Canada
Program to Draw Foreign Students Deemed Failure
Many international students in Canada are moving to the United States or other countries to work after graduation despite an after-graduation job program designed to keep them in Canada. A report, commissioned by the Canadian Bureau for International Education [1] and released in October, recommends that the government create a national international –student strategy, and study how other countries, such as Australia, handle the issue.
The government created the job program two years ago, hoping it would help attract foreign students to Canada and retain them after graduation. But according to a survey of 900 foreign students by the report’s author, Sheryl Bond, only a third were planning to stay in Canada. Among other obstacles, the students said that potential future employers lacked proper information, that they had only 90 days to find a job when the process usually takes much longer, and that the program’s official documents often conflict with one another. As a result, many foreign students feel the Canadian government is not serious about the program.
Canadian educators are worried about the recent decline in international students. Other countries are using the possibility of postgraduate jobs as a marketing and recruiting tool. The report, Northern Lights: International Graduates of Canadian Institutions and the National Workforce [2], notes that Australia, Britain, and New Zealand, among other countries, are aggressively working to attract and retain international students though five-year work permits and employer-information programs.
– CBIE [3]
October 30, 2007
McGill U. Tops 2 Rankings
Not only has Montreal’s McGill University [4] been ranked No. 1 by Maclean’s magazine in the medical-doctoral category, but the U.K-based Times Higher Education Supplement found McGill to be the top public university in North America (and twelfth overall).
The annual Maclean’s rankings [5] were released in November. The University of British Columbia [6] and Queen’s University [7] tied for second (last year they were fourth and second), and the University of Toronto [8] slipped to fourth. Toronto had topped the rankings from 1994 to 2005 in the medical-doctoral category. In the comprehensive category, which covers universities with a wide range of undergraduate and graduate research, the University of Victoria [9] moved from third place last year to first place this year, Simon Fraser University [10] placed second (up from fourth), and the University of Waterloo [11] went from second to third. Last year’s top-ranked University of Guelph [12] placed fourth. In the primarily undergraduate category, Acadia [13] and Mount Allison [14] Universities tied for first, St. Francis Xavier [15] placed third, and the University of Northern British Columbia [16] and Trent University [17] tied for fourth.
– Macleans [5]
November 8, 2007
– Times Higher Education Supplement [18]
November 8, 2007
Chile
Coalition Government Reaches Agreement on Education Reform
The National Agreement for Education Reform was signed in November by politicians representing a coalition of the governing Concertación party and the opposition. The agreement, which must be approved by parliament, would create new educational policy and introduce changes to the student selection system in addition to new financing rules.
If passed into law, the reform would establish a new General Law of Education to replace the Pinochet-era Constitutional Organic Law of Teaching (LOCE). It would also create a superintendent of education, a Quality Assurance Council and a National Education Council. President Michelle Bachelet announced her support for the plan in April, saying it would assure that the state provides quality education for all students, rather than simply guaranteeing access to education. The proposal would also require financial changes – restrictions on spending, and assurances that resources are used efficiently and effectively – and changes to the student selection system, eliminating selective admissions up to the sixth grade.
– The Santiago Times [19]
November 14, 2007
Mexico
University Recruits in United States
The National Autonomous University of Mexico [20] is looking to capitalize on the growing population of Hispanics in the United States by recruiting from among them – one of the first major efforts by an institution south of the border to do so. The institution is Latin America’s largest public university, and has recently increased recruitment activities in cities in the United States with large Hispanic populations by offering language courses and seminars on culture and politics at campuses there. Former UNAM students who came to the United States without completing their degrees are also being offered the opportunity to finish their studies by taking classes via video link.
The university’s biggest foreign campus [21], with an annual enrollment of between 1,500 and 2,000 students, is in San Antonio, housed in a two-story building donated to the university by the Texas city. In exchange, UNAM professors teach San Antonio municipal employees Spanish and assist with translation services. Similar programs are run in Chicago; Gatineau [22], Quebec; and, in a recent opening, Los Angeles.
– The Chronicle of Higher Education [23]
October 31, 2007
United States
New Fulbright Program Targets Scientists
Concerned that the United States is failing to recruit adequate numbers of graduate students in science and technology, officials at the Fulbright Program have introduced a new grant, the International Fulbright Science and Technology Award [24], to attract international doctoral students to the United States. This fall 29 students from 27 countries began their studies under the new grant, which distributes $160,000 in federal support per student for their studies, as well as five-year student visas.
