Regional

Standardized Credits in the Far East

Japan announced plans in March to standardize student-evaluation methods with universities in China and South Korea, in a possible first step toward a pan-Asian student-exchange program.

Japan’s ministry of education says the plan will make it easier for students in Asia’s three largest higher-education markets to move between countries and transfer credits or prior learning. Universities in the three counties currently swap academic credits at their own discretion, reports the Yomiuri Shimbun, but many colleges refuse to accept foreign evaluations. A 2007 survey found that approximately 70 percent of Japan’s state-run universities do not allow students with credits from foreign colleges to “enter the next academic grade,” says the newspaper.

The announcement by Japan might be seen as a strategy to internationalize its higher education system, which is currently struggling under the weight of a declining university-age population. The government has announced a plan to triple the number of foreign students at its universities by the end of this decade; most are likely to come from China and South Korea.

The newspaper says the ministry wants to expand the standardization plan to cover universities in member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, as a prelude to a European Erasmus-style exchange program.

– Yomiuri Shimbun
March 1, 2010

Afghanistan

The American University of Afghanistan Forges Ahead Under New President

The American University of Afghanistan bills itself as Afghanistan’s “only independent, private, non-profit, non-sectarian, coeducational institution of higher learning,” and has been educating since 2004, yet it has had difficulty at the presidential level from the get-go. The former minister of higher education who founded it was its first acting head, and the only other president, Thomas M. Stauffer, resigned in September 2008, after less than two years of a controversy-marred tenure.

The new head, C. Michael Smith, told The Chronicle of Higher Education that he has committed to five years at the helm, believing that it takes at least that long to get goals accomplished as the head of a university, especially a new one.

Mr. Smith, 68, came to Kabul after four years as dean and then president of the American University of Nigeria, where enrollment grew from 124 to more than 1,200 by 2009. A president’s presence at a young institution “makes a big difference,” he says, explaining that, “he needs to be seen walking the campus.” Mr. Smith moved with his wife to Kabul in September, and he hopes the American University of Afghanistan will help stem the country’s brain drain and will attract Afghan-American professors back to their home country to teach. Something similar happened at the university’s counterpart in Nigeria.

The university currently enrolls just over 400 students, and receives the bulk of its financial support from the U.S. government through the United States Agency for International Development. While the official tuition rate is around $5,000, the average student pays about $3,000 once scholarships and financial aid are factored in. In a country as poor as Afghanistan, however, that is still a huge sum, so Mr. Smith plans to focus on raising money for scholarships and to help pay for construction of the 42-acre campus, across the street from its temporary facility. Increasing female enrollment, from 20 percent now to around half, is another goal.

– The Chronicle of Higher Education
February 14, 2010

Australia

Applications for Visas to Study at Vocational Schools Slump

According to recent data released by the Australian government, there has been a sharp drop in the number of overseas students applying to vocational programs after a number of well-document problems in the sector in the last year, which have included attacks and murders of Indian students and a hard-hitting expose of corrupt practices by a number of college operators.

Despite the vocational sector’s problems, the immigration department received 28,403 student visa applications for the tertiary sector as a whole between October and December 2009, up two percent from last year during the same period, despite a sharp drop in applications from India. For the education sector more broadly, there was a 15 percent drop in visa applications, with student visa applications for vocational education plummeting to 19,530, a drop of 38 percent, according to The Age.

Education Minister Julia Gillard cited the figures in Parliament in February, marking a year since the government received the landmark Bradley Review of higher education.

“Despite recent troubles impacting on our international education sector, indicative data suggests that growth in international enrollments at university is holding up,” she said. “The overall decline in student visa applications is expected to impact mostly on the VET (vocational education and training) sector”.

– The Age
February 3, 2010

Overhauling the Student-immigration System

The Australian immigration department has cancelled at least 20,000 applications from foreign students for permanent residence because of their poor English and because they hold qualifications for occupations no longer considered in demand under the existing skilled migration program.

According to a February announcement by Immigration Minister Senator Chris Evans, Australia’s independent skilled migration system will be overhauled to discontinue the link between students studying a trade considered in short supply and remaining in the country.

The Australian education-export industry has come in for considerable criticism in recent months for acting more like an immigration factory than an education provider, because students studying in-demand trade subjects, such as culinary studies and hairdressing, were getting preferential residency and immigration treatment to study at colleges of questionable quality than, say, a Rhodes scholar (Mr. Evans’ example).

