Regional

Chinese GMAT Test-Taker Numbers Skyrocket

Twenty percent of people who took the GMAT last year were from China, according to a new report from the Graduate Management Admission Council, the body responsible for administering the business-school entrance exam globally. The number of Chinese test-takers grew 45 percent over last year, to 58,196. Globally, the number of GMATs taken rose 11 percent to a record 286,529, and the number of test scores sent to schools increased 11 percent to 831,337.

For the 12 months through June, those resident in the United States accounted for the largest number of test-takers, with India rounding out the top three after China. Although the U.S. is still the top destination for aspiring business students, Asian schools and other overseas programs are growing in popularity among Asian applicants. For the 2010-2011 testing year, Asian citizens sent 69 percent of their scores to U.S. management programs, down from 74 percent in 2007, according to data reported in April by the council.

The growth is somewhat surprising, given that the median number of applications to two-year, full-time M.B.A. programs that started this fall dropped 22 percent, according to an earlier report by the admission council. But while interest is declining in full time MBA programs, other options—part-time, online, specialized and shorter programs—are attracting more interest. Also, many students rushed to take the exam before a new section, Integrated Reasoning, was introduced at the beginning of the summer.

– Wall Street Journal
September 24, 2012

Times Higher World Ranking Says Asian Universities Are Catching Up

Institutions in China, Taiwan, Singapore and the Republic of Korea are seeing dividends from increased funding for universities, according to the latest Times Higher Education World University Rankings. The Asian gains are coming at the expense of universities in the U.S. and UK, with UK universities in the top 200 sliding by an average of 6.7 places, and 51 of 76 U.S. universities in the top 200 losing ground.

Asian universities, especially in the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and China, performed particularly well in the rankings, published in early October, rising by an average of almost 12 places.

Perhaps the most impressive gains in ranking performance came from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, which jumped 83 places to 86th, thanks mainly to a significant increase in research income. Experts believe that continued investment in education by Asian nations and the withdrawal of public funding in the U.S. and UK will mean continued gains for universities in countries like China, Korea and Singapore.

The rankings used 13 performance indicators to examine universities’ strengths – in teaching, research, knowledge transfer and international outlook – using an identical methodology to 2011-12.

– Times Higher Education
October 3, 2012

Afghanistan

Stanford University Collaborates to Build Law Program

A new double-bachelors law degree is being offered by Stanford University in collaboration with the American University of Afghanistan (AUAF). It will be financed by a $7.2 million grant from the U.S. State Department.

The Afghanistan Legal Education Project will build on an existing partnership with AUAF to develop a full, five-year integrated Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Laws degree program at AUAF’s campus in Kabul, Afghanistan. This new degree program trains Afghan students to become professional lawyers who can provide much-needed legal representation services, help enforce Afghanistan’s constitution, help stabilize the country through rule of law, and become legal educators to teach Afghanistan’s next generation of lawyers.

Law is an undergraduate discipline in Afghanistan; students will first enroll in two years of AUAF’s general liberal arts education, followed by three years of legal studies instruction. The first class of this new law degree-granting program will graduate in 2015.

– State Department News Release
September 24, 2012

University Name Change Prompts Protests

The second-largest university in the Afghan capital of Kabul has been the scene of major student protests and violence after President Hamid Karzai changed its name from Kabul Education University to the Martyr of Peace Professor Burhanuddin Rabbani University.

Mr. Rabbani, a leader of a Tajik political party, was killed last year by a suicide bomber. The New York Times reports that the name change has caused a rift between ethnic groups in the country, with Tajiks, mostly from outside the university, supporting it and Pashtun and Hazara students opposing it. The university is a teacher-training institution with 7,000 students. The violence in October came after 17 days of peaceful protests.

– The New York Times
October 8, 2012

China

Number of Students Overseas Continues to Soar

The number of Chinese students enrolled in higher education programs overseas increased to 339,700 in 2011 and accounted for 14 percent of all the international students studying overseas, according to a recent report published by the Center for China and Globalization in September.

Wang Huiyao, director of the center and editor of the report, says that with China having become the second largest economy in the world, more Chinese families can now afford to educate their children abroad. Due to the international financial crisis, many countries have loosened their visa policies and earmarked education as an important revenue earner, he says.

