HE news from around the world
Click on the headings for the full stories
(see also daily news updates on the home page of our website)
AFRICA
AllAfrica.com has featured a story originally published by the Daily Trust, describing how African universities lag behind in in areas such as IT provision, research and infrastructure and will have to partner in order to stop the flow of African students abroad, as discussed in the ‘Internationalisation in Higher Education in Africa’ conference, organised in Abuja by the British Council, the African Network for the Internationalisation of Education and the National Universities Commission (NUC). According to the President of the UNESCO Global University Network for Information for Africa, Professor Peter Okebukola, 230,000 out of the 3 million mobile students are African, accounting for a total 7.5% of student mobility.
CANADA
Academia Top Ten discloses both AUCC's controversial Statement on Academic Freedom, as well as the Open Letter with which CAUT responded in a highly critical manner.
University World News describes the ongoing boom in private higher education across Central America. Foreign varsities are rushing in to establish their brand in the region, causing concerns for lack of regulation.
FRANCE
According to the Hindustan Times, the new French minister of higher education and research, Laurent Wauquiez has stated that France will spend €22b over the next few years to reform its higher education system. Planned changes include a crackdown on bureaucracy, a state-driven programme of mergers between universities, new types of connections with the business world, and the construction of 1221 new campuses to replace older ones. Regarding student mobility, the government’s goal is to increase the number French students studying abroad and to streamline student mobility to France through partnerships with non-French universities.
SRI LANKA
The Daily News discloses that the government of Sri Lanka has announced plans to make the country a prominent education hub over the next few years, increasing public spending on higher education. Following the steps of other countries in the region, such as Malaysia and Singapore, Sri Lanka aims to reverse outbound mobility, encourage international universities to set operations in the country encourage and in the long term attract foreign students to study in Sri Lanka.The ministry of education has announced that it will allow private higher education institutions such as the Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology, the Australian College of Business and Technology and the Acquinas College of Higher Studies to award degrees.
UK
The Birmingham Post reports that the University of Warwick has joined a NYU-led consortium bidding for a technology-focused multi-campus in New York City. The bid is currently being considered by the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, and if successful, it will allow Warwick to be the first British university running a campus in the US. Warwick’s participation in the project marks an increase in economic connections between Midlands-based and US businesses over the last few years. In the meantime, Lancaster University has announced its plans to set up a new campus in Guangzou, China, in partnership with Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, aiming to attract 8,000 - 10,000 students.
USA
Bloomberg covers the Open Doors report, released by The Institute of International Education on 14 November, describing a 4.7 % increase in the number of international students in the U.S in the academic year 2010-2011. In total 723,277 international students attended a course in the U.S last year. More than 25% came from China (157,558, a 23% increase from the previous year), followed by India (103,895) and South Korea (73,351), whereas there was a 44% increase in the number of students coming from Saudi Arabia (22,704) and a 14% decline in the number of Japanese students (21,290).
JAPAN
Perhaps more Japanese students will apply to US universities next year, as the Japanese ministry of education has announced that it will offer scholarships to 5,000 high school and university students to study abroad, in a bid to make the Japanese economy more competitive at the global stage. The number is expected to surge to 10,000 scholarships over the next five years according to The Mainichi Daily Times .
GLOBAL
The International Association of University Presidents (IAUP) at the World Innovation Summit for Education (Wise) in Doha announced that it will join forces with Microsoft. According to Trade Arabia, Microsoft will provide members of the Association with ‘guidance and opportunities to collaborate with colleagues around the world on critical issues’, focusing on challenges posed by technological disruption and globalisation. On the top of that, Microsoft will also expand its $500 million Partners in Learning programme, hitherto focusing on K-12, to higher education.
GLOBAL
Alan Ruby and Adriana Jaramillo's A buyers' guide to branch campuses, published in University World News, breaks down some of the basic rules of the great branch campus game.
AUSTRALIA
Besides featuring a slew of interesting articles, The Australian’s comprehensive Higher Education Special Report on International Students features a very cool interactive map of International Student Migration Across the Globe.