The changes will include the scrapping of a current list of 106 “in-demand occupations,” which will be replaced by a new skilled occupation list that Evans said would focus on “high-value professions and trades.” In addition, a points test to determine if aspiring migrants are accepted will be revised to give more weight to high-value skills and overseas qualifications. A new list will be available in April and it will be reviewed annually.

University presidents have welcomed the changes, but the vocational college sector has warned of a collapse in the export-education market worth billions a year to the Australian economy. Foreign students who have qualifications for an occupation no longer considered in demand can apply for a temporary 18-month visa, allowing them to gain work experience.

– Inside Story
February 10, 2010

Foreign Students Keeping Research Programs Alive

Enrollments in Australian doctoral and research masters programs are falling and completion rates are among the lowest of the OECD countries. Foreign student enrollments in PhD degree programs, by contrast, have leapt by 125 percent in the last six years.

However, despite the growth in overseas enrollments, they comprise just 17 percent of total research students compared to 40 percent in the United Kingdom. As a whole, overseas students currently make up 22 percent of undergraduate enrollments and a remarkable 53 percent of those undertaking masters by coursework degrees (largely because these represent a means of gaining permanent residency).

Part of the reason is because foreign students have limited access to scholarships. Advocates of Australia attracting more foreign research graduate students say government grants should be available as it is in Australia’s long-term interests to educate and train international graduate students.

– University World News
February 21, 2010

Bangladesh

Draft Legislation on Private Universities Moving Forward

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid said in February that the government had drafted a new law on private universities in a bid to ensure discipline, progress, standards and good management in the private sector. He said that while some of the country’s 53 private universities are of a good standard, many are not.

The minister said the government had updated the private university law in an effort to ensure good management and education standards in those universities. The cabinet in January approved a draft of the amended Private University Bill 2009. The bill is currently being vetted by the law ministry.

– Daily Star
February 25, 2010

China

Yale President: “China’s Best Universities to Rival Ivies within a Generation”

With China pouring money into the expansion of its tertiary sector, its universities will rival the best in the West within a generation, according to Yale University‘s president, Richard C. Levin, in an interview with The Guardian newspaper. However, Mr. Levin was quick to point out that he does not consider the rise of Asian universities as a threat. “Competition in education is a positive sum game,” he said. “Increasing the quality of education around the world translates into better informed and more productive citizens.”

– The Guardian
February 2, 2010

50 of China’s Richest Give Nearly $150 Million to Universities

According to a recent ranking of Chinese tycoons’ donations to their alma maters, following the controversy over entrepreneur Zhang Lei who gave a record US$8,888,888 to Yale University, more than 50 tycoons donated a total of over one billion yuan (US$146.5 million) to the Chinese universities they attended.

The ranking, published by an independent Chinese website (www.cuaa.net), carried out research on tycoons listed in five rich lists, including Hurun and Forbes, from 1999 to last year, and found alumni from Zhejiang University “the most generous”.

Duan Yongping, 49, a tycoon involved in the electronic appliance business, topped the list for having donated 248 million yuan to Zhejiang University. Duan, who studied at Zhejiang University from 1977 to 1982, ranked 71st on the Forbes rich list in 2003 and 340th with a fortune of three billion yuan on last year’s Hurun rich list.

– AsiaOne
January 27, 2010

Shanghai Universities Face Criticism for Emphasizing English, rather than Chinese, Fluency in Admissions

Four universities in Shanghai that set independent admission examinations chose to test English but not Chinese this year, and as a result came under fire on a number of internet forums for being unpatriotic, among other things.

Hu Guang, a representative of the Shanghai People’s Political Consultative Conference, said the universities’ decision to exclude Chinese from the subjects to be tested was “hasty, irresponsible, short-sighted and inconsistent with laws”. Reportedly, Hu, along with 30 other representatives, signed a proposal to correct the idea that Chinese is an insignificant subject in domestic college entrance examinations.

According to the guidelines of the universities in question, students who clear the independent admission examinations would be given priority during admission provided they clear the national college entrance exams this summer. Officials at one of the four institutions in question, Tongji University, said the move was designed to ease the burden on students by “not testing everything”, local media reported.

The four universities are well respected in the fields of engineering, mechanics, design, economics and finance, all of which would arguably require good English-language skills given the international nature of the fields and publication forums.