Last year, some 76,800 high school students went abroad for studies, accounting for 23 percent of all the Chinese students studying abroad, the report says. The report also notes that many high school students are giving up on the gaokao (Chinese national college entrance examination) and opting to study abroad.

– Center for China and Globalization
September 21, 2012

Explaining the Study Abroad Phenomenon

In an article published in International Higher Education, Qiang Zha, an associate professor in the faculty of education at York University in Canada, looks at the trends in Chinese study abroad over the last decade and some of the factors influencing the dramatic growth in the number of Chinese studying overseas.

With respect to trends, Qiang points out that Chinese students studying abroad are becoming younger, with Chinese moving from graduate programs in the 1980s to undergraduate studies from the late 1990s, to now a rising proportion of study-abroad students at the secondary level. All this comes despite huge expansion in access to higher education in China in recent years. Overall, Chinese higher education enrollment grew at an annual rate of 17 percent between 1998 and 2010, while the volume of Chinese students studying abroad increased by over 25 percent annually in the same period.

In explaining the trends, Qiang points to increasing wealth among Chinese households alongside a deterioration of quality standards at domestic universities resulting from the rapid massification of Chinese higher education. The quality question is being addressed by the Chinese government under its 2020 Blueprint, officially unveiled in July 2010, which places a focus on improving and assuring quality, and aiming to nurture creativity among Chinese students and create a tier of ‘world-class’ universities. It also seeks to stabilize enrollment in Chinese universities – with future increases targeted at vocational education programs, professional graduate programs and private institutions.

Qiang argues that this strategy will result in a steep hierarchical structure, with a top tier of universities receiving significant support from the state, while a majority of low-tier institutions are left to survive by relying on market forces. This in turn will lead students with the financial or academic means to pursue overseas education if they cannot secure top-tier slots at home.

Since China opened to the world in 1978, close to 2.3 million Chinese students and scholars have studied abroad. At the end of 2011, more than 1.4 million remain abroad. Qiang argues that unless Chinese higher education provides an environment in which students are allowed to develop to their full potential, those numbers are likely to continue rising.

– International Higher Education
Fall 2012

Falling Enrollments in the Private Sector

Enrollments at private institutions of higher education have been growing rapidly for more than a decade, from 14,000 students in 1997 to 30 million students in 2011, but they are now facing problems attracting students, with some colleges showing a significant drop in recruitment this year to the point that programs are being axed.

Across the country, enrollment declines have become quite common in China’s private colleges, also known as minban or ‘people’s colleges.’ Some of the decline is attributed to a smaller pool of students passing the highly competitive national college entrance exam, the gaokao. The number of candidates taking the examination has dropped from 10.15 million in 2008 to 9.15 million in 2012, according to official figures – an almost 10 percent drop at a time of rapid expansion in private higher education provision, spurred on by the government which has not been able to expand public provision rapidly enough to meet demand.

Many less prestigious public universities, which have also expanded in recent years, are also facing problems recruiting students, according to education professionals in China. Meanwhile public universities are expanding and setting up second-tier colleges. Public universities have been allowed by the government to establish wholly owned private subsidiaries to generate revenues at a time when universities and municipalities were starting to go into debt. These public-private institutions carry the prestigious name of the public university, which also guarantees the quality of the degree.

Compounding the problem for less prestigious institutions is that an increasing number of students are going overseas to study, while foreign providers are beginning to establish a presence in China. Demographic decline could put even more pressure on private institutions. The number of high school leavers in 2009 was around 25 million. This is expected to decline to around 19 million in the next decade.

– University World News
October 14, 2012

Hong Kong

University of Hong Kong Becoming a Beacon for International Students

This year, the University of Hong Kong (HKU) admitted a record 2,500 students from 57 different countries to degree programs, with another 600 students enrolled in various exchange programs. Not including mainland Chinese students, HKU received 3,000 international applications (from 96 countries) this year for undergraduate degree programs alone, a 44 percent increase versus 2011.

According to HKU Chairman of the University Admission Committee, Professor John Spinks, some of the reasons behind the university’s surging popularity include the strong local economy, strong post-graduation work prospects in Hong Kong, and being ranked by the QS World University Rankings as the best university in Asia.

Excluding those from mainland China, students from India, Korea and Malaysia make up the largest populations of international undergraduates on campus.

