Regional

Asian School Children Continue to Top PISA Rankings

The latest results from the Program for International Student Assessment were released in early December and revealed that, once again, Asian 15-year olds outperform most of their Western counterparts in the tests of reading literacy, mathematics and science.

The test is conducted every three years in more than 65 countries and major metro areas, with the latest results, for 2012, showing that school children in Shanghai perform best in mathematics, with a mean score of 619 points – 119 points above the OECD average – followed by Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei, Korea, Macao, Japan, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and The Netherlands. In reading the top 10 performers came from Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Korea, Finland, Canada, Taiwan, Ireland and Poland.

In science, Shanghai once again topped the ranking followed by Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Finland, Estonia, Korea, Vietnam, Poland and Canada. The United Kingdom is ranked 23^rd, 26^th and 20^th over the three disciplines, while the United States ranked 36^th overall, slightly above the OECD average in just reading.

– PISA
December 2013

Bangladesh

Political Unrest Delays University Admissions

Prolonged political instability in Bangladesh in the run-up to and after disputed elections in early January has severely disrupted university admissions, with some institutions seeing multiple postponements of entrance examinations during the unrest, reports University World News.

The admissions process for new undergraduate students normally starts soon after the announcement of Higher Secondary Certificate examination results in early August. Many university entrance tests are held in November and December, with classes starting in January. But at least 14 public universities have not yet held admissions tests for new students.

Bangladesh has some 34 public universities, enrolling almost 200,000 students. University authorities now fear students will not be able to complete courses on time if admissions tests are not held soon.

– University World News
January 15, 2014

China

Education to Drive Improved Sino-US Relations

Policy leaders stressed in November that the best way to strengthen relations between the U.S. and China should start with a concentrated effort to increase the number of American students studying in China.

At a conference sponsored by the 100,000 Strong Foundation, the financial executive Stephen Schwarzman described the Schwarzman Scholars program, a $300 million scholarship program that will support 200 students annually who enroll in a yearlong master’s program at Tsinghua University in Beijing. The first class of scholars will begin in 2016. Of the 200 students, 45 percent will come from the U.S., 20 percent will come from China and 35 percent will come from other countries, Schwarzman said.

Schwarzman, CEO of the Blackstone Group, said the scholarship program aims to give students experience beyond the classroom. The scholars will meet with Chinese leaders, travel widely throughout China and be mentored by leaders in their field of study. The conference was sponsored by the 100,000 Strong Foundation, which is housed at American University.

The Foundation grew out of a 2010 U.S. State Department initiative to increase the number of Americans studying in China to 100,000. In the 2011-12 academic year, 14,887 American students studied in China, only a 2 percent increase from the 2010-11 academic year, according to recent data.

– Inside Higher Ed
November 22, 2013

American to Lead Expansion of Top Chinese Business School Overseas

An American, Gregory Marchi, has taken up a position that will see him lead Western expansion efforts of the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business, one of mainland China’s leading business schools. Specifically, the school is looking to offer executive education and MBA programs in the United States, while also building partnerships with American universities.

“We’re a school doing something that’s not been done for the past 200 years—going from East to West,” said Sun Baohong, Cheung Kong’s associate dean of global programs, who helped recruit Mr. Marchi. “We’re opposite the traffic.”

Founded 11 years ago, Cheung Kong is a private, independent educational institution, and the only business school with faculty governance. Its reputation has soared, and its alumni include some of China’s most prominent business leaders. After opening offices in Hong Kong and London, Cheung Kong has turned toward the United States. While it has no plans to establish a full-fledged branch campus in America, Mr. Marchi, who is based in New York, aims to build on the school’s strength in educating mid- and upper-level executives. It wants to offer executive MBA programs, perhaps joining with top-ranking American universities to offer dual or joint degrees.

What the school offers, Mr. Marchi says, is a Chinese perspective on China. “Our core strength is doing business in China,” he says. “That’s an area where we can add value.”

– The Chronicle of Higher Education
November 25, 2013

Chinese Recruitment Agencies Undergo Evaluation

China’s largest agency association, Beijing Overseas Study Service Association (BOSSA), has begun an evaluation process that will help to regulate education agencies in China. BOSSA, which represents 72 of China’s state-endorsed consulting agencies, is also providing training for its members in order to raise standards in the industry, reports PIE News.

The inspections, which are funded and backed by the Chinese government, began in November. BOSSA has recruited a team of experts to act as an impartial third party evaluator for the inspections, and will initially focus on 71 Beijing-based agencies. Education counseling agencies will receive one of three ratings: pass, fail, or in need of improvement. BOSSA will provide agencies whose performance they consider unsatisfactory with guidance on how to improve. If they fail to make the suggested improvements within a set timeframe, they will fail the evaluation.