The science-and-technology Ph.D. award was in part a product of a January 2006 summit of higher-education and State Department officials and is meant to counter the perception of an unwelcoming United States that has been losing its ability to attract the brightest foreign students. According to statistics from the Institute for International Education [25], Germany sent the most Fulbright students to the United States in 2007/08 (223), followed by Pakistan (178), Colombia (73), Indonesia (72) and Turkey (67). China tops the list for the number of scholars sent (46), followed by Russia (31), Taiwan (30), Korea (28) and Argentina (23).
– The Chronicle of Higher Education [26]
October 25, 2007
NAFSA Lays Down International-Education Challenge to Presidential Candidates
NAFSA: Association of International Educators [27] has challenged [28] the 2008 cadre of presidential candidates to place international education squarely at the center of the next president’s solution to economic, security and public-diplomacy challenges.
In a letter to the candidates, Marlene M. Johnson, the group’s executive director, says the next president must implement a national strategy for restoring the status of the United States as the number one destination for international students, scholars, and leading scientists, and for making sure that Americans know about the rest of the world through study abroad. To accomplish this, Ms Johnson suggests that a senior White House official be appointed to do so and to hold each federal agency head accountable for ensuring that different bureaus are not working at cross-purposes.
– NAFSA [29]
November 7, 2007
EU-US Launch 14 New Academic Cooperation Projects
In 2006, a new eight-year EU-US Atlantis education agreement [30] was signed and in September of this year the European Commission announced that it is jointly launching with the United States 14 new transatlantic cooperation projects at a cost of US$11 million split between the two regions. The purpose of the new agreements is to foster academic exchange that would result in double degrees, joint curriculum development and policy studies.
The 14 new projects were selected from a total of 56 funding applications. The selected projects cover 32 European institutions from 12 EU Member States and 22 American institutions, supporting 380 students in two-way transatlantic exchanges with full recognition by the home institution of the studies undertaken abroad.
– EU news release [31]
September 14, 2007
US a Magnet for Top Academics in Science and Economics
According to a new study, elite scientists and economists are being funneled into US institutions after graduation in ever greater numbers. The study by researchers at Britain’s Warwick University [32] tracks the careers of hundreds of academics and finds significant evidence that newly minted talent finds the US an irresistible destination, particularly for young academics in economics.
The report, Elite Scientists and the Global Brain Drain [33], shows that a massive75 percent of assistant economics professors working in the top ten US universities gained their undergraduate degrees in other countries. The report also shows that of a sample of 158 of the world’s top physicists, nearly 44 percent are no longer working in the country where they were born. Switzerland and the US provide the strongest lure, most likely fuelled by higher salaries and readily available funding, the report says. It also looked at elite bioscientists working in the US, showing that 44 percent were born outside the country – with Japan, followed by the UK and Canada, being the major “donor” counties.
– Warwick University [33]
September 2007
Overall International Graduate Enrollment Numbers Jump, New Enrollments Stall
Total international student enrollment at U.S. graduate schools increased by a healthy 7 percent from 2006 to 2007 compared to an anemic increase of 1 percent the year before. However, growth for first-time enrollments, an indicator of future trends, slowed to 4 percent (or one-third of last year’s growth) according to survey results [34] released in November by the Council of Graduate Schools [35].
Meanwhile, despite the significant rise in total international enrollments – partly a function of last year’s large increase in first-time enrollments – nearly half of the graduate schools that responded to the survey in 2004 and 2007 have fewer international students now than in 2003 (on average, the difference is 7 percent). In absolute terms international graduate enrollment remains below the levels seen in the years before 9-11.
The survey also found that the rate of growth in admissions offers to international students slowed from the previous year, this time by half (a 7 percent growth in admissions offers to non-U.S. citizens in 2007 compared to 14 percent the year before). Other significant findings in the report show that total enrollments of students from China, the second-biggest exporter of international students after India, increased 15 percent this year after dropping 2 percent last year, and first-time enrollments and admissions for students from China increased at about the same rate in 2006-7 as in 2005-6.
The survey tallied responses from 172 graduate schools (a 36 percent response rate). Nine of 10 institutions with the highest international student enrollments responded to the survey, as did 76 percent of the top 25 and 68 percent of the top 50.
– Council of Graduate Schools [36]
November 5, 2007
Foreign Student Enrollments Almost Back to pre-9/11 Levels
The total number of international students enrolled at institutions of higher education in the United States rose by 3.2 percent in 2006/07 to 582,984, while new enrollments were up 10 percent suggesting continued total enrollment growth in the near future. The number of Americans studying abroad also rose significantly, by 8.5 percent, to 223,534 in 2005/06, with short-term programs and study in non-traditional countries outside of Europe growing particularly, according to the Institute of International Education [25]’s annual Open Doors [37] report, released in November.
