Australia

University of Sydney to Adopt 4-Year Undergrad Degree

The University of Sydney announced in June plans to shift undergraduate degrees from three to four years as part of a major overhaul of instruction, that includes the reduction in the number of undergraduate degrees from 122 to about 20.

University officials said that more time was needed to promote critical thinking and other key skills. At the same time, the university will discourage students from taking more than one undergraduate program, but will instead encourage master’s programs after a single undergraduate degree. The moves are part of a plan to overtake the University of Melbourne in rankings, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

– Sydney Morning Herald
June 2, 2015

New Federal Government Body to Oversee International Education Sector

After a decade of lobbying, Australia’s international education sector has been given a whole-of-government body to oversee it, with the June announcement by Education Minister Christopher Pyne of the creation of the Coordinating Council for International Education.

He said it would be responsible for, among other things, finalizing Australia’s first ever national strategy for international education. The council will include the federal ministers whose portfolios include oversight of international education, including education and training, foreign affairs, trade, industry and immigration. It will also include representatives from the education and business communities.

According to stakeholders, some of the first priorities of the council will be student visa reform, international marketing and Brand Australia, and issues related to immigration fraud and international agent use.

– The Australian
June 3, 2015

International Enrollments from First Quarter Hit Record Highs

Australian universities and other higher-education providers took their largest ever intake of new international students this year, with 61,493 beginning their studies in the three months to March 2015. The total tops the previous high of 56,512 in 2010, before the slump in student numbers caused by the higher Australian dollar and concerns about student safety.

The lift in student numbers took the total number of international students in higher education in the three months to March to 271,281 – the highest number ever recorded for the first quarter of a year. Overall, international student numbers are growing strongly this year, with a total of 413,032 enrolled in the first quarter – a figure which also includes students in vocational education, English language colleges, schools and non-award courses.

– Financial Review
June 15, 2015

Private Colleges to Benefit from Changes to Student Visa Laws

Private colleges will find it easier to benefit from Australia’s booming international student business, following changes to the student visa system announced by the federal government in June.

The government announced that it would reduce the number of student visa categories from eight to two and that the current visa risk assessment system, which favors universities and a limited number of other education providers, would be replaced. The new system, which will be introduced in mid-2016, is particularly welcome to private education providers, most of whom were shut out of the streamlined visa processing system established by the previous Labor government.

Labor’s scheme, which was a response to immigration fraud by some private vocational colleges, offered easy visa processing only to students at universities. The Abbott government extended the right to some private education providers but most were required to operate in a highly complex visa risk assessment system, which students found difficult to understand.

Under the new system, to be known as the simplified student visa framework (SSVF), students applying to all education providers will be assessed for visa risk under a single framework. It will be based on the country they come from and the immigration compliance record of other students who have studied at that particular education provider.

– Finance Review
June 16, 2015

China

Agent Reputation Number 1 Concern for Chinese Students Looking to Study Overseas

Reputation and consultant qualifications outstrip cost as the biggest deciding factors for Chinese students when selecting a study abroad agent, but most said they believed agent advice to be mostly profit motivated, a survey commissioned by the Ministry of Education has shown.

An overwhelming 80 percent of the 21,702 students and parents who responded to an online survey carried out by Beijing Overseas Study Services Association for China Customers Association magazine said that reputation would be a major factor when selecting an agency to use. Qualifications and capability of agents followed, mentioned by 59 percent of respondents to the multiple-choice questionnaire, while just 37 percent cited cost.

“The urgency of customers to verify the qualifications and credibility of overseas study services intermediaries not only demonstrates the increase of customers’ self-protection awareness… but also shows the commercial reputation of most overseas study service agencies needs to be improved urgently,” the report states.

The survey also revealed that consumers are hesitant to trust even qualified agents. Two thirds said they would only partially trust information provided by a qualified agent, believing them to be knowledgeable but motivated primarily by profit.

– The PIE News
May 25, 2015

Diploma Mills Exposed

Bearing names similar to top universities, China’s fake colleges woo and swindle high school graduates through slick recruitment websites. A list released recently by sdaxue.com, a site that helps students choose higher education institutions, has exposed 60 Chinese “universities” or “colleges” as unaccredited diploma mills, according to a report from Xinhua.

The website published two similar lists in 2013 featuring different fake schools. The most recent list pushes the total number of exposed bogus colleges to 210. Of all the listed colleges, 83, or 44 percent, are located in Beijing, where many of the country’s top universities are concentrated, according to sdaxue.com. Shanghai comes in second, with 15 fake colleges.

The institutions’ names, though slightly altered, are extremely similar to key Chinese universities and colleges, leading to confusion among students and their parents. Though their accreditation is usually fabricated or out of date, the institutions are still recruiting students, according to sdaxue.com. The case has led to accusations of lax supervision, which has been blamed for other high-profile scandals including food safety and environmental violations, and eroding public trust.

