Canada

Universities Drive Nation’s Research and Development

In the developed world, no other nation’s universities does a larger share of overall research than in Canada, according to a report released in October by the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada at its annual meeting of university presidents.

Last year, Canadian universities were responsible for 36 percent of the country’s research and development, compared with 14 percent of the United States’ research done by American universities, according to the report, “Momentum: The 2008 Report on University Research and Knowledge Mobilization.” Universities in the 30 member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development were responsible, on average, for 17 percent of their countries’ research. Universities in Britain carried out 26 percent of research there.

The report points out that Canada’s private sector turns to universities to do its basic research. Last year the private sector invested a higher proportion of its research spending in Canadian universities than was the case in all the other Group of Seven countries (Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United States). Private investment in university research has grown steadily since 1995, and Canadian industry in 2007 spent 6.4 percent of its total research money at universities. The private sector in the United States invested only 1.1 percent of its total research budget at universities in 2006, the latest year figures were available for this report.

– Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada
October 2008

Student-Visa System Open to Abuse

According to the findings of an internal government review, regulations for Canada’s foreign students are so lax they are easily abused, according to The Vancouver Sun , which obtained a copy of the report.

The review finds that the student-visa system has gotten increasingly flexible since 2002, and today does not even require students to show up for class. Canada has recently introduced new initiatives to improve the attractiveness of Canada as a study destination. These include measures designed to make it easier for students to extend their period of study, and measures to improve job opportunities through which students can work for up to two years in Canada after graduation.

“While these changes have made the program more attractive to genuine students, it also has opened up the opportunity for nongenuine students to use the study permit as a means to secure work in Canada,” the report concludes. “It has also opened up an avenue for individuals who are seeking general entry into Canada for an extended period of time to do so under the guise of being a student.”

According to the review, 80 percent of students who apply for a visa to study in Canada are approved. The number of foreign students in Canada rose to 157,000 in 2006, up from 71,000 in 1997. The review was undertaken after an earlier audit found widespread student-visa fraud in British Columbia.

– The Vancouver Sun
October 2, 2008

Chile

Top University Introduces 4-Year Degree Modeled on US System

In October, Chile’s prestigious Universidad Católica (UC) announced it will start a four-year undergraduate degree program modeled after the U.S. undergraduate system in 2009.

The new UC undergraduate degree will provide students with a range of electives to choose from, allowing them to shape their degree programs as they progress, much like the liberal arts undergraduate degree in the United States. Typically, students in Chile follow a focused and rigid path towards graduation. Electives are generally few, with the vast majority of courses concentrated in the student’s chosen subject area.

The 670 students selected annually for the program will be able to choose from one of three different colleges: Arts and Humanities, Social Sciences, and Natural Sciences and Mathematics. Each college will require students to take 12 basic courses and, additionally, fulfill the university’s language and general education requirements, which includes a series of electives outside the student’s area of study. Students will also have to choose a major, which may include a number of “tracks,” or specializations. For example, a student majoring in “narration” within the Arts and Humanities College can choose between the theater, audiovisual studies and journalism tracks.

Upon graduation, students will receive a degree from his or her college with certification of his or her major and minors. They will then have the option of studying from between one and four additional years to receive a master’s or doctoral degree.

The university called the opening of the new college system “a radical step” in the university’s “objective of offering education in tune with international standards and the current demands of the labor market.” The university will also continue to offer degrees based on the traditional Chilean model.

– Santiago Times
October 10, 2008

Australian Universities Urged to Send Faculty to Chile

Australian universities have been encouraged to send academics to Chile to recruit research students under an ambitious Chilean national program of outbound scholarships.

“It would be ideal if institutions could send faculty to support the recruitment of high-quality research candidates,” says an Australian government progress report on Chile’s bicentennial scholarship program.

In the first round, 750 graduates applied for 120 to 150 places in Australia and New Zealand, following a July agreement under which the Chilean Government will fund as many as 500 of its students to study for masters and PhD degrees at Australian institutions. The second round, which closes on November 30, is expected to be more competitive, as California, Canada and Britain will come in as recruiters.

To promote innovation and productivity, Chile has set up a $US6 billion scholarship fund for overseas scholarships; by 2012 it plans to send 6,500 graduate students abroad each year.

– The Australian
October 15, 2008

United States

International Students More Likely to Complete Doctoral Degrees

International students in the United States complete their PhDs at a higher rate than domestic students, according to the Council of Graduate Schools, which has released results from the largest analysis to date of data on doctoral students.

The report, part of The PhD Completion Project, looked at completion and attrition rates from data submitted by 24 mostly US universities. Analysis of the results from the study of 19,000 students who entered PhD programs in 1992-93 through 2003-04 found that international students out-complete domestic students in all five broad fields of study identified by the report. Overall, the completion rate for international students, a cumulative 10-year rate, is 67 percent, compared with 54 percent for domestic students.

– Council on Graduate Schools
September 9, 2008

Duke Business School Announces Ambitious International Expansion Plans

Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business announced ambitious expansion plans in September to build a network of international campuses and partnerships in Dubai, London, New Delhi, Shanghai and St. Petersburg. The top-ranked business school plans to offer MBA programs at each location, in addition to operating at least two research centers, providing open enrollment executive education and customized corporate education, and coordinating service learning with local needs.

