Last week, the Dutch Volkskrant reported on an interesting study on the distribution of research funding by the Netherlands Research Council (NWO). Loet Leydesdorff (one of the researchers that introduced the Triple Helix concept) and Peter van den Besselaar – both of the Amsterdam School of Communications Research of the University of Amsterdam – conducted a study on the grant allocation decisions of the Netherlands Research Council in the Humanities and Social Sciences in the Netherlands.

Besselaar and Leydesdorff tested whether the grant decisions correlate with the past performances of the applicants in terms of publications and citations, and with the results of the peer review process organized by the Netherlands Research Council

In their paper they show that the Council is successful in distinguishing grant applicants with above-average performance from those with below-average performance, but within the former group no correlation could be found between past performance and receiving a grant. When comparing the best performing researchers who were denied funding with the group of researchers who received it, the rejected researchers significantly outperformed the funded ones. Within the top half of the distribution, neither the review outcomes nor past performance measures correlate positively with the decisions of the Council.

The authors conclude with some questions for further research. They suggest a network analysis of applicants, reviewers, committee members, and Council board members. This might provide an answer to the question whether funding is correlated to the visibility of the applicants within these networks. After all, in the social process of granting proposals many processes play a role, apart from scholarly quality: bias, old-boys’ networks and other types of social networks, bureaucratic competencies, dominant paradigms, etc., all play an important role in selection processes.

If my reading of the paper is correct, it might also point to a discrepancy between the grant decision makers and the international academic community. If we consider that metrics (past performance) and peer review very much emerge in international networks and the grant distributors make decisions contradicting the metrics and peer review, what does that tell about the Council members’ involvement in these international networks?

The paper will be published later this year in the journal Research Evaluation.

Filed in: Competition, Netherlands, Science, Social Science | Comment »

What if I graduated from Amherst College or the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, I was not a European citizen and I would like to pursue a career in the Netherlands? Well, the Dutch government would say I was not educated sufficiently to enter the Netherlands. You might ask yourself why? Isn’t the ENS de Lyon a good school? Actually it is, according to its 72nd place in the 2006 THES rankings.

No, it’s not that ENS Lyon is a lousy university. It’s just that they ended up on rank number 157 of the Times Higher Education Ranking in 2007. And – as I feared before – nowadays in the Netherlands this means that you are not qualified as a skilled migrant. As is stated in the new immigration policy – entered into force this year – only some knowledge workers are eligible to enter the Netherlands:

From abroad, immigrants are only eligible if they graduated from a university in the top 150 of the two recognised university rankings, the league tables published in 2007 by the ‘Times Higher Education Supplement‘ and the ‘Jiao Tong Shanghai University’.

You might argue that ENS Lyon improved its ranking to 140 in 2008. But no…, the Dutch government uses the 2007 league tables. Period!

Or what if I had graduated from some of the world’s best liberal arts colleges? From Amherst, Williams, Swarthmore, Wellesley?

Not good enough…

And what if I had graduated from the University of Hokkaido (Japan)? The University of Notre Dame (USA)? Shanghai Jiao Tong University (China)? Universität Stuttgart (Germany)? University of Calgary (Canada)? Macquarie University (Australia)? Helsinki University of Technology (Finland)? RWTH Aachen (Germany)? University of Surrey (UK)? University of Barcelona (Spain)? Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden)? ….Bergen, Ottawa, Frankfurt, Brussels, Stockholm, Coimbra, Delaware?

No…not good enough…

Filed in: Higher Education, Netherlands, Ranking | 1 Comment »

The OECD recently published a very interesting report on skilled migration and the diffusion of knowledge: The Global Competition for Talent: Mobility of the Highly Skilled. This publication can be seen as a follow-up of the 2002 report International Mobility of the Highly Skilled. Here’s a short summary of the summary:

“International mobility of human resources in science and technology is of growing importance and can have important impacts on knowledge creation and diffusion in both receiving and sending countries indicating that it is not necessarily a zero-sum game.