– China Daily
February 2, 2010

Longer Degree Programs Could Ease Unemployment Pressures

Students in Beijing could take between three and six years to complete their courses under a flexible credit system. The Beijing Municipal Commission of Education is considering an overhaul to ease unemployment pressures brought on by large numbers of students graduating at the same time, the China Daily newspaper reported. The plan could come into effect as early as this fall. An estimated 220,000 students will graduate from Beijing universities this year, and the overhaul would mean that students could move at different speeds and graduate at different times of the year.

– China Daily
February 3, 2010

Hong Kong

Redefining Secondary and Tertiary Education

Last September Hong Kong began the process of reforming secondary and undergraduate education structures and curriculums with students aged 15 to 16 beginning the new three-year senior secondary curriculum in Secondary Four. At the end of their three years of instruction, successful students will graduate with the new Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education (HKDSE), which replaces the Hong Kong A-level, leading to new four-year undergraduate programs, which will replace current three-year programs.

The three-year pre-HKDSE secondary structure has also been modified, meaning the Hong Kong Certificate of Secondary Education Examination (HKCEE) at the end of Secondary Five will be phased out. This new 3+3+4 model is currently running in parallel with the old system, and will continue to do so until 2012 when a double cohort of students will take A-levels and HKDSE examinations, which will likely place a burden on universities and colleges that will have to absorb almost double the number of graduating students as in normal years. The new HKDSE curriculum includes four core subjects (English, Chinese, Mathematics, and enquiry-based Liberal Studies), two to three elective subjects, and ‘Other Learning Experiences’ covering aesthetic, physical and careers education, and community service.  All students will be eligible to study for the new diploma, unlike in the past when up to 25,000 qualified students annually were locked out of the system because of A-level quota restrictions.

Reforms of Hong Kong’s academic structure will have serious implications for the international mobility of Hong Kong students and the transferability of credentials. According to a recent article in International Focus, a publication of the UK’s Higher Education International Unit, Britain’s centralized admissions service (UCAS) has compared Hong Kong’s new school leaving credential favorably with the British A-level. This evaluation results from the Hong Kong government’s decision to commission UCAS to conduct an equivalence study to improve the international transferability of the HKDSE before students graduate with them in 2012.

The grading system for the HKDSE runs from Levels One (the lowest) to Five, with a norm referenced 5* and 5** for finer differentiation for university entry. The UCAS tariff concluded that for all subjects except mathematics, Level 5* is equivalent to a British A-level grade of between A and A*, with  Level 5 a grade A; Level 4 a C and Level 3 an E. There are no equivalents to Grades B and D. The tariff does not cover Levels 1 and 2. Mathematics is dealt with separately because of its compulsory and extended components.

At the university level, institutions are responding to the changes by redesigning their curricula for the fourth year. Most are looking to include more liberal arts style curriculum content, language instruction and plans for overseas study and work experience. In the meantime, measures to promote Hong Kong as an international education hub already include the provision of land for as many as five new higher education campuses to operate on a self-financed basis with start-up loans available from the government. Officials have also indicated that they may welcome branch campuses from overseas.

– International Focus
February 17, 2010

India

The End of CBSE Class 10 Examinations

This March was the last time the Central Board of Secondary Education’s final examination for millions of 15-year-old Class X students would be mandatory. The high-pressure examination will not be missed by a majority, for whom performance on the test was often make or break for future academic pathways.

The alarming increase in the number of exam-related student suicides in recent years forced the Indian government to rethink the evaluation processes at secondary school, and last year, Kapil Sibal, the Union Minister for Human Resources Development made the Grade 10 board exams optional from academic year 2010-2011.

“If a student wants to go for pre-university course, he may appear for 10th board exam. But in case of a student pursuing the course in the same school, he need not appear in the class-10 exam for promotion to class-11,” the minister said adding that an internal evaluation should suffice.

Mr. Sibal has also introduced a grading system from this year onwards to replace a mark-based system of evaluation. There will be a nine point grading scale ranging from A1, A2 to E1 and E2, and students will be awarded grades in accordance with the marks they have scored.

– India Express
August 30, 2010

Foreign Students from Select Countries to Pay Less than Others

In a major step to attract international students from countries in the region, Indian universities are to slash the fees they charge, reports the Deccan Herald. The University Grants Commission took the decision and asked central, state and ‘deemed’ universities to immediately lower fees for foreign students from seven countries.

The decision will benefit students from Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Maldives, who will pay the same fees as Indian students. Until now these students have been paying fees that are almost double those of local students.