There are approximately 450 licensed agencies in China, but the number that operate without license runs into the thousands, making it hard for overseas universities – and students – to tell the good from the bad.

BOSSA is also cooperating with ICEF, a global industry group, and the American International Recruitment Council (AIRC) to promote an online training course aimed at promoting good service standards for individual agency practitioners.

– PIE News
December 3, 2013

Reforming University Admissions

China is looking at ways it can change the all-important university admissions test, known as the gaokao, that is typically the only deciding factor taken into consideration by university admissions departments across the country. Government officials have indicated that they want to add some subjective factors – such as consideration of extracurricular activities – to admissions decisions in response to concerns that the current system promotes rote learning over creativity. Some opponents say a move away from a straightforward points-based system will harm students from poor, rural areas who most need help getting into university. In the 1970s, half of students at prestigious Tsinghua University were from poor, rural areas. In 2010, that share was down to 17 percent.

The gaokao takes the form of ‘3+X’ in most provinces, with the ‘3’ compulsory subjects being Chinese, mathematics and English, each currently accounting for 150 points. The ‘X’ refers to either arts and humanities disciplines or science disciplines, accounting for 300 points.

Now the government has taken its first tentative steps towards reforming the system. In December it announced that the English-language part of the test can be taken several times, with the best score counting, while reducing the weighting of the English section from 150 to 100 and making up the difference in other sections (Chinese and ‘X’). More significantly, it said it would move towards an evaluation process where the test did not make up 100 percent of the score, and would include more subjective assessments of, for instance, extra-curricular activities. Details are expected this year, reports The Economist.

– The Economist
January 4, 2014

Chinese Universities Come Away Big Winners in Emerging Economies Ranking

According to a new ranking of universities from developing nations, China has more top universities than any other emerging economy. The inaugural Times Higher Education BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings consider universities in Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, as well as 17 other “emerging economies.”

Peking University tops the ranking, with Tsinghua University second. The University of Cape Town in South Africa rounds out the top three. Four of the top 10 and 23 of the top 100 institutions are Chinese. The countries with the next biggest representations are Taiwan (21), India (10), Turkey (7), then South Africa and Thailand (5 each). Russia has only two representatives in the ranking, fewer than the former Soviet satellite states Poland (four) and the Czech Republic (three).

Although they were considered in the analysis, no universities from Indonesia, Pakistan, Peru or the Philippines made the table, which uses the same methodology as the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2013-2014. Factors considered include scholarly citations, research income and the proportion of foreign students. The 22 countries analyzed are those defined as emerging markets by the FTSE Group’s Country Classification.

– Times Higher Education
December 4, 2013

The Value – or Lack Thereof – of the Foreign Degree in China

Chinese parents who can afford to do so continue to make huge investments in their children’s education by paying tuition for them to attend colleges and universities in the United States and other Western nations. However, some experts in China are questioning the financial value of the degrees earned abroad by Chinese students.

Recent findings suggest there is no longer much of a wage premium for those who return. Furthermore, the growing numbers of Chinese students going abroad means that it is no longer the cream of the crop that return with a foreign degree. And some are questioning whether the Chinese students end up with enough knowledge of either the West or their home. Zong Qinghou, the second wealthiest man in China, who sent his only daughter to study abroad, recently said at a press conference that she “knows neither the current situation for Chinese enterprises nor the situation abroad.”

– Financial Times
January 1, 2014

Struggling to Bring Home STEM Talent

China is struggling to align its development goals with foreign study policy, according to a recent article in the Diplomatic Courier.

“National development goals place a new emphasis on advanced science and technology as China’s industry recognizes that it must, of necessity, lift itself up the value chain to remain globally competitive.” Yet, the article points out, recent attempts “to lure back Chinese scientific and technology-related entrepreneurial talent from foreign countries” has so far met with “equivocal success.”

Which is not to say Chinese students are staying abroad like they used to. Since 1978, an estimated 2.6 million Chinese have gone overseas to study. In 1995 only around 6,000 returned, but today between 400,000 and 600,000 return each year. According to China’s Ministry of Education, some 800,000 Chinese have returned over the past five years, or roughly 70 percent. It is an unprecedented number, and China expects it will only increase in the coming years.

In 2008, the Chinese government launched an incentive scheme to lure back Chinese scientific and technology-related talent from foreign countries. It was supposed to run for 10 years and repatriate 2,000 of the best Chinese minds to spur innovation. After just five years, the program has already exceeded its quota, however, it appears to have attracted more business graduates than the core STEM talent it sought. That talent appears to be staying overseas, where it is also in demand and work and environmental conditions are considered by many to be better.