– Xinhua
May 22, 2015

Ministry Seeks International Acceptance of Gaokao Admissions Examination

China’s education ministry is pushing for the country’s National College Entrance Exam, known as the gaokao, to be accepted for admission by more overseas universities. The move comes as the weighting of the English language segment in the examination has been reduced, and amid fears that Chinese students may lose out on overseas university places because of a perceived ‘lowering of standards’ as the number of subjects examined expands.

Over nine million school leavers in China sat the gaokao in early June. But preparing for additional examinations for overseas universities is stressful. Yu Jihai, deputy-director of the Ministry of Education’s international department, speaking at a recent conference, said: “We are currently working on having foreign countries recognize the grades of China’s gaokao.”

Ministry officials claim some 60 Australian universities now accept applications from China on the basis of gaokao scores after the University of Sydney first did so in 2012. The University of San Francisco in the U.S. became the latest overseas university to announce, in May, that it will admit, on a trial basis, a handful of students from China on the basis of a gaokao score and one-on-one interviews. Some institutions in Italy, France, Germany and Spain have accepted these scores on an individual basis. In France, specific scores in gaokao mathematics and science exams are used to judge academic levels of students applying for degrees in those subjects.

But very few students are able to gain admission to institutions abroad solely on gaokao scores and require additional high marks in language-proficiency tests, which can be challenging for many students. In a bid to dispel the view that the gaokao tests are mainly rote-learning, Chinese officials are telling overseas universities during regular educational exchanges that the examination has been broadened to include a larger number of subjects – previously only performance in mathematics, Chinese and English were examined – as well as including ‘personal and social character’ in the assessment. These will include community engagement and volunteering as well as cultural and sporting activities. The new version is currently being piloted in Shanghai and in Zhejiang province on China’s east coast.

– University World News
May 26, 2015

India

25,000 UK Students in India Over Next 5 Years

Approximately 500 British students left for India in July to either intern, study or be part of a cultural ‘immersion’ program. They are the first group in the Generation UK-India scheme, facilitated by the British Council in collaboration with the government of India, which will see as many as 25,000 students from the UK travel to India over the next five years, in the hope of enhancing their career prospects in global Indian firms.

Of the 6,000 British applicants this year, 400 have been selected. An additional 400 have applied for 100 positions to teach in 60 schools across India. At present five Indian universities are involved in the program. These are the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad or IIM-A; the National Institute of Design or NID, Ahmedabad; the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay or IIT Bombay; the University of Delhi, and the Indian Institute of Science or IISc, Bangalore. It is hoped that at least 25 more Indian universities will be ready to participate by next summer when 1,000 students from the UK are expected to arrive.

– University World News
June 5, 2015

South Korea

International Enrollments Decline, Despite Promotional Program

After the number of foreign students in Korea reached almost 90,000 in 2011, the Ministry of Education announced an ambitious plan the following year to raise that number to 200,000 by 2020, in part to make up for declining domestic enrollments due to a falling birth rate. The ministry said the number of high school graduates is expected to fall short of the college entrance quota from 2018.

However, since the plan’s announcement, international enrollment numbers have been on the decline. According to recent ministry data, the number of foreign students has decreased for three years in a row, from 89,537 in 2011 to 84,891 in 2014.

Many foreign students and graduates from universities in Korea point out that Korean degrees are not helpful in getting jobs there and the job opportunities offered them are not enough.

Given that more than 70 percent of foreign students come from China, Japan and Mongolia, observers say that the number of foreign students in Korea will keep decreasing unless the country offers something more for them.

– Korea Times
June 2, 2015

Vietnam

School Leavers Take New University Entrance Examination

In a radical revamp of its much criticized university entrance examination system, Vietnam will hold its first combined school leaving exam and college entrance exam in July, with students sitting a single examination for the first time instead of two separate high-stakes examinations.

Higher education institutions have also been granted more leeway to include their own assessment methods to select would-be students in addition to the new combined exam, which is designed for the entire high school cohort, rather than a select group aiming for top universities.

Under the old system, named the ‘three commons’ examination, all candidates took the same exam on the same dates during the first or second week of July. Prior to the ‘three commons,’ students sat another baccalaureate test in late May. The ‘three commons’ was criticized as being unnecessarily stressful for students and encouraged the proliferation of cram schools and private tuition.

In a radical change announced in February, the Ministry of Education and Training merged the two into one exam to be held for the first time in July. In the past, students who sat both the Baccalaureate and the ‘three commons’ studied for exams in four to seven subjects, sometimes at several different test locations. The new combined exams mean most will sit four subjects at one test center. More than a million students will sit the exam this year.

– University World News
June 12, 2015