Receiving countries benefit from a variety of positive effects related to knowledge flows and R&D. But sending countries can also experience positive effects. Much of the literature on highly skilled emigration focuses on remittances and brain drain but emigration of skilled workers can also spur human capital accumulation in the sending country. Brain circulation stimulates knowledge flows and builds links between locations. Diaspora networks can function as a conduit in these migration flows so that all countries can benefit.

Most OECD countries are net beneficiaries of highly skilled migration but there are significant variations. Students are increasingly mobile as well and often leads to skilled migration, both short and long term migration. Some evidence suggests that immigrant HRST (Human Resources in Science and Technology) contribute strongly to innovation.”

Skilled migration is an increasingly important rationale for the higher education internationalisation policies of national governments (and of the European Union as well). In this global competition for talent, Australia and Canada have  actively linked the recruitment of foreign students to their skilled migration policies. This approach is also increasingly chosen by European countries. Particularly in the science and technology related fields, skill shortages are becoming apparent and the benefits of (cultural) diversity for innovation are recognised.

And if you need a highly skilled and diverse body of professionals, why not start with foreign students? At Nuffic we recently published an appeal for an increased attention for internationalisation. In this appeal, the skilled migration approach is clearly apparent (see here for the Dutch booklet, or here for the English translation). Obviously, we are of the opinion that such policies should not come at the expense of developing countries…

The new OECD report shows again that such policies can create benefits for both the sending and receiving countries. This goes in  particular for emerging economies where the opportunities for brain circulation are present. Other studies – like this world bank report – show that it are the least developed countries that suffer most from the brain drain because brain circulation does not occur in these countries. Here, skilled migration policies should be accompanied by compensating and mitigating policies for the sending countries (see this CGD publication for some ideas on this issue).

Filed in: Higher Education, Internationalisation, Mobility, Netherlands, World | 1 Comment »

Just before going to a meeting on rankings I saw this. It is from the proposed new immigration policy: Blueprint for a modern migration policy (pdf; in Dutch). As in so many other immigration countries, it contains a chapter on skilled migration. Here is a translation of the passage that surprised me:

Anticipating the implementation of the new migration system, the government will at the latest in the first half of 2009 introduce a regulation for highly skilled immigrants. On the basis of the regulation, foreigners can stay in the country for a maximum of one year to find a job as a ‘knowledge migrant’ or to start an innovative company.

The objective of the regulation connects well to the ambition of the innovation platform to attract 1000 extra knowledge migrants. It is also in line with the advice on knowledge migrants of the Commission on Labour Participation in its report ‘towards a future that works‘.

The target group consists of foreigners that are relatively young and received their Bachelor, Master or PhD degree not longer than three years ago. Migrants are eligible if they received their degree from a university that is in the top 150 of two international league tables of universities. Because of the overlap, the lists consists of 189 universities…

And guess what the two league tables are. Yes, the Shanghai ranking and the Times Higher Education Ranking. Now…this will mean that firms like this have influence on who is eligible to come and work in the Netherlands. Something is not right here…

Filed in: Globalisation, Higher Education, Netherlands, Ranking | 3 Comments »

In the Dutch weekly journal ESB (Economic and Statistical Reports), economists from the universities of Groningen and Rotterdam presented an interesting article. Their starting assumption is that high student evaluations will have a positive effect on the market share of universities. After all, if a programme in a particular university is highly ranked by students, more students will chose this particular university to attend that programme.

The authors collected six year of student evaluations where students rate their programmes on a scale of 1-10  (as published annually in the Dutch weekly magazine Elsevier). Market share for each programme/university combination was calculated by dividing the number of students in programme X in university Y by all students in the Netherlands in programme X. When the evaluation of the programme is compared with the market share, we get the following graph:

On the basis of this finding (and the results of a simulation that they run), they present some interesting conclusions. I won’t go in details, but one of them is that there is no clear relation between evaluation and market share. Hence, students have other criteria than quality in the choice of where they will attend university (especially location, and in particular the distance to their place of residence).