– Diplomatic Courier
January 7, 2014

Test-Taker Numbers Drop for the National Graduate Examination

The number of candidates taking China’s 2014 national graduate school entrance examination, which took place in January, dropped this year, according to data cited by China Daily USA. Admission officials said the end of free graduate programs might be behind the decline in numbers.

The Ministry of Education said that 1.72 million people participated in this year’s examination, a decline of 40,000 from last year. It was the first drop in five years. According to the Beijing Education Examinations Authority, about 250,000 people applied for universities in Beijing in 2014, a drop of 7.85 percent compared with 2013.

This year is the first in which free graduate education has been replaced with university scholarships, and the first with no age restrictions on entry. In the past, the ministry’s enrollment guide on graduate exam registration stated that, in general, applicants should be younger than 40, although there was no age limit for those willing to pay for their own tuition.

– China Daily
January 6, 2014

India

Just 10 Percent of India’s College-Age Population Enrolls in Higher Education

Access to higher education among the college-age population is just 10 percent, according to a report authored by development economist Abusaleh Shariff of the Delhi-based Centre for Research and Debates in Development Policy and Amit Sharma, research analyst for the National Council of Applied Economic Research.

The report says that huge disparities exist in access to higher education – across gender, socio-economic and religious groups and geographical regions. The skew is most marked across regions. Thus, a dalit (untouchable) or Muslim in south India, though from the most disadvantaged communities, would have better access to higher education than even upper caste Hindus in many other regions.

The report, released by the US-India Policy Institute in Washington, is based on data from the 64th round of NSSO survey 2007-08. It also brings to light some other facts related to access. For example, ‘tribals’ and dalits fare worst with just 1.8 percent of those castes having any higher education. Muslims are almost as badly off, with just 2.1 percent able to access further learning. Similarly, just 2 percent of the rural population is educated beyond secondary level, compared with 12 percent of the urban population.

– The Times of India
January 5, 2014

Universities Given Authority Over Technical Sector

The University Grants Commission in January approved a regulation giving universities absolute power over quality control of their affiliated colleges in technical education including engineering, management and pharmacy, according to a recent article in The Telegraph.

Universities will examine parameters such as infrastructure, faculty strength, admission processes, lab and library facilities of colleges proposing to run technical programs before granting them approval. This was previously done by the All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) until the Supreme Court stripped it of regulatory powers last April. The court ruled that the AICTE would remain an advisory body and would advise the UGC on quality standards.

There are nearly 10,000 engineering and management colleges affiliated to some 60 universities in the country. The AICTE had put in place an online system for monitoring institutions and their facilities. Private institutes appeared skeptical whether universities would have “adequate staff and resources” to successfully monitor engineering institutions.

– The Telegraph
January 10, 2014

IITs to Step up International Recruitment

In a bid to improve their performance in global rankings, India’s prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) have reportedly, “decided to step up inter-disciplinary research collaborations tailored to meet the national development agenda and open the premier engineering institutions to more foreign students at the post-graduate and research levels.”

The move was agreed at a retreat of IIT Directors, hosted by the Union Human Resource Development Ministry. The meeting was also attended by senior heads of large public sector companies interested in adding input on the needs of the labor market. Representatives of India’s Oil & Natural Gas Corporation, for example, indicated interest in increasing research investment in IITs to have these institutions as “research referral units” for the oil company.

In addition to boosting ranking performance, IIT heads hope that by attracting a more international student body there will be a broader foreign alumni network that can then go to act as brand ambassadors for the institutions, according to a report in The Hindu.

– The Hindu
January 17, 2014

Malaysia

Top British Boarding School to Open School

British boarding school Epsom College has announced that it will open its first overseas campus at the Kuala Lumpur Education City (KLEC) development in Bandar Enstek, Malaysia this September.

ECiM will follow the Cambridge International Examination (CIE) syllabus with all teaching in English. Funding from KLEC and Epsom College’s alumni network contributed to the RM140 million ($43 million) investment. KLEC is envisioned to be an international hub for international education in Malaysia, with educational options from primary school through PhD, together with commercial and residential areas of development.

The international boarding and day school will teach pupils aged 3-18 years, with up to 90 percent of the senior pupils boarding. The first year’s intake will be limited to 200 students, though the campus will ultimately cater for around 900 senior school and 650 prep school pupils.

– The PIE News
January 16, 2013

Myanmar

Yangon University Reopens to Undergraduates After 25-Year Hiatus

Closed following student unrest in 1988, Yangon University welcomed its first crop of undergraduate students this year to study a curriculum “free from the interfering hand of the military,” reports Al Jazeera.