– India Education Diary
September 23, 2012

India

India Accounts for Just 3.5% of Global research Output

According to a recent study by Thomson Reuters, just 3.5 percent of global research output in 2010 was from India, and in most disciplines, India’s share of global research output was below this overall average.

In clinical medicine, India’s share was just 1.9 percent, with neurosciences at 1.4 percent, immunology at 1.8 percent, molecular biology at 2.1 percent, and environmental research at 3.5 percent. In mathematics, India’s share of world output was 2 percent in 2010, compared to 17 percent for China. In materials sciences, India’s share was at 6.4 percent while China’s stood at 26 percent, and in physics India’s output was 4.6 percent of the global total compared to China’s 19 percent.

“India has been the sleeping giant of Asia. Research in the university sector, stagnant for at least two decades, is now accelerating but it will be a long haul to restore India as an Asian knowledge hub,” said the report.

Even in fields that Indians are typically considered strong in, research output was still low when compared to the nation’s economic and demographic strengths. For example, research output in physics, engineering and computer sciences stood at just 4.6 percent, 4.3 percent, and 2.4 percent of the global total respectively in 2010.

The report noted that, “during the 1980s and 90s, the output of India’s research was almost static while other countries grew rapidly, particularly in Asia. China expanded with an intensity and drive that led it rapidly to overtake leading European countries in the volume of its research publications. India is just beginning on this gradient.”

– The Times of India
October 1, 2012

Better Quality Graduates Needed

As part of an India special, the Economist magazine wrote in length about the troubles facing the Indian education system, pointing to a number of surveys and reports that highlight the issues.

The OECD predicts that by the 2020 India will be producing the second highest number of graduates behind only China, giving it an estimated 24 million graduates aged between 25 and 34, or 12 percent of the world’s total. As far as institutions of higher education go, India’s official count, both private and public, is nearly 26,500, which is more than any other country in the world. The number of students currently enrolled is 15 million, or nearly 14 percent of the college-age cohort. However, the quality, according to the Economist, is often “wretched.”

In engineering, for example, India produces over 500,000 graduates a year. Aspiring Minds, a Gurgaon-based company that assesses students’ employability, surveyed 55,000 of them last year and found that less than 3 percent were ready for the job market without extra training. According to the survey only 17 percent of the graduates had basic skills, 92 percent were deficient in programming or algorithms, 78 percent struggled in English and 56 percent lacked analytical skills. “There is a long way to go before engineering graduates in India become employable,” the survey concluded.

Nonetheless, it still means that India produces around 100,000 engineering graduates a year who could soon be working in its IT firms and beyond. And some institutions are succeeding in producing well-qualified graduates, notably the publicly run institutes of technology and of management. Some private groups, such as NIIT, a computer-education company, also produce reasonable graduates.

But it’s not enough. In 2010 India had just over 500,000 civil engineers when it needed nearly 4 million, and 45,000 architects when it needed 366,000, according to a survey by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, predicting that by 2020 the cumulative shortfall of core professionals involved in the building trade could be in the tens of millions.

Private money is making a dent. Several tycoons, rather than leaving their entire fortunes to their children, have endowed universities such as the OP Jindal University (named after a steel family), the Azim Premji University (after the founder of Wipro) and the Shiv Nadar University (after the founder of HCL). They are paying higher salaries for good faculty, luring Indian academics from foreign universities and encouraging research as well as teaching. And Indians will pay for a good education. A survey in 2011 by Credit Suisse suggested Indians typically spend 7.5 percent of their income on education, more than Chinese, Russians or Brazilians. Some 500,000 of India’s 1.4 million schools, with around 300 million students, are private.

– The Economist
September 29, 2012

Japan

Outbound Academic Mobility Drops Significantly

Just 59,000 Japanese students studied abroad in 2009, down from 82,000 five years ago. Of those, 41 percent were in the United States, 26 percent in China and 6 percent in the United Kingdom.

In an effort to counter the trend, the Education Ministry this year unveiled a plan to extend financial subsidies of between US$1 million and US$2 million to universities and departments that offer study-abroad programs. The objective of the scholarship program is to “create Japanese graduates who can survive in the 21st century,” defined by officials as developing a mindset that is adventurous and sensitive to diverse cultures while maintaining a Japanese identity. The department has reportedly received more than 200 applications from universities for funding through the program.

Reasons cited for the study-abroad decline include poor language skills and poor job opportunities upon return.

