Regional

Bank Looks to Build Regional Excellence in Higher Education

According to Juan Carlos Hernandez, the director of projects and partnerships at the British Council in Mexico, improving the standard of its higher education has only recently become a priority for a region previously preoccupied with establishing democracy and combating poverty. And one major reason why Latin American universities have been held back is their insularity.

According to Marcelo Villar, rector of Austral University, a small private university in Buenos Aires, even universities within Argentina have historically had little interest in learning from or collaborating with each other. In fact they are much more likely to look abroad for partnerships. However, he thinks that all that is rapidly changing and describes Latin America as “the new big player in the neighborhood.”

Evidence of this can be seen in June’s groundbreaking summit of more than 1,000 vice-chancellors, organized by Spanish bank Santander. Network building is at the heart of Santander’s efforts to improve higher education in Latin America, in which it has been investing for the past decade. Santander also invests in higher education elsewhere such as its home country of Spain and, more recently, the UK. But the lion’s share of the €500 million (US$650 million) it has spent so far – with another €600 million committed for the next five years – has been given to Latin American institutions, including 200 universities in Brazil alone.

The bank does not prescribe what the money must be spent on, believing that individual vice-chancellors are best placed to know what their strategic priorities are. But it is very keen to use its networks to promote greater collaboration, not merely with Europe and North America but also within Latin America. As well as organizing the Mexican conference, it has also developed a web portal, www.universia.net, to host discussions among the region’s universities. A significant proportion of institutions have used Santander’s investment to fund scholarships for their students to study abroad.

– Times Higher Education
October 30, 2010

New York Medical Schools Seek to Stem Flow of Caribbean-based Med Students to New York Hospitals

New York State’s 16 medical schools are trying to make it more difficult for foreign medical schools to use hospitals in New York State as part of their educational programs. If the move is successful, it could seriously damage Caribbean medical schools, many of which rely on hospitals in New York for much of the training during the third and fourth years of medical school.

The changes, if approved, could put at least some of the Caribbean schools in jeopardy, their deans said, because their small islands lack the hospitals to provide the hands-on training that a doctor needs to be licensed in the United States.

The dispute also has far-reaching implications for medical education and the licensing of physicians across the country. More than 42,000 students apply to medical schools in the United States every year, and only about 18,600 matriculate, leaving some of those who are rejected to look to foreign schools. Graduates of foreign medical schools in the Caribbean and elsewhere constitute more than a quarter of the residents in United States hospitals.

The New York medical school deans say that they want to expand their own enrollment to fill the looming shortage, but that their ability to do so is impeded by competition with the Caribbean schools for clinical training slots in New York hospitals. And they complain that the biggest Caribbean schools, which are profit-making institutions, are essentially bribing New York hospitals by paying them millions of dollars to take their students. The American medical schools traditionally pay nothing, because hospitals like the prestige of being associated with universities.

The New York schools say they now send about 4,400 of their students to New York hospitals for clinical training in their third and fourth years, and would need to expand that by 15 to 30 percent to help solve the doctor shortage. Foreign schools send about 2,200 students, more than 90 percent of them from the Caribbean, according to the state.

– The New York Times
December 23, 2010

Canada

Canadian University Presidents Unveil New Partnerships and Scholarships on Weeklong Trip to India

A total of 15 Canadian university presidents were in a delegation that visited India in November, where they reportedly went out of their way to stress that they were interested in building mutually beneficial relationships, and not just there to boost Indian enrollments at Canadian campuses. This was driven home with an announcement on the second day of scholarship initiatives for Indian students, including a C$3.5 million (US$3.43 million) new fund that will provide up to 51 fellowships for Indian graduate students who took part in the 2010 MITACS Globalink program, a summer research internship program for top Indian undergraduates. There were also several high-level meetings to talk about research collaborations, with several new partnership agreements announced.

Of the 225,000 Indian students who studied abroad in 2008, only 3,152 attended Canadian higher education institutions. However, that picture is changing, with Canadian diplomats saying they expect to issue student visas to as many as 14,000 Indian students in 2010 and perhaps more than 20,000 in 2011. With international students contributing to the Canadian economy C$6.5 billion a year, the Canadian government knows the value of increasing its efforts in India.

During the trip, which took a year to plan, the presidents met 20 Indian vice-chancellors, many of whom flew into New Delhi to meet them, and signed six memoranda of understanding (MoUs). The trip garnered healthy media attention in India, coming on the heels of a June MoU on collaboration in higher education signed by Prime Ministers Stephen Harper and Manmohan Singh.

Paul Davidson, President of the Association of Colleges and Universities of Canada (AUCC), was also on the trip and said increasing international student enrollments was just one reason the Canadians had chosen to visit India. He also counted improving the ‘Canada brand’, identifying emerging faculty for research exchanges and bringing about more research collaborations among the trip’s other goals.

– University Affairs
November 22, 2010

Haiti

Online Provider Offers Some Hope

The earthquake that devastated Haiti in January destroyed huge tracts of physical infrastructures and the country’s higher education system was no exception: of Haiti’s 32 major universities, 28 were leveled and the remaining four were severely damaged. As a result, many academics and students left the country, contributing to a brain drain that many fear will cripple Haiti further still.