In their discussion, the authors indicate that this shows that competition on the basis of quality is not really taking place in the Netherlands. One reaction could be that the government should enable universities to compete on the basis of price. In other words, universities should be able to set their own tuition fees. This is currently not allowed for Dutch and EU students and the government decided last week that this will not be possible in the near future.

I could pose an alternative hypothesis on the interpretation of the results. The results show that students don’t take quality of education into account in their decision-making process. This could indicate that students don’t purchase a service (a high quality education), but a product (a degree). Universities should therefore emphasise the quality of their degrees, not the quality of their education. If the value of the degree differs per university (reflected in the opportunities to enter the labour market in higher positions or on a higher remuneration), the students will take this into account. This then would mean that universities are better of improving their position in rankings, attracting more prestigious scholars (like Nobel laureates) and increase their budget for marketing. This will bring them a in a better competitive position. On the other hand… maybe economics doesn’t provide answers for everything…

Erjen van Nierop, Peter Verhoef, Philip Hans Franses. Studie Evaluaties en marktaandelen van universiteiten (subscription required). Economisch Statistische Berichten, 4 April 2008.

Filed in: Competition, Higher Education, Netherlands | 1 Comment »

Some more interesting news from the Netherlands. According to an article in Dutch newspaper the Volkskrant, new teachers at Dutch universities will need to get a teaching certificate. All universities will require starting assistant professors/lecturers to get such a certificate within a few years from the start of their position. At one university – that already used a similar system – early career academics spend around 260 hours for the teacher training.

I’m happy with the attention given to teaching, especially because of the current over-emphasis on research (because it is easily quantifiable and internationally comparable). But 260 hours…? Two or three weeks would be enough, I would think. I already heard one Dutch academic on radio expressing fears for ‘the terrorism of educationalists’…

But what I am most surprised about is the fact that the training is meant for those that will start an assistant professorship or lecturer position. I am sure that this will be a major distraction for early career academics. Considering that a Ph.D. is a normal requirement for this position, why not integrate the training in the Ph.D.? Considering that the Dutch Ph.D. training is predominantly research based (as opposed to course-based), there should be some time to include a couple of weeks of teacher training in that.

And one more question for my readers: do you know of any other countries that require a similar teaching qualification for starting assistant professors or lecturers?

Filed in: Higher Education, Netherlands | 4 Comments »

After 9/11 the number of international students in the US dropped considerably due stricter visa requirements and security regulations. Just now that the US is relaxing the regulations, the Netherlands seems to become more restrictive towards international students, at least those from specific countries.

My former university – the University of Twente – this week announced that they had rejected a number of Iranian students and that they will not be able to process new applications from Iranian students. Is the University of Twente (UT) getting paranoid? No! They are acting according to a United Nations resolution and a following decision by the Dutch Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They had requested universities to give a formal guarantee that the Iranian visa applicants do not have access to certain specific scientific knowledge (read: nuclear knowledge). UT’s president explained:

Students have the right to attend all courses and they should be able to develop freely. We don’t want to exclude students from education and therefore we cannot give the guarantee that the Ministries of Education and Foreign Affairs demand from us. (…) As a university we cannot exclude the possibility that Iranians will be exposed to nuclear knowledge. We can’t control that.

(more…)

Filed in: Higher Education, Internationalisation, Netherlands, Politics, Science | 3 Comments »

It’s that time of the year again. Looking back upon the things that happened and thinking about the things to come. Sydney is busy preparing for the new year’s eve celebrations and so am I. But at the same time I’m thinking about the changes that are going to come in 2008.

And there will be some important ones. First of all, I’ll be moving back to the Netherlands. After three years, my fellowship at the University of Sydney is coming to an end and so is my stay in wonderful Sydney. As from March this year, I will call The Hague my new home. And another major change for 2008 is me leaving academia. After working in universities for almost 10 years, it’s time for a change. But more about that later. For now, I wish all readers a great new year’s eve and all the best for 2008!!!

Filed in: Australia, Netherlands | 6 Comments »

Dutch newspaper the ‘Volkskrant’ has published its annual list of the 200 most influential Dutch people. The list portrays the Dutch ‘old boys network’ that rules the Netherlands through its interpersonal networks and interlocking boards and directorates. Clearly, the strength of weak ties at work; but how are these ties connected to the Dutch universities?