– University World News
September 30, 2012

University of Tokyo Launches First Fully English-Taught Degree Program

The University of Tokyo, one of Japan’s most prestigious universities, is starting its first four-year undergraduate degree in English as part of its efforts to attract more top-level talent from abroad.

Officials told The New York Times that they want to attract more international students from countries beyond South Korea and China where many people become fluent in Japanese. The inaugural class includes students from Australia, Britain, Finland, Poland, the United States and Vietnam.

The program, PEAK, for Programs in English at Komaba (Komaba being the name of the campus in Tokyo), is the university’s first four-year undergraduate curriculum where all courses required for graduation can be taken in English. Officials said that they are motivated in part by the need to internationalize their campus as a means of boosting the university’s standing in international rankings. The new group of international students adds less than 1 percent to the freshman class of 3,000. But expectations are high among top officials at the university.

Students who speak English will be able to take an array of classes during their first two years, including physics, mathematics, philosophy, linguistics and economics. They will then proceed to a major in one of two fields during their third and fourth years: environmental science or East Asian studies, with a particular focus on Japan.

– The New York Times
October 7, 2012

Laos

China Readies A Campus in Laos

China’s Suzhou University has opened a branch campus on the outskirts of the Laotian capital Vientiane after years of preparation and lobbying, reports the South China Morning Post. The campus marks two firsts: Laos’ first foreign campus and the first time a Chinese university has opened a branch abroad.

The university will operate from the free-trade zone known as Vientiane Industrial and Trade Park from next year, after a year in rented space from Kavin College, a deserted private school. The university also has plans for a much larger campus on a 75-acre plot of land for which it recently signed a 50-year concession agreement in Xiengda Village, four miles outside Vientiane.

China has been mending ties with its southern neighbor, home to a considerable ethnic Chinese population, in recent years and bilateral trade increased 66.8 percent last year, according to Laotian Ministry of Industry and Commerce figures. Chinese state-owned companies are building roads, bridges and the capital’s first skyscraper, and they are upgrading the country’s two largest airports.

Suzhou University plans to invest US$50 million in its Laotian branch, more than double the sum originally stated last year, when the mainland’s state-run news agency Xinhua first reported the project. The investment equals a fifth of the entire education expenditure of the South East Asian nation in 2010, according to the most recent World Bank figures. That year, Laos spent US$240 million, or 3.3 percent of its gross domestic product, on education.

Eventually, the university plans to enroll 5,000 students over its two campuses with programs offered in economics, management, law, computer science, railway transportation, electronic communication and various technical subjects consistent with economic and social development. The university is also planning to set up a training hospital.

The university has already begun teaching Chinese language courses to 120 students, but its undergraduate offerings are not yet proving popular. The plan was to have 100 students, half studying international economics and trade the other half international finance, beginning in mid-October, but so far only 30 have enrolled. The Chinese Ministry of Education approved the project in June last year but Laotian authorities only issued the university a permit to teach in July this year. The campus has not yet been granted official university status and is registered as a limited company.

– South China Morning Post
September 30, 2012

Nepal

66 Colleges With Foreign Affiliations Banned

The government of Nepal banned 66 foreign-affiliated colleges in October because they were running programs not approved by the authorities. Hundreds of fee-paying Nepalese students have been affected.

Education Ministry spokesperson Janardan Nepal told AsiaNews that “these colleges are offering courses without prior approval as required by the law, taking in the fees without any assurance that classes will start.”

“In two weeks, we have received more information about their behavior,” he added. Hence, “We urge students and parents to check the legal status of the programs foreign-affiliated colleges offer because without government authorization, no degree will be recognized.”

The schools include the British College Institute of International Management Science, the International School of Management and Technology, the Sunway International Business School, the Institute of Banking and Management Studies, the Softwarica College of IT & E-commerce and the Padmashree International College.

– AsiaNews
October 11, 2012

New Zealand

Redoubled Efforts to Promote New Zealand’s Education System in China

The government agency charged with promoting New Zealand’s education sector abroad will soon launch a targeted media campaign in China which will include a factual TV series broadcast in Mandarin.

The programs will paint a full picture of contemporary New Zealand, “inspire parents and potential students with real stories about current students and alumni success and give information on studying in New Zealand.”

“We believe television is a great format to illustrate contemporary New Zealand, letting Chinese students and alumni speak for themselves,” said Caroline Carruthers at Education New Zealand.  ”We can then use this concept in other advertising mechanisms to support the documentary, social media in particular.”