Particular strength was seen in the English-language sector, up 30 percent, with 129 percent more Saudi’s taking English classes than the year prior. The top three sending countries — India, China and Korea — all showed increases, while the number of students from Japan, the fourth largest source of international students, fell again by 8.9 percent. The 2006/07 total figures are just over 3,000 short of the count for 2002/03, which recorded figures for the 2001/02 academic year.
Meanwhile, a “snapshot [38]” survey of this fall’s international enrollment numbers conducted by eight different associations, including IIE and NAFSA: Association of International Educators [27], suggests continued growth, with 55 percent of institutions responding that new enrollments of international students increased this fall over last.
– Open Doors [37]
November 12, 2007
Foreign Languages Back in Vogue
The number of university-age students enrolling in foreign languages in the US continues to climb steadily, increasing by 12.9 percent from 2002 to 2006. Arabic and Chinese have seen the most dramatic growth in learners, up 126.5 percent and 51 percent respectively, according to the Modern Language Association’s survey on “Enrollments in Languages Other Than English in United States Institutions of Higher Education, Fall 2006.” [39]The survey had a 99.8 percent return rate among 2,801 colleges and universities.
Conducted on average every four years since 1958, the survey found that increasing government support for language programs post-September 11 has resulted in gains for all of the 15 most widely taught languages save Biblical Hebrew, down 0.3 percent from 2002 to 2006. Enrollments in the less commonly taught languages also increased by 31.2 percent from 2002, fueled largely by a 55.9 percent growth in Middle Eastern and African languages (the most popular being Aramaic, Swahili and Persian), with 42 new languages introduced. Although overall numbers are at their highest levels since 1960, as a percentage of the national student body, they are half the 1960 number at 8.6 percent.
Among the most widely taught languages, Spanish remains the most popular by far with more than 50 percent of all language enrollments, and a 10.3 percent increase in enrollments from fall 2002 to 2006. Enrollments in French and German increased gradually, continuing a reversal of declines in the 1990s. Yet, as a share of total language course enrollments, the percentage studying Spanish, French and German declined from 74.4 percent in 2002 to 71.3 percent in 2006.
– Modern Languages Association [39]
November 13, 2007
Technical Doctoral Degrees on the Rise Especially among non-US Citizens
The number of doctoral degrees awarded by American universities rose 5 percent in 2006, to a record high of 45,596, according to a report [40] released in November by the National Science Foundation [41]. Almost all of the increases were seen in technical fields, which may help assuage the fears of those who worry that US universities are not producing enough scientists and engineers. Overall 2,211 additional doctorates were awarded in 2006 when compared to 2005. Of that number 1,865 came in science and engineering fields.
However, the numbers may not provide solace to all, as 1,521 of the additional doctorates were awarded to non-US citizens, more than two-thirds of all of the new Ph.D.’s awarded. In total, foreign-born researchers accounted for nearly 35 percent of all doctorates granted in 2006 (15,947 of 45,596), and for 43 percent of the Ph.D.’s awarded in scientific and engineering fields (12,775 of 29,854). Non-citizens accounted for more than 70 percent of doctorate recipients in electrical, civil and industrial/mechanical engineering, and more than half of Ph.D. recipients in all other engineering fields, computer sciences, mathematics and physics.
A detailed breakdown of the data is available here [40].
– National Science Foundation [40]
November 2007
Strong Pound, Weak Dollar Equals more UK Students at US Universities
According to figures released in November by the Institute for International Education [25], the number of Britons studying in the United States is up 2 percent to 8,438 for 2006-07, despite a forecasted decline. This is the most significant climb in recent years. The number of US students going the other way remained constant at 32,109 maintaining the UK’s dominate position as the leading destination for overseas US students.
These positive transatlantic figures come despite a relatively negative political view of current US foreign policy in the UK among the college-age population, one of the factors responsible for declining numbers of British students studying at US universities in the post-9/11 environment. However, with living costs increasing in the UK and the value of the dollar plunging to lows not seen since the Carter administration, the opportunity cost of four years at an American university has become significantly cheaper for those paying in sterling. Added to the mix is the fact that British students have faced increasing tuition fees at home, meaning that paying for one’s education is no longer anathema to them. All of a sudden, world-class facilities in the US seem pretty good value for money. If the cap on tuition fees is lifted, as expected, in 2010, then the economics of studying in the US should make even more sense – assuming continued dollar weakness.
Although costs remain prohibitively high to many, new scholarship schemes may help. The Fulbright Commission is piloting a US Student Achievers Program (USAP), which offers help in applying for places and scholarships to US institutions of higher education for gifted students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds residing in Britain and a select group of other countries. It gives students access to advisers who help them identify the American institution best suited to their ambitions and who guide them through the applications process. Add in generous US scholarships and the savvy, gifted UK student can today find academic bargains in the US.
– The Guardian [42]
November 27, 2007