of the world's leading social theorists, consulted by governments for his understanding of global trends in communication and economy, and dividing his time between academic appointments in Los Angeles, Barcelona and Oxford. His latest book, Communication Power, has just been published.
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: The global crisis of capitalism
Karen MacGregor
The global crisis of capitalism, fully revealed in 2008, has been brewing for some time and is a structural crisis of 'informational capitalism' because it affects the heart of the system - the global and all interdependent financial markets. It will not bring down capitalism, according to renowned scholar Manuel Castells, "but is going to change it fundamentally".
Full report on the University World News site:
GLOBAL: Revolutionising higher education
Universities need to transform in various ways if they are to respond effectively to the socio-economic and technological demands of today's world, according to internationally respected scholar Manuel Castells. But despite the many challenges and opportunities facing universities, many "continue to be corporatist and bureaucratic", rigid in their functioning and primarily concerned with defending their own and professors' interests.
Full report on the University World News site:
AFRICA: Higher education and development
Karen MacGregor
Several countries have linked higher education to economic development with great success, including Finland and South Korea. Africa, where an upcoming study of university systems across eight countries has unearthed contradictory notions of the role of the university, could draw on international best practice to encourage more flexible, differentiated, networked and development-focused higher education systems better placed to support economic growth.
Full report on the University World News site:
SOUTH AFRICA: Strengthening PhDs in social sciences
Trish Gibbon*
Can the social sciences meet what appears to be an increasing demand for PhD graduates? Is existing supervisory capacity sufficient? Is quality being compromised? Where does the demand originate and where do the graduates go? These are some of the questions raised in a seminar with Manuel Castells on strengthening doctoral scholarship in the social sciences in South Africa.
Full report on the University World News site:
NEWSBRIEFS
GLOBAL: OECD World Forum in Busan
Assessing the progress and failings of our societies requires a far broader set of measures than just economic indicators. This is why international experts in fields as diverse as the environment, development, business and social affairs will be meeting in Busan, South Korea from 27-30 October to discuss and develop the statistics needed in a range of areas affecting quality of life.
Full report on the University World News site:
FRANCE: Higher education and research a priority
Jane Marshall
Higher education and research remain next year's chief priority in the French budget, totalling just over -29 billion (US$42.5 billion), an increase of 5.3% on 2009. The high allocation is in keeping with President Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 election promise to increase the sector's funding by -1.8 billion annually over five years until 2012, in an effort to make France succeed in the "worldwide battle for intelligence".
Full report on the University World News site:
GERMANY: Rise in research appeal
Corina Ulshöfer
More than 360 US students are taking advantage of the summer holidays to do research internships in Germany, funded via Rise, the Research Internships in Science and Engineering Programme coordinated by the German academic Exchange Service, DAAD.
Full report on the University World News website:
FRANCE-AUSTRALIA: New study and internship options
An agreement signed between French and Australian universities in Canberra last Wednesday will provide mutual recognition of each country's education qualifications and periods of prior study.
Full report on the University World News website:
GLOBAL: Exceptional community outreach programmes
The MacJannet Foundation and the Talloiresnetwork have called for nominations for the second annual MacJannet Prize for Global Citizenship. The prize recognizes exceptional university-based programmes around the world that demonstrate active citizenship and student leadership.
Full report on the University World News website:
BUSINESS
EUROPE: Tax incentives help but changes needed
Alan Osborn
An international conference of European vocational training and taxation experts in Brussels has found considerable scope for tax incentives to cover a greater share of investment in education and training than they do today. But this will only work if the incentives are used in a mix with other measures such as grant and loan schemes, subsidies, learning accounts and training funds.
Full report on the University World News website:
UK: New cyber-security centre to fight online crime
Leah Germain
The role of universities in the fight against cyber-crime - a key problem for businesses worldwide - has been illustrated by the opening last week by Queen's University Belfast in Northern Ireland of a centre for secure information technologies. The £30 million (US$48 million) state of the art research institute is, claims Queen's, to be the UK's principal centre for the advancement of technology designed to counter cyber-attacks.
Full report on the University World News website:
CANADA: Student journal republished - 40 years on
Leah Germain
Two medical students at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver have resurrected the UBC Medical Journal, a periodical that had been not been published since 1968. After a four decade long hibernation, the first edition of the new UBC MJ - which was published in September in print and online, carries original research, reviews on medical trends, clinical reports and commentaries on the principles and practices of medicine.
Full report on the University World News website:
FEATURE
GLOBAL: Who owns IP, university or researcher?
Neil Brown*
The question whether a university or its employees own the intellectual property in inventions is not a new one. It has been around for a long time, has been the subject of many disputes and judicial decisions, and with the increasing commerc ialisation of universities, the involvement of several institutions in one project and the hunger for research funds and venture capital, it is not going to become any easier.
Full report on the University World News website:
HE RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
AUSTRALIA: Re-moralising the university
Steven Schwartz
The central ethical premise of universities has changed fundamentally. The discovery and dissemination of knowledge has been replaced by the desire to exploit it. Can anyone today imagine a university giving a valuable vaccine away? Hardly likely. In fact, the government encourages universities to do just the opposite - to patent our discoveries and capitalise on our intellectual property. One famous university has just spent a large amount of money on lawyers trying to prove to a court that it owned the rights to a successful drug.
Full report on the University World News site:
EUROPE: Preparing Europe for a new Renaissance
Raise R&D spending in Europe to a gargantuan 5% of gross domestic product by 2030. Triple the share of the European Union's budget spent on science, and triple national outlays on higher education within Europe as well. And while we're at it: double the percentage of the EU population with a tertiary education. Those are some of the ambitious - and some say unrealistic - targets a European science policy panel laid out for the next 20 years in a report last week, writes Martin Enserink for ScienceInsider.