Content generated will also be distributed via the www.newzealandeducated.com website and YouTube. Carruthers pointed out that a clear focus of the campaign’s second stage (still in development) was to reach students themselves as well as their parents. The content will also support education agents.

New Zealand is working to double the economic value of its international education sector to $5 billion by 2025. A major part of that plan is to turn Auckland, the country’s most popular study destination, into a major international education hub.

– PIE News
October 12, 2012

Pakistan

HEC Receives Scholarship Funds

The government in Pakistan has released more than 3 billion rupees ($32 million) to the Higher Education Commission to support over 10,000 doctoral students on government scholarships. The ministry of finance released the funds on September 4, allaying fears that they would not be forthcoming.

The commission had not been able to send stipends to the scholars in the preceding two months, following disputes in the government over Pakistan’s higher education budget.

To date, 10,502 students have received funding to study overseas and domestically through the HEC scholarship program. A total of 6,508 have pursued studies in Pakistan, while 3,994 have done so through the overseas scholarship program.

– The Nation
September 4, 2012

Sri Lanka

3-Month Lecturer Strike Ends

Sri Lanka’s longest lecturer strike, which lasted close to 100 days, was called off by the Federation of University Teachers’ Association in October after the government agreed to terms with striking faculty members.

The country’s Higher Education Ministry shuttered the campuses of all public universities in August, after the breakdown of negotiations between the ministry and the teachers’ union. The strike ended after the government agreed to a pay raise for instructors – among the worst paid in Asia – and to increase spending on education in next year’s budget, while also agreeing to implement measures to increase institutional autonomy. Over the three months, universities suspended academic activities for approximately 90,000 undergraduate students and examinations were also affected.

The strike and other higher education controversies in recent months have been a severe setback to the Higher Education Ministry’s ambitions for Sri Lanka to become an Asian education hub.

– Colombo Page
October 15, 2012

Turkmenistan

English-Language University Under Consideration

Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov has ordered the establishment of a new institution of higher education in Ashgabat, the capital, which will conduct classes in English, the national TV channel Turkmenistan reported in October.

Berdimuhamedov said the fee-charging university will train highly qualified specialists in different professions to international standards. Planned faculties include international economics and international law and management. A branch of the Gubkin Russian State University of Oil and Gas has been operating in Ashgabat since 2009.

– Trend
September 15, 2012

Vietnam

Government Tops Up Overseas Scholarship Program

The Vietnamese government has provided extra funding for a program it initiated in 2006 designed to help Vietnamese students pursue graduate study overseas. The extra VND450 billion (US$21.6 million) from the national budget will help top Vietnamese students selected by the Ministry of Education and Training to continue their studies abroad, after initial funding for ‘Project 322’ ran out.

The money will also be used to help implement Project 911 for those who have graduated from a program funded by Project 322 and want to undertake doctoral studies. This follows an announcement by the ministry in May that candidates who passed the entrance exam for Project 322 were no longer eligible to attend overseas programs.

The initial goal for Project 322 was to send 2,000 students overseas between 2006 and 2014. According to the ministry, that goal has already been achieved, hence the need for additional funding.

– VNS
July 3, 2012

More Programs Offered in English

Three graduate programs at Vietnam National University-Hanoi – masters and doctoral degrees in organic chemistry, and doctorates in Vietnamese studies – are the latest to switch to being taught in English this academic year. The university now has 17 programs taught in English, seven at the undergraduate level and seven at the graduate level. The university, which is the country’s largest multi-disciplinary institution, offered its first English-language program in 2007.

The English language initiative has additional funding to increase the number of international students and academic staff, as well as for research and international publication, in an effort to boost the university’s global standing in international rankings.

Students must follow a preparatory English course in their junior year and are only eligible to register for their major course after achieving a minimum ILETS score of 5.0. A score of 6.0 is required by the end of the program. To date, 126 students have received bachelor degrees and 26 masters degrees under the Nhiem vu chien luoc project, which is funded by the Ministry of Finance. More broadly, the Ministry of Education and Training is monitoring a separate Chuong trinh tien tien (Advanced Programs) project launched in 2008 under which 35 undergraduate programs are delivered in English at 23 institutions nationwide.

– University World News
September 23, 2012