Australia

UNSW to Accept Chinese Applicants for Direct Admissions Based on Gaokao Scores

The University of New South Wales has joined a number of other Australian universities in deciding to accept scores from China’s national higher education entrance examination, the gaokao, for direct entrance into its undergraduate programs.

Pro vice-chancellor (international) Fiona Docherty said UNSW would accept gaokao scores as the basis for entry into degrees in the humanities, commerce, economics, actuarial studies, architecture, fine arts, media, engineering and science.

She said the practice, to begin next year, was part of UNSW’s wider China Ready program, which was “designed to deliver premium higher education solutions tailored to the Chinese market.” In August the university also plans to launch a China web portal offering information about UNSW in Chinese.

A 2009 report for Australian Education International found that recruitment using gaokao cut-offs could “produce students with outstanding ability.” The report found that about half of Australia’s universities allowed Chinese applicants direct entrance based on their high school results. But the others insisted on an initial year of foundation studies.

Last year the University of Sydney joined other Australian institutions, including Adelaide, La Trobe and Monash universities, in accepting direct applications based on gaokao scores. Applicants must also meet English language and subject requirements. La Trobe offers A$10,000 scholarships for “outstanding” gaokao students.

– The Australian
April 27, 2013

China

Top U.S. University Offers Chinese Students Chance to Build Verifiable Admissions Portfolio

Wake Forest University is launching a new program for Chinese high school students intended to help “bridge the gap” between the Chinese and U.S. educational systems and provide students with “incontrovertible” video evidence of their academic readiness. The package is being designed for use by any college admissions office around the country.

The Wake Forest Advantage curriculum focuses on four core learning skills – academic research and inquiry, academic discourse and communication, exploring U.S. college and university culture, and refining individual learning strategies – and emphasizes collaboration and reflection. It will be presented in various formats: a two-week intensive summer program, an after-school program, and during the actual school day.

Students in the after-school program, but not the summer academy, produce a “digital portfolio” that Wake Forest will distribute directly to U.S. admissions offices upon their request. The student-created DVDs will show the students engaging in common Western-style classroom practices – such as giving presentations, debating with classmates, and working in groups – as well as reflecting on those experiences. A team of K-12 teachers in North Carolina will evaluate the videos, which will be placed in envelopes sealed with gold, silver or bronze stickers to indicate the students’ level of preparedness for a U.S. classroom.

– Inside Higher Ed
April 25, 2013

Number of Indian Students in China on the Rise

There are currently 9,200 Indian students at Chinese universities, an increase of 15 percent versus last year, according to a report by India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

Traditionally, Indians have not studied in China and relations between the countries remain cool due to two unresolved border disputes. However, the MEA report claims Indians are increasingly attracted by China’s admission system, affordable fees and facilities.

International branch campuses such as The University of Nottingham and University of Liverpool are also a draw. Business opportunities, buoyed by China’s strong economic growth are another incentive. Medicine is the most popular field of study for Indians in China, followed by engineering and business studies.

– The PIE News
April 29, 2013

Shanghai Graduates Offered Cash to Find Jobs in Tough Labor Market

Universities in Shanghai are offering a variety of incentives such as subsidies for students willing to return to their hometowns to work amid a tough job market. This is meant to ensure continued strong enrollments for next year by being able to point to high graduate employment rates.

Shanghai Dianji University is offering a transportation subsidy of up to 1,500 yuan (US$242) and a minimum 800 yuan each to senior students from outside the city who were willing to return to their hometown to work. A 1,500 yuan subsidy is also offered to students setting up their own businesses. Incentives will also be offered to students admitted to graduate studies, the university said.

“It is the first time that we offer such subsidy in our history due to the poor employment prospects this year,” said Yao Weichun, deputy director of the university’s student affairs office. He said there had been a 6 percent drop in the number of students graduating with a bachelor’s degree who had secured a job compared to last year.

– People’s Daily Online
May 14, 2013

Toughest Job Market Ever for University Graduates

By mid-April, only 28.24 percent of Beijing’s 2013 graduates had found jobs, and Shanghai’s graduates fared only slightly better, at 44.4 percent. The low placement numbers reflect the higher number of graduates this year and the slowdown in China’s economy, experts say. Internet chat rooms have dubbed 2013 “the worst year to graduate in history.”

This year a total of 6.99 million students graduated with a master’s, bachelor’s or technical college degree in China, an increase of 190,000 from 2012. In contrast, the number of jobs available decreased by 15 percent compared with 2012, according to China Youth, a state-run newspaper.