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UNI-LATERAL: Off-beat university stories
GLOBAL: Which country claims the Nobel prize?
Melanie Mahoney*
Nobel Prizes are a big honour not only to their winners but to the country the winner is from. The news that Tasmanian-born Professor Elizabeth Blackburn, with two other researchers, won the Nobel Prize for medicine gives Australia - and the US - something to boast about.
Full report on the University World News site:
AUSTRALIA: The whole truth and nothing but - sometimes
Lauraine McDonald*
Organisational research has created a new way to generate repeat business - training staff to 'appear' to be telling the truth. Most people are not good at detecting lies and research has found in 80% of cases, customers believed they were being lied to when actually they were told the truth.
Full report on the University World News site:
US: Students will work for beer
A new study suggests that the cliché of a full-time college student working a low-wage job to pay her tuition and getting lower grades than she'd have if she wasn't working is more fiction than fact, writes Jennifer Epstein for Inside Higher Ed. If the student works fewer than 20 hours a week, she may, in fact, have a higher grade point average than her jobless peers and be spending her pay on 'beer money' or other non-tuition expenses.
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WORLD ROUND-UP
US: New rankings - US decline or a flawed measure?
Most higher education leaders say that institutional rankings are highly questionable, given the many intangibles in what make a college or university 'best' for a given person or course of study, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. But what about national trends? Can international rankings of universities provide a picture of the relative rise and fall of nation's universities? The Times Higher Education-QS rankings suggest there are national patterns that can be discerned - and the picture is one of decline for American institutions.
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UK: Oxford University's global standing at risk
Oxford University faces "grave" risks and needs more than £1 billion (US$1.6 billion) investment in the next decade to bring its "unfit for purpose" facilities up to a world-class standard, the institution's outgoing vice-chancellor warned last week, reports Rachel Williams for The Guardian. The university slipped from fourth into joint-fifth place in the just-published Times Higher Education-QS world university rankings.
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PAKISTAN: Students barred from UK in visa snarl-up
The British home secretary, Alan Johnson, arrived in Islamabad last week to try to defuse a row with the Pakistani government over a huge visa snarl-up that could cost thousands of students their places at top British universities, writes Declan Walsh for The Guardian.
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US: International 'leapfrogging'
In 1970, 29% of the world's college students were enrolled in the United States, which had 6% of the world's population, writes Scott Jaschik for Inside Higher Ed. But in 2006, the US enrolled only 12% of the world's students. The United States actually grew in enrolments, but other parts of the world - especially China - experienced surges far beyond the totals in the US.
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CHINA: Spending on universities rises during recession
The year 2009 probably will be remembered as one of the worst in terms of higher education financing in the US, writes Cong Cao for UPI Asia. Contrary to this miserable scenario, institutions of higher education on the other side of the Pacific have seen their financial situation improving despite the crisis. Hao Ping, China's Vice Minister of Education, announced this at a news conference to showcase educational achievements on the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
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SAUDI ARABIA: King fires critic of university
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah has removed a top cleric who criticised gender mixing of students at a new university, reports Voice of America. The king issued a royal order last Sunday relieving Sheikh Saad al-S hithri of his position on a top council of religious scholars.
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IRAN: Authorities arrest 18 students
Iranian authorities arrested 18 student leaders in Tehran on 2 October in a crackdown on demonstrations, which flared up at two universities as classes resumed this week, writes Nazila Fathi for The New York Times.
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GLOBAL: Women and Nobel prizes
Only 39 Nobel Prizes have been handed out to women, and that includes this year's three female winners and both of Marie Curie's awards, writes Amber Bellaire for The Globe and Mail. Considering that the Nobel Foundation was founded in 1900, Ada Yonath, Elizabeth H Blackburn and Carol W Greider were nothing short of ecstatic on the announcement of their awards this week.
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ISRAEL: Nobel prize "the fruits of past investments"
Professor Ada Yonath's shared Nobel prize for chemistry has raised Israeli hopes for additional honours, writes Yaheli Moran Zelikovich for Ynet News. But heads of the higher education system warn that ongoing budget cuts are shifting the Jewish state away from similar achievements in the future.
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UK: Earlier A-levels could ease university entrance
Britain's exams watchdog has backed an overhaul of the university applications system that would enable teenagers to sit A-levels immediately after Easter and to get their results before the end of the summer term, writes Joanna Sugden for The Times.
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UK: Tories - 10% off for early student loan payments
Graduates in England would be offered a 10% discount on early repayments of their student loans under Conservative Party plans to raise an emergency fund to expand universities and prevent a repeat of this year's admissions crisis, writes Polly Curtis for The Guardian.
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MALAYSIA: More scientists and researchers needed
Malaysia is in dire need of more scientists, researchers, innovators and pioneers in science and technology, Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said last week, reports Bernama. He said the target under the Ninth Malaysia Plan was to have 60 researchers, scientists and engineers per 10,000 of the workforce, but to date, the country had achieved only 18% of the desired number.
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MALAYSIA: In pursuit of excellence
To cement Malaysia's status as a global education hub, plans are afoot to improve the nation's higher education scene and the private sector is set to change in a big way, writes Richard Lim for The Star.
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THAILAND: Universities fear return of state control
Leaders of Thailand's 13 autonomous universities say that draft regulations giving political office-holders power to appoint spec ialists to evaluate each university and decide subsidies mark an unacceptable increase in government control, reports Chuleep orn Aramnet for The Nation.
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MALTA: Higher education legislation is drafted
Draft legislation on further and higher education is being prepared by Malta's Education Ministry, reports the Times of Malta. It will include legislation to fully regulate private provision by creating structures to license, accredit and quality assure further and higher education.
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