Iran

Six US University Presidents Visit Iran

The presidents of six leading research universities in the United States toured Iran and met with top officials from Iranian universities in November as a delegation organized by the Association of American Universities.

According to an AAU news release, the six-day trip resulted from an invitation by the president of Iran’s top scientific university, the Sharif University of Technology, in Tehran. The delegation also visited Tehran University and other institutions. Despite, pre-trip reports to the contrary, the university leaders also met with Iranian Minister of Science, Research and Technology Mohammad Mehdi Zahedi, according to the Cornell Daily Sun.

The universities represented on the visit were: Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University, Rice University, University of California at Davis, University of Florida, and the University of Maryland at College Park.

The presidents, some of whom were invited because their institutions have engaged in previous exchanges with Iran, met with higher-education officials, faculty members in science and engineering, and students.

– The Cornell Daily Sun
December 1, 2008

Minister Impeached over Fake Degree

The Iranian interior minister, Ali Kordan, was sacked in November, following an impeachment hearing for faking a degree from Oxford University. In a parliamentary vote, 188 members voted to impeach Kordan, while just 14 were against the motion and 45 abstained. Kordon claimed he had been awarded an honorary doctorate of law by Oxford.

The bogus degree was uncovered in August, when MPs questioned the authenticity of Kordan’s qualifications shortly after his appointment to the post of interior minister. The bogus credential was dated June 2000, but red flags were raised due to poor grammar on the degree and due to the fact that none of the signatories had ever worked in law at Oxford.

The university said it had “no record of Mr Ali Kordan receiving an honorary doctorate or any other degree from the university.

– The Guardian
November 4, 2008

Saudi Arabia

Construction Begins on World’s Largest Women’s University

Work began in October on the construction of a new campus for Riyadh Women’s University, the first university in Saudi Arabia exclusively for female students.

Capacity at the campus ultimately will accommodate 40,000 students. It currently accommodates 17,000 students, University President Princess Al-Jawhara Bint Fahd said. Students will have 13 academic faculties to choose from, including medical studies at a 700-bed hospital.

Saudi ruler, King Abdullah, attended the groundbreaking ceremony, a move that is seen as a reflection of his personal commitment to expand education in Saudi Arabia, for women as well as men. This commitment has come in for private criticism from elements in the Wahhabi religious establishment, and even from conservative Muslims inside the vast royal family itself.

– Arab News
October 29, 2008

Lecturers at Saudi Universities Top Global Salary Rankings

University faculty in Saudi Arabia are the best paid in the world while scholars in China are the worst off, according to a recently published global study of salaries conducted by the Boston College Center for International Higher Education in the United States. The average academic salary across 15 countries surveyed is US$4,050 a month in purchasing power parity dollars.

The study, International Comparison of Academic Salaries: An Exploratory Study, looked at salaries at entry level, national averages, and the top rung of the academic ladder, using the Word Bank’s purchasing power parity (PPP) index. The study finds that China pays academics the lowest salaries at all of the three levels surveyed, Canada pays academics most generously at entry level, while average and top-level salaries are highest in Saudi Arabia.

“China and India consistently register the lowest salary averages,” says the report, “while Saudi Arabia, Canada, the United States and Australia hover near the top of the spectrum across the three salary levels analyzed in this study.”

– Boston College Center for International Higher Education
October 2008