– Deccan Herald
February 14, 2010

Private Universities Founded by Rich Philanthropists Look to Fill Part of the Supply Shortage in Higher Education

In the desert state of Rajasthan, a new 100-acre private university has just begun classes, and other industrialist-funded institutions are being constructed in other parts of the country in response to a dramatic need for university places in India, reports The Chronicle of Higher Education.

In Rajasthan, NIIT University was founded by two multimillionaires who earned their fortunes through a successful multinational computer-training and consulting company, NIIT. Rajendra Pawar says he and Vijay Thadani started NIIT University after it became clear to them that the Indian government does not have enough money – or an adequate plan – to take on the myriad challenges facing the country’s education system.

Currently, just 12 percent of the college-age population attends tertiary-level classes. In the last decade, a growing number of India’s recently wealthy have established a few of the 1,500 universities that education experts estimate India will need to fuel its economic growth. These business executives promise to revamp the reputation of private higher education in India by offering better pay to faculty members, setting high academic standards, and tailoring programs to industry needs. They also hope to offer an alternative to current teaching methodologies under which students are encouraged to think narrowly and learn passively.

Many of these new institutes offer just a handful of undergraduate degrees in industry-focused fields such as engineering, or graduate programs focused on management education. But most plan to scale up to become multidisciplinary universities. To build a comprehensive university with up-to-date equipment and facilities requires space, however. And many of these new campuses are being built in suburbs outside major cities, close to industries in which their graduates might one day work.

The NIIT campus opened last November with 29 students and offers three engineering undergraduate degrees, a master’s degree in educational technology and a doctoral program in biotechnology. This September the university plans to enroll 450 students and eventually aims to house as many as 7,000.

Within the next 10 to 12 years, says Mr. Pawar, the university will develop a range of programs to provide students with a broad base of knowledge. Undergraduate students at NIIT pay annual tuition of about $8,000. Graduate students pay about double that. It is a hefty price. Undergraduates at India’s premier higher-education institutions—the Indian Institutes of Technology—pay only $1,100 to $1,300. However, with rich backers and higher tuition fees, NIIT can attract strong faculty members and institutional leaders because they can offer much better salaries than state institutions.

– The Chronicle of Higher Education
February 28, 2010

Indonesia

U.S. Ambassador Outlines U.S. – Indonesia Education Cooperation Goals

In a recent opinion piece in InsideHigherEd, U.S. Ambassador to Indonesia Cameron Hume outlined some goals of his mission as relates to educational cooperation between the United States and Indonesia. The ambassador said that his embassy “is pursuing two major goals over the next five years: doubling the number of Indonesian students in the U.S. [from 7,509 in 2008] and the number of American students in Indonesia [from 120], and increasing university-to-university partnerships.”

To achieve this, an embassy education-working group has been established to support bilateral higher education cooperation. The embassy is also working to expand science and technology collaboration with Indonesian counterparts. For example, Bruce Alberts, president emeritus of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, will be visiting Indonesia this year in his capacity as science envoy appointed by President Obama.

Other areas of focus have been the Department of State’s recently expanded EducationUSA student advising service to help provide Indonesians with easier access to accurate, credible information about studying in America; a renewal of the Fulbright scholarship program, which was recently renewed for five years by a bi-national agreement between the governments of the United States and Indonesia to support the exchange of M.A. and Ph.D. students, teachers and scholars. Indonesia has also committed to sending hundreds of promising Indonesians to the U.S. for M.A.’s, Ph.D.’s and research as Fulbrighters over the next four years.

Two large U.S. education delegations have recently made productive trips to Indonesia. In July, some 30 educators representing more than 20 U.S. institutions were hosted by the Indonesian government. And in early December, the Department of State funded a 14-member College Board delegation of admissions officers. And a good example of private sector interest in engaging with U.S. higher education involves Harvard University, where the John F. Kennedy School of Government recently announced a $20.5 million gift from Indonesian businessman Peter Sondakh’s Rajawali Foundation to launch an institute for Asia and an Indonesia studies program.

– InsideHigherEd
February 26, 2010

Japan

Study Sidelined in Last Two Years of Undergraduate Programs in Favor of Job Hunting

Japanese university students face huge challenges in finding jobs post-graduation, especially in the current economic climate, and by graduation this spring, many students will have spent 18 months and hundreds of hours preparing for and attending job interviews and recruitment fairs, all but abandoning study for months on end, reports The Chronicle of Higher Education.