Until recently the word “poverty” was banned, alongside any discussion of domestic politics at the University. After an outburst of student-led protests in 1988, the political science department was shuttered. Further protests 10 years later led to the shut-down of all undergraduate teaching, but things are now changing.

“We have full autonomy,” says Kyaw Naing, a rector at the school, two weeks after the university re-opened its gates to undergraduates in December.

After retired generals took power in 2011 and, to the surprise of many outsiders, began a radical political and economic reform program they called a transition to “disciplined democracy,” the West suspended or lifted most of their trade and economic sanctions. U.S. President Barack Obama made an historic speech at the university in November 2012, hailing the country’s “remarkable journey.”

This year’s intake consists of 50 students in each major, bringing total enrollment to 1,000 for the year. However, rebuilding the nation’s once proud universities will be a long road. A lost generation of students means that faculty resources are sparse, and while the education budget has tripled since 2011, Myanmar’s expenditure remains far lower than its Asian peers.

– Al Jazeera English
January 10, 2014

Singapore

Government Launches Well-Funded Program to Lure Back Talent from Overseas

Singapore is offering handsome salaries and five years of guaranteed research funding to woo back top Singaporean scientists and engineers from overseas, as it looks to further its ambitions of becoming a leading global research and development hub.

The Returning Singaporean Scientists Scheme launched in October by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, aims to encourage leading researchers in their field globally to take up leadership positions in Singapore.

Scientists may choose to start as visiting fellows before converting to staff positions, or take up full-time employment immediately with the host Singaporean university or research institutions offering them a ‘competitive package.’ Scientists will also receive five years of funding support from the National Research Foundation. Since 2010, a growing number of Singaporean scientists have begun returning home seeing better opportunities than elsewhere thanks to increased government funding.

Singapore has spent billions of dollars in recent years setting up research centers for biotechnology, aerospace engineering, water technology and medical sciences, mainly attached to the National University of Singapore and Nanyang University. Many are headed by top scientists head-hunted from Western universities.

– Straits Times
October 26, 2013

Taiwan

Government Announces Internationalization Plans, Hints at a Desire to Attract Foreign Campuses

The government of Taiwan hopes to attract foreign campuses to Taiwan, while also increasing the number of foreign students studying in Taiwan from 78,000 last year to 150,000, or 10 percent of all tertiary students, by 2020. The international enrollment goal is not unrealistic considering last year’s total was more than double the 30,000 international students that were in the country in 2008. Students from China accounted for 24,000 of the total last year.

Having more foreign students on Taiwan campuses is linked to “an important election campaign promise of mine six years ago,” said Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou in January, referring to his “Ten Thousand Galloping Horses” project that encourages Taiwan’s youngsters to travel overseas to broaden their life experiences while welcoming those from other countries to “make friends with our young in Taiwan.”

A program that would ease the regulatory hurdles of collaborating with foreign institutions under the Free Economic Pilot Zones (FEPZ) initiative is also being mulled by the government. The provisions would reportedly allow local institutions to collaborate with foreign universities to set up branch campuses and independent colleges in Taiwan. However, the establishment of such institutions requires revisions to the University Act, which could take up to three years. Collaborative efforts under the FEPZ for this year will focus at the program level, which does not require legal amendments.

President Ma said at this year’s National Conference of University and College Presidents in January that with a focus on improving quality standards through informed reform policy, Taiwan would be positioned to establish itself as an important East Asian hub for higher education.

“Many countries have chosen Taiwan as a top place for training their educators. India, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam provide government scholarships for academics and teachers to study in Taiwan,” he said.

– Taiwan Today
January 14, 2014

Vietnam

Two More Private Universities Recommended for Closure

Following a recent evaluation by the Hanoi People’s Committee of 20 higher education institutions operating in the Hanoi region, Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training could revoke the licenses of at least two universities which it has recommended be shut down.

The private Bac Ha International University was found to be operating a student enrollment office and conducting training in Hanoi without a license, while significant problems with another private institution, the University of Technology and Management were also uncovered, official media reported.

With high unemployment rates among degree holders in recent years, the quality of higher education has preoccupied policy-makers and education administrators in Vietnam, reports University World News. The government’s priority is to boost the quality of existing institutions. Earlier in 2013, the government slashed enrollment quotas at 23 higher education institutions due to poor facilities and resources.

The ministry recently opened two independent Centers for Education Accreditation under the auspices of two national universities, one in Hanoi and another in Ho Chi Minh City. The centers are part of a bigger scheme, with initial investment of some VND99 billion (US$4.7 million), to reform the tertiary education accreditation system to meet international standards.

– University World News
December 6, 2013