In Beijing, 229,000 students will graduate this year, 9,000 more than in 2012. According to data from hiring businesses and organizations, however, there are only 98,000 jobs available for graduates, 16,000 less than in 2012. Many privately owned companies have lowered their hiring quotas, and most are offering jobs that are less lucrative than in previous years, with diminished benefits.

Even graduates from top schools are having a hard time compared with previous years. Xiong Yizhi, the director of the career center at Tsinghua University, said only 60 percent of Tsinghua’s graduates have jobs, but he expected that number to climb at the end of May, when many students who are still considering their offers will make a decision, according to China Youth.

– International Business Times
May 17, 2013

Hong Kong

Fee Hikes of Up to 20 Percent For International Students

Hong Kong’s eight government-funded universities have raised tuition fees by as much as 20 percent for international students this year, attributing the hike to inflation and a stronger yuan. More than 10,000 students will be affected.

Despite the tuition fee increase, Melanie Wan, senior manager of communications at the University of Hong Kong (HKU), was confident the university would remain attractive to mainland students. “Over the years, HKU has attracted top students from the mainland with its high quality education and internationalized campus,” she told University World News. But some observers took the view that increasing fees for non-local students would deter some.

“The increase of tuition will definitely affect non-local students’ willingness to come to Hong Kong,” said Professor Chung Yue-ping, education finance expert at the Chinese University. “Local universities can create more scholarships, provide subsidies for living and allow students to take certain paid jobs to lessen the impact.”

While the eight universities have all increased the levels of scholarships, some fear it will not be enough to cover the cost of training students and cite a need to fund non-local students. According to Chouk Yin, the external liaison manager of mainland and external affairs at City University, “the purpose of admitting non-local students is to make our university more international. Making money is not the purpose. Admitting non-local students can also promote communications between local students and students from other cultures. It can broaden the scope of local students.”

– University World News
May 4, 2013

Education Reforms and System Restructuring Offer Rewards

Hong Kong’s new academic structure, now phased in across senior secondary and higher education, has resulted in marked achievements in extending education opportunities and demand for higher education, along with early indicators that it is better preparing students for further studies, a review report has revealed.

The reforms have moved the city’s tertiary education structure from a three-year to a four-year undergraduate system, beginning in September 2012. In line with higher education being extended to four years, school education has been reduced from 13 years to 12. The Progress Report on the New Academic Structure Review: The New Senior Secondary learning journey – Moving forward to excel, published in April, shows that the changes at university level are part of fundamental reforms, systematically implemented since 2000 and affecting all levels of education in Hong Kong.

The reforms have culminated in the New Academic Structure for Senior Secondary Education and Higher Education. Opportunities to receive senior secondary schooling have been extended to all, which is expected to increase the demand for higher education, or ‘multiple pathways’ through vocational and sub-degree alternatives that can eventually lead to a bachelor degree. Under the previous model, only the top third of school-leavers were entitled to prepare for the former Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination (HKALE) – the passport to undergraduate education. In contrast, in 2011-12, more than 85 percent of the age group enrolled in Secondary Six, according to the report.

The report also shows that under the new system there has been a substantial increase in the number of students continuing to further studies. In 2012, more than two-thirds of those who sat the new Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education (HKDSE) examination achieved the grades needed to enter bachelor or sub-degree programs in Hong Kong. Enrollment figures show that 80 percent of those qualifying for bachelor and sub-degree courses under the new system are now studying on such programs in Hong Kong.

Participation at undergraduate level has, as a result, increased to 23 percent of school-leavers, compared with 18 percent under the old model. Another 7 percent are studying overseas. The UK, followed by Mainland China, was the leading destination for Hong Kong students in 2012. The two countries accounted for 25 percent and 22 percent respectively of overseas Hong Kong students, according to survey data from schools, with Australia (14 percent), the U.S. (13 percent) and Taiwan (13 percent) also receiving significant numbers of Hong Kong students.

– University World News
April 27, 2013

India

Delhi’s Switch to Four-Year Degrees Causes Much Debate

Delhi University is regarded as one of India’s best universities, if not the best, and beginning with the next academic year in July it is shaking up the Indian university system by switching to a four-year undergraduate program.

The university enrolls a massive 400,000 students through its 62 affiliated colleges and School of Open Learning, so the additional year will require significant additional resources and teaching staff.

A group of political leaders recently appealed to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to intervene to postpone the “hasty implementation” of the switch so that “its various ramifications can be examined through wider debate and consultation.”

“No provision has been made for additional infrastructure or teaching posts for the extra year. The shift to the four-year undergraduate program, without ensuring these essential requirements, will be an irresponsible move,” stated 40 members of parliament in a memorandum addressed to Singh.