The recruiting system, which began in the early 1950s as a response to labor shortages, has caused years of tension between corporations and universities, which complain that it disrupts study. For students, who pay among the highest tuition fees in the world, the system essential creates a wasted year of study opportunity. In the past, this wasn’t necessarily a problem as students had jobs lined up before graduation, but under the current economic climate of high unemployment, some are saying the system is beginning to crumble.

A record 2,000 job offers were rescinded last spring amid a wave of corporate bankruptcies.

Students staged a rare protest against the system in November at Tokyo’s Waseda University, complaining about spending so much of their university lives looking for work rather than studying or developing their interests. A voluntary code adopted by Japan’s largest business lobbying group, the Keidanren, in 2007 does not allow companies to start recruiting graduates before October, but the code is widely flouted, say critics, with recruitment beginning as early as the summer before students’ senior year.

Yui Tsuchiya, a fourth-year politics major at Sophia University who was able to secure a job, estimates that she spent more time looking for work than she did in a classroom: “It’s about 60-40. It makes studying very difficult, especially if you have an interview. You can’t think about essays.”

– The Chronicle of Higher Education
February 7, 2010

New Zealand

Bullish on Chinese Enrollments

According to government officials, institutions of education in New Zealand are enrolling the largest number of Chinese students since the 1990s after seeing major declines in 2002 and 2003.

Education New Zealand chief executive Robert Stevens said the export education industry was worth almost NZ$2.5 billion  (US$1.7 billion) to the national economy last year, and was expected to climb by more than $250 million (US$170 million) this year alone. Mr Stevens said New Zealand had been aggressively marketing itself in China, nearly doubling its marketing budget. New Zealand’s other export education markets had been growing for years, but Chinese student numbers plummeted after the 2002-03 financial year.  Numbers had slowly been increasing for the past three years, but the speed of the increase was hopefully on the rise, he said.

The number of Chinese students dropped by almost two-thirds about eight years ago because of bad publicity in China after the closure of some private schools and a high-profile extortion case involving an Asian student. At the same time, other countries started marketing in the lucrative Chinese market, Mr Stevens said.

China remains New Zealand’s main market for international students, and in 2008 there were 20,579 Chinese students in New Zealand, with 17,189 from South Korea and 10,676 from Japan. More than 60,000 overseas students studied in New Zealand in 2008.

– The Dominion Post
February 18, 2010

International Doctoral Enrollments Skyrocket

Doctoral programs across New Zealand have seen a six-fold increase in international enrollments this decade. In 2008, the most recent year for which figures are available, there were 6,397 doctoral students enrolled in the country’s eight universities. Of those, 1,839 or 28 percent were from overseas, a huge increase from 2001 when there were just 310 foreign PhD candidates.

The Performance Based Research Fund is cited as a driving force behind the impressive growth. Introduced in 2003, the fund rewards institutions for every completed research-based graduate degree, thereby making it in a university’s interest to increase graduate enrollments, both domestic and international. But the biggest influence on international student numbers was the introduction in 2006 of a policy to subsidize foreign doctoral candidates as if they were domestic students, enabling universities to reduce their fees for foreign PhD students to the same level as for domestic students. The difference is significant, reducing annual fees from around NZ$28,000 (US$19,700) to just NZ$5,000 (US$3,500).

Nearly half of New Zealand’s foreign doctoral students in 2008 were from Asia, with Europe contributing a quarter of the total and North America 12 percent.

– University World News
February 21, 2010

Pakistan

Pakistan Looking to Build Academic Ties with China

Pakistan president Asif Ali Zardari said in February that he wants to build on Pakistan-China bilateral trade and commercial ties to include academic exchanges and institutional links between universities in Pakistan and Sichuan province, according to a report in the Dawn newspaper. Talking to a Chinese delegation led by the Vice-Governor of Sichuan Province, Zardari reiterated that strengthening and expanding cooperation with China in all fields was one of the key objectives of Pakistan’s foreign policy.

– Dawn
February 8, 2010

Singapore

Carnegie Mellon Offers Dual PhD with Nanyang

Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is offering a new international dual doctoral program in collaboration with Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University. The mechanical engineering program is slated to launch in August with 10 students and the selection process is underway, said Chriss Swaney, CMU College of Engineering spokeswoman. Upon completion of the program students from the two universities would receive a doctorate from both institutions.

“Carnegie Mellon has a longstanding tradition of collaborating with top universities around the world to provide opportunities for our students to learn in competitive and entrepreneurial environments,” said CMU President Jared L. Cohon in a written statement. “This agreement will enable PhD candidates, both in Pittsburgh and Singapore, to work with some of the top minds in a variety of academic disciplines.”