However, efforts are being made to restore access to education. One such effort comes from California-based University of the People, which is providing free access to online degrees in computer science and business administration. It lacks degree-awarding powers, but as it has applied for licensing it may enroll students on degree-level programs. In the mean time, it is establishing a number of computer centers in Port-au-Prince to provide students access to its programs. There are currently 16 students enrolled, with plans to increase the number to 250 over time.

From its website, the university describes itself as “the world’s first tuition-free, online academic institution dedicated to the global advancement and democratization of higher education. The high-quality, low-cost and global educational model embraces the worldwide presence of the Internet and dropping technology costs to bring university level studies within reach of millions of people across the world. With the support of respected academics, humanitarians and other visionaries, the UoPeople student body represents a new wave in global education.”

– Times Higher Education
December 9, 2010

United States

New Jersey Colleges to Work Together in Attracting International Students

A group of 27 New Jersey colleges and universities announced plans in November to launch Study New Jersey, an international effort to promote the east coast state as an attractive destination for foreign students studying abroad.

“As public resources dry up, we need to generate new revenue,” said Courtney McAnuff, vice president for enrollment management at Rutgers University. “New Jersey is actually a great destination for international students.”

The colleges will partner with an arm of the U.S. Department of Commerce to launch a website advertising New Jersey to foreign students. Brochures about the 27 schools — which include research universities, county colleges and English language training institutes — will be translated into multiple languages and distributed to hundreds of consulates and embassies around the world. Representatives of New Jersey colleges will also appear at overseas college fairs and host visiting delegations from other nations.

The idea for the Study New Jersey initiative came from the U.S. Commercial Service, the trade promotion arm of the federal Commerce Department. Colleges in Illinois, Oregon and other states have launched similar efforts.

– NJ.com
November 15, 2010

Domestic Ph.D. Production Expands Slowly, Foreign Awards Decline

There was a slight growth in the number of research doctorates awarded by American universities in 2009, due in large part to increased graduation rates among women, according to newly reported data from the Survey of Earned Doctorates. The study also reveals the first drop in five years in the number of science and engineering doctorates awarded to non-U.S. citizens.

The report, which was released by the National Science Foundation, provides data on who the doctorate recipients are, the fields they are in, and how successful they are in finding employment. As a whole, the number of research doctorates granted by universities and institutes in the United States in 2009 rose to 49,562, up 1.6 percent from 48,763 in 2008. Seven of the eight broad scientific fields saw increases, with the mathematical sciences experiencing the largest proportional gain, followed by agricultural sciences and the social sciences. Computer science saw the only drop in Ph.D. graduation rates. The number of doctorates granted in engineering fields fell over all, by nearly 3 percent, although there was a 10 percent increase in the subfields of aerospace and aeronautical engineering. Ph.Ds in the humanities grew by nearly 3.5 percent.

The overall increase in all categories of science and engineering doctorates issued in 2009 by American institutions was largely due to growth among women, up 5 percent to 13,593, the NSF reported. Men earned 19,849, a decline of five doctorates from their 2008 total.

– National Science Foundation
November 2010

International Students Pump $19 Billion Into U.S. Economy in 2008/09

A study released by NAFSA: Association of International Educators in November estimates that international students contributed $18.78 billion to the U.S. economy during the 2008-09 academic year – an increase of $1 billion over the previous year.

The US economy actually grossed $25.5 billion from nearly 700,000 international students in 2008-09 through a combination of tuition and fees and living expenses for them and their dependants. But 28.3 percent of this total came from within the United States in the form of institutional grants, government or private scholarships or fellowships, and other funding sources. Education is this country’s fifth-largest service-sector export, according to the Department of Commerce.

NAFSA calculated the figures for The Economic Benefits of International Education to the United States: A Statistical Analysis, 2009-10 from data compiled by the concurrently released Institute of International Education (IIE)’s Open Doors 2010 report and the higher education database compiler Wintergreen Orchard House.

– NAFSA
November 2010

Job Market Tight for International MBAs

One of the biggest challenges facing international students looking for jobs is whether they can work in the United States once their student visas expire. Most can’t, making the task of finding a job in the country’s shrinking job market very difficult.

Before an employer can hire a non-citizen in a specialized field, it must obtain an H-1B visa from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. The employer must prove that it searched far and wide for qualified Americans or permanent residents and that the non-citizen is the best candidate. Fees for the visa can be in the thousands of dollars, and so for some companies, the paperwork and costs aren’t worth the effort.

So, many schools are helping international students adjust their job-search strategies, suggesting that a return home is often the best option. While the earning potential is higher in the United States, advancement opportunities for someone with an American MBA are often better in their native countries. Additionally, multinational corporations are more likely to be looking for U.S.-trained MBAs in their home countries than in the United States where there is a plentiful domestic pool of talent right now.

– Chicago Tribune
November 22, 2010