Despite opposition, on May 9, in a meeting that went on into the night, the university’s executive council approved the new curricula and degrees. “With these approvals, all formal requirements as per the University of Delhi Act, statutes and ordinances have been complied with and the university is all set to launch the program,” said a statement from the registrar’s office.

Unlike its existing curricula, Delhi University is making sure that the new four-year undergraduate programs are hands-on and will prepare students for the job market. Apart from the main subjects that will be offered, colleges will also teach four applied courses to show students how they can use their knowledge in real life. Each program has four applied courses which will be taught in the second and third years.

– Daily Mail
May 26, 2013

Japan

Reform Efforts at University of Tokyo Focus on Improving Academics, Attracting Internationals

The University of Tokyo is taking a series of steps to try to increase the intellectual rigor and international perspective of its students. The university is Japan’s most prestigious, but educators there have long worried that students focus too much on gaining entry, and not enough on learning once enrolled.

To attract more motivated and talented students in specific academic areas, the university will introduce a recommendation-based entrance examination for academic year 2016 for the first time since the 1947 academic year, when the school education law was enacted.

Another reform will be the use of massive open online courses (MOOCs) to introduce students to new styles of education. Other plans include more courses in English and special grants to allow newly admitted students to take a year off for study abroad or other educational experiences, with just 0.5 percent of the student body engaging in overseas study, much lower than the national average of 2 percent.

Bringing in more foreign students will also enable local students to interact with other cultures. But overseas, the University of Tokyo doesn’t have the brand recognition it does in Japan. Last year the school made an effort to increase the number of international students by launching Programs in English at Komaba (PEAK), an undergraduate course provided exclusively in English at the university’s Komaba campus in Tokyo’s Meguro Ward. Twenty-seven foreign students entered the program. This year, the university sent 13 professors to 15 countries in Asia, Europe, the United States and Oceania to meet with prospective students to try and boost demand.

The university is taking another step to attract overseas students by changing the traditional start of the academic year from spring to fall. Fall enrollment, which is common in many universities outside Japan, would better suit the schedules of overseas students. The system would also encourage Japanese students to study abroad, officials said.

– Asahi Shimbun
May 24, 2013

New Scholarships for Overseas Study

In a bid to encourage more Japanese students to study abroad, a plan is in the works to offer scholarships to those taking short-term overseas courses, the Japanese education minister, Hakubun Shimomura, said during a visit to Washington.

The offer, which Mr. Shimomura said would be available as early as 2017, is tied to a series of education initiatives by Japan’s conservative government headed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who is eager to make the country more competitive internationally.

Speaking in May at a conference organized by the U.S.-Japan Research Institute in Washington, Mr. Shimomura said that the grants could give a badly needed lift to the number of Japanese students abroad, which has been declining steadily.

The number of Japanese students studying overseas peaked at 82,945 in 2004 and fell to 58,060 in 2010, according to the Ministry of Education. Fewer than 20,000 Japanese students studied in the United States in 2011, compared with 46,000 in 1999, according to the Institute of International Education.

– The New York Times
May 5, 2013

Myanmar

Myanmar Universities Look to the World for Help

Yangon Technological University has come a long way since it was the site of anti-government student protests in 1988 that eventually spread across Myanmar. The campus has been refurbished and a sense of normality is beginning to return. Undergraduate students, barred for about a decade, are back, although they all must leave by 5 p.m.; they cannot live on campus.

One important question is how the university is going to forge links with the outside world. Like many other universities in Myanmar, Yangon Technological lacks adequate teaching materials, research facilities and updated technology, all of which a foreign partner could bring. Nyi Hla Nge, a retired rector at the university, said he had written a letter to the president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology seeking to “establish cooperation.”

Foreign institutions say the Education Ministry is showing new openness. “Our ability to engage with them has quadrupled over the last few months,” said Andrew Leahy, a public diplomacy officer with the U.S. Embassy in Yangon who is working on exchange programs. In January, the U.S. Embassy placed the first Fulbright scholar in nearly three decades at Yangon University. EducationUSA, the U.S. State Department’s outreach program for foreign students, held its first college fair in Myanmar in February. More than a thousand students and parents attended, as did representatives of almost a dozen U.S. universities and community colleges. Also in February, a delegation of 10 American universities, organized by the Institute of International Education visited Myanmar to explore partnerships.
In April, the institute released a report citing some of the problems in Myanmar’s education system.

In February, the European Union organized a higher-education conference with ministers, university administrators and foreign academics. The conference was “significant” because such “open and frank discussions” had not happened before, said an E.U. representative, who requested anonymity because he did not have permission to speak to the news media.