The four-year program requires students to spend two years at each university. Funding for the CMU side comes from regular tuition and on the Nanyang side from the Singapore Economic Development Board.

– Pittsburgh Business Times
March 4, 2010

Taiwan

Battling Declining University Enrollments

Facing declining enrollments from traditional students, the government of Taiwan in February instituted a program to allow high school graduates 25 years or older with four years of work experience to enter colleges and universities nationwide without taking entrance exams.

Dubbed the “four-two-five” initiative, the move is aimed at reversing the declining-enrollment trend, which is threatening to close a number of colleges and universities. The Ministry of Education said this situation is largely due to the nation’s declining birth rate.

Separately, in keeping with President Ma Ying-jeou’s goal of internationalizing Taiwan’s tertiary intuitions, the ministry is to bolster its efforts aimed at recruiting overseas students.

“Foreign student numbers are restricted at 10 percent for Taiwan’s tertiary institutions,” said MOE Deputy Minister Lin Tsong-ming. “In future, there will be no limitations on the number of prospective students from other countries.”

– China Times
February 3, 2010

Recognition of Mainland Chinese Degrees Will Likely not be Retroactive

While the government of Taiwan plans to soon recognize degrees from the Chinese mainland, it appears likely that degrees earned previously will not be retroactively recognized by the Ministry of Education, which finalized a draft amendment to its current regulations in February.

The ministry stated that students from Taiwan who obtain a degree conferred by a higher education institution on the mainland after the amendment is passed into law must apply with the government for official recognition of the degree.

As the amendment currently stands, Taiwan students who are currently studying at mainland Chinese universities or have done so in the past would have to undergo qualification screening examinations by the ministry, with no promise that all degrees would receive recognition. According to ministry estimates, approximately 20,000 Taiwan nationals studied at higher education institutes on the mainland between 1985 and 2009, and thousands more are currently pursuing degrees there.

– Liberty Times
February 8, 2010

Government to Sponsor Cooperation with Prestigious US Universities

As part of its five-year NT$50 billion (US$1.6 billion) initiative to develop a group of world-class universities, the Taiwanese government is encouraging its universities to expand exchanges with their US counterparts in the hope of giving Taiwan a voice in public policy debates in the United States, Minister of Education Wu Ching-ji said in February.

The ministry hopes that more funds will be allocated to establish educational foundations or research centers at renowned US schools. If Taiwanese students can graduate from highly reputed schools in the U.S., they will have a better chance of finding a good job and be better placed to speak for Taiwan there, Wu said.

According to the minister, China has spent lavishly over the past decade in forging cooperative relationships with reputed U.S. schools, which has helped Chinese students enroll at those institutions. The number of Taiwanese students studying at those same universities has been on the decline, and top schools are now less likely to offer scholarships to students from Taiwan, Wu said.

– Central News Agency
February 5, 2010

More Students Enter Graduate School as Job Market Continues to Falter

Taiwanese universities in February and March saw a big increase in the number of test-takers sitting graduate admissions exams. Analysts said the economic downturn, which has squeezed job opportunities, is a major factor driving the growth in graduate applicants.

National Taiwan University in Taipei held its examinations in February with a record 23,546 candidates participating. Officials said the number represents a steep increase from 2008 of more than 2,000 exam-takers. National Cheng Kung University in southern Tainan City had more than 20,000 candidates in its March exam, the sixth year the university has had more than 20,000 participants.

Other top schools, including National Chengchi University in Taipei and National Chiao Tung University in Hsinchu, reported that more than 10,000 college graduates registered for their exams.

– China Post
February 24, 2010

Vietnam

57 New Universities in Last Decade, 3 of Them Foreign

Three universities have been established in Vietnam since 1998 with foreign money or in collaboration with foreign universities, while growth in domestic universities has been huge, VietNamNetreports.

A report by the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) said that from 1998-2005 Vietnam established three new universities and eight junior colleges as well as upgrading 32 junior colleges into universities and 40 vocational schools into junior colleges. During that time, only two foreign-invested universities were established: RMIT and Dresden Vietnam Polytechnic University.

From 2006-2009, Vietnam established 22 new universities with one foreign university – the British University Vietnam – established during that time. According to the MPI, foreign investment has more commonly been focused on setting up short-term foreign language and vocational training centers. Officials state that Vietnam has not attracted much foreign investment in university education because of the length of time it takes to verify projects and the complicated procedures involved.

– ViteNamNet
March 2, 2010