“If you want to do this correctly, you have to be both embedded in each local economy so you come to understand it well, and you have to connect across the economies,” said Fuqua Dean Blair Sheppard at an announcement event.

Duke will reveal further details about country-specific arrangements in a series of separate announcements over the next few months, but began by announcing its partnership with the Graduate School of Management in St. Petersburg. The university will also be reconfiguring and launching an expanded Cross Continent MBA program in August 2009, involving study at the five different locations, plus Durham, North Carolina.

– Duke News Release
September 14, 2008

Indian Industrialist Gifts $50 Million to Cornell for International Research and Recruitment

Ratan Tata, an Indian industrialist and Cornell University alumnus, announced in October a gift of US$50-million to his alma mater to help recruit top Indian students to the campus and to support joint research projects with Indian universities in agriculture and nutrition.

The gift will allow Cornell to establish and expand partnerships with Indian scientists that build on its strength in applied agriculture research. In addition, the money will be used to set up scholarships for up to 25 Indian undergraduate and graduate students at any one time.

Mr. Tata says he recognizes the “enormous value” of his university education and wanted other Indian students to have a similar experience, regardless of their socioeconomic background. The Tata scholarships will be offered to six to 10 students annually, depending on level of need. Although the goal is to award the grants mainly to undergraduates, some may initially go for graduate-student stipends. About 3,000 of Cornell’s 20,000 students are from outside the United States.

– The Chronicle of Higher Education
October 17, 2008

College-Educated Immigrants Struggle to Find Work that Matches their Qualifications

Twenty percent of college-educated immigrants in the United States are either unemployed or working to pay the bills in unskilled positions, depriving the U.S. economy of the full potential of more than 1.3 million foreign-born workers, according to a study released in October. The report by the Washington-based Migration Policy Institute is the first to quantify the extent of what is anecdotally well known, especially to those who ride taxis in large metropolitan areas on a regular basis.

Highly educated Latin American and African immigrants fare far worse than Europeans or Asians, according to the report. Nearly half of recently arrived college-educated Latin Americans hold unskilled jobs. So do more than one-third of those who have been in the country for more than 10 years and have presumably had more time to learn English, make professional contacts and pass U.S. professional certification exams. Well-educated European immigrants are just as likely to find good jobs as their American peers. Asian immigrants educated abroad do only slightly worse.

Although African immigrants are more likely to hold highly skilled jobs than Latin Americans, they have the highest unemployment rates of all foreign-born groups. During the 2005-2006 period, 6 percent of recently arrived, college-educated Africans and 4.1 percent of Africans with a U.S. degree were unemployed, compared with 2.6 percent of U.S.-born college graduates. English-language proficiency and employer sponsorship appear to be the main variables driving the likelihood of immigrants finding suitable work. While Africans typically have good English competence when compared to Europeans and Latin Americans, they fare poorly in terms of employer sponsorship.

– Migration Policy Institute
October 22, 2008

Major Banks Cut Financing to Foreign Students at Top U.S. Schools

The third largest bank in America (by market capitalization) is canceling loan programs that made it easier for international students at Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Michigan to obtain money for education, reports Bloomberg. Some of those interviewed by the financial news service said the move by Citigroup might result in them having to return home.

MIT and Michigan have learned of Citigroup’s intention to end some offerings in November before students begin borrowing for the 2009-2010 school year, and a similar program at Harvard already has ended, officials at the schools said in interviews with Bloomberg. As many as 1,000 foreign students may be affected at the three schools combined.

The global financial crisis is prompting Citigroup to raise standards of creditworthiness. Other lenders are unlikely to pick up the slack, partly because international students have a higher probability of default than U.S. students and loan companies want to minimize risk when credit is tight. The canceled loan programs, called CitiAssist, have been handled by Student Loan Corp., an 80 percent-owned unit of New York-based Citigroup. Bank of America, one of the biggest providers of loans to international students, announced in April that it was ending a similar program.

– Bloomberg
October 15, 2008

Bust and Boom: Grad Schools Benefit from Financial Crash

With a severe hemorrhaging of dollars and jobs on Wall Street, MBA graduates are reconsidering career options, a pattern that is repeated time and again in times of economic uncertainty.

Graduate programs typically see an enrollment boost during economic downturns, and New York area schools are no exception. As Wall Street firms shed tens of thousands of jobs, graduate programs at local schools like NYU and Columbia University have seen a flood of applications. Deadlines for fall 2009 aren’t until later this year, but signs are pointing to growth even as some warn that the worsening credit crisis may jeopardize students’ ability to pay for graduate school (see above).

“There’s a huge surge,” said Dave Wilson, chief executive of Graduate Management Admission Council, in an interview with Crain’s New York. “When there is economic turmoil, school is a good place to park until the market settles.”

“Applications are through the roof,” said Linda Meehan, Columbia’s assistant dean for MBA admissions.

Some warn that the credit crisis could make it harder for individuals to pay for graduate school as the availability of private loans at low interest rates has shrunk. Even so, domestic graduate students tend to rely on federal loans, which have not been impacted by the credit crisis, said Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.com. However, scholarship programs could take a major hit, if endowment donations dry up. But most schools, which are in the process of evaluating their budgets for next year, told Crain’s they are confident that scholarships will remain unchanged.

– Crain’s New York
October 16, 2008