The U.S. Agency for International Development began taking applications last November to finance higher-education projects in Myanmar. More than 200 organizations and individuals participated in an information session on agency grants in Washington in December. The European Union will also provide financing for faculty and student exchanges.

– The New York Times
May 5, 2013

New Zealand

Universities Encouraged to Enroll More International Students After Budget Freeze

New Zealand’s public universities will, for the second year in a row, receive no increase in budgetary spending from the government under the new federal budget delivered in May. The government has also further restricted spending on student loans and allowances, while threatening to arrest students seriously in default if they enter or leave the country.

Budget increases did come for research funding, and the government will spend NZ$56 million (US$46 million) over the next four years on increases in the rates paid for enrollments in engineering and science, and for private tertiary institutions that for many years have been paid less than public institutions.

To make up for budget shortfalls, the government has urged tertiary institutions to enroll more international students, and hopes to double income from that source by 2025. The budget includes an extra NZ$10 million a year to help attract more foreign students.

– University World News
May 16, 2013

Millions of Dollars to be Spent Promoting New Zealand to Foreign Students

New Zealand announced in May a multi-million-dollar marketing push to attract more foreign students, especially those from Asia. Tertiary Education Minister Steven Joyce said the government had committed NZ$33 million (US$26 million) in its new budget to promoting New Zealand in key markets such as China, India, Southeast Asia and South America.

Joyce said almost 100,000 overseas students were enrolled in New Zealand’s eight universities, supporting about 32,000 jobs. He said the government’s goal was to more than double the international education sector by 2025.

Joyce added that international students offered more than financial value to New Zealand, crediting them with helping the country forge strong “people-to-people links” in the Asia-Pacific region.

– Agence France Presse
May 16 2013

Singapore

NYU to Close Singapore Law Program

New York University’s law school has announced that it will shut down a legal-education program it had introduced in partnership with the National University of Singapore, saying that the program will end when its Class of 2014 graduates.

In its announcement, NYU said the cost of graduate legal education had risen “significantly” in recent years, and said the program had been made possible by a grant from the government of Singapore. The two universities have agreed to end the program without seeking additional money to continue it. The move marks the second time in the last year that NYU has decided to end a program in Singapore due to financial woes. Last November its Tisch School of the Arts Asia announced that it would stop admitting new students.

– NYU news release
May 2013

South Korea

SAT Scandal Brings Up Questions About Korea’s Test-Taking Culture

The recent cancellation of U.S. college entrance exams in South Korea—the first time SAT tests have been called off nationwide anywhere in the world for suspected cheating—is throwing the spotlight back on the country’s hyper-competitive academic environment.

At least 10 staff members of test centers have been barred from leaving the country as part of an investigation by the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office. The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education has launched a separate inquiry. The U.S.-based administrator of the SAT scrapped the May 4 sessions in South Korea three days before the test date after it discovered questions from the tests circulating in test-prep centers in the country.

In modern-day South Korea, the academic environment is ultra-competitive because obtaining qualifications from the best institutions has long been critical to winning the most-desired jobs. Almost two-thirds of South Koreans between 25 and 34 years old have college degrees, the highest ratio in the world, according to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development.

The need to gain a competitive edge has pushed South Koreans abroad. For several years, South Koreans were the largest foreign student group at U.S. universities, though they are now third behind the Chinese and Indians. About 60 registered SAT prep centers operate in Seoul alone, according to the metropolitan education office.

– The Wall Street Journal
May 9, 2013

Vietnam

Vietnam to Partner with Russia in Building a New World-Class University

The Vietnamese government has said that it will invest US$150 million to create a state-of-the-art university of technology in Hanoi, with Russia as the academic sponsor, according to a recent announcement from the Ministry of Education and Training. This is the latest in a series of partnerships forged with foreign governments aimed at creating world-class universities.

The project will have two steps. In the first phase, from now until 2016, a Russian training institute will be established as a unit of the 47-year-old Le Quy Don Technical University. From 2016, the institution’s name will be changed to the Vietnamese Russian University of Technology.

Russian involvement in the project includes providing textbooks and curricula, granting degrees, sending professors to Vietnam to deliver courses in Russian, and hosting Vietnamese students and faculty on internships and fellowships at top Russian universities.

Under a similar arrangement, the Vietnamese German University was established in 2008 in Ho Chi Minh City, and the University of Science and Technology in Hanoi was created in 2009 in a partnership with the French government. Two other projects are also being negotiated, one in partnership with the Japanese government and the other with the United States. Both the German and French university-partnered projects have gotten off to slow starts, with slower than expected enrollment uptakes.

– University World News
May 4, 2013