Topping the list this year was Alexander Rinnooy Kan, Chairman of the Social and Economic Council of the Netherlands (SER). His current profile lists chairmanships/memberships of a wide variety of boards and councils, ranging from multinationals to business schools and from museums to hospitals.

The list is assembled according to a network analysis by the Erasmus University in Rotterdam and uses a database of over 8,000 persons. The ranking is based on more than 5000 positions in 1098 bodies in 518 organisations in various sectors. The Queen, Dutch Ministers and Members of Parliament are excluded from the list. For a further explanation of the methodology, have a look here (in Dutch).

I decided to have a closer look at the top 100 and their connections to the Dutch higher education landscape. If we first have a look at the Alma Maters of these powerful individuals, the graph below shows that Leiden University (the oldest university in the Netherlands) has awarded the most degrees to the list. 19 out of 100 attended Leiden University. Interesting detail is that 15 of them studied Law in Leiden (making this club the low countries’ equivalent of the Skull & Bones??).

(more…)

Filed in: Higher Education, Netherlands, Politics, Ranking | 1 Comment »

While the rest of the world is concerned with petty issues like the quality of education, access to education, excellence in education, etc, some enlightened patriots with a judaeo-christian heritage xenophobic Dutch Members of Parliament see to it that their Ministry of Education deals with the questions that really matter. Here’s a translation of the formal letter to the deputy minister of education [pdf]:

Questions of Members Wilders and Bosma for the Deputy Minister of Education, Culture and Sciences, Mrs. Bijsterveldt-Vliegenthart about Halal-meals during a school outing of an ROC (ROC stands for Regional Vociational Schools):

1. Are you aware that students of the ROC Amsterdam were only served halal meat during their school outing and that this is confirmed by the ROC?
2. Do you share the opinion that halal meat should not be a main component of a meal at a school outing of a Dutch school?
3. Do you share the opinion that the muslims at our schools should adapt to the Dutch norms and values and not the other way around? If not, why not?
4. Who will be responsible for the additional costs of the (more expensive) halal meat?
5. What do you plan to do in order to prevent students from being forced into a halal barbecue?
6. How will you deal with the ROC Amsterdam?

For people who think this is a joke: unfortunately IT’S NOT! This is apparently what really matters in Dutch education, according to Geert Wilders and his disciples.

Let’s raise the dikes, close the gates, shut down the kebab joints, pizzerias and noodlehouses and enjoy the brussels sprouts and meatbals!

Filed in: Culture, Netherlands, Politics | Comment »

Not many blog posts these days…and that won’t change too much in the next few weeks. I’m working hard to finish two papers for two conferences next month in Austria and Ireland. Before the conferences, I’ll be in the Netherlands for a few weeks.

And talking about the Netherlands… During my frequent short term writer’s blocks I stumbled upon this video called “Sex, Drugs and Democracy”, a documentary about the liberal nature of Dutch society. At least…. the way it was in 1994. It starts with the usual stuff. By now, everyone probably heard about the sex and the drug policies in the Netherlands, so skip that.

A small part – related to society and politics – is actually quite interesting. When I watched the part I thought I was watching a video from the 1980s. And that was not only because of the hairdo (I did know our hair in the eighties was rather ridiculous, but apparently the same goes for the nineties). This part of the documentary illustrates how a society can change in just over 10 years. I’m sure that the movie is rather one-sided even for that time. But still, it’s been a long time since I have seen Dutch people being so proud about:

(more…)

Filed in: Culture, Netherlands, Politics | Comment »

The outcome of the battle for ABN Amro between the Royal Bank of Scotland Group and Barclays will not just affect the banking sector but also have an impact on Dutch higher education. The Volkskrant reports this morning that Barclays wants to invest 20 Million Euros in the Facult of Economics of the University of Amsterdam. The university can use the money to attract top professors in order to improve the quality of its education and research. In return, the faculty will change the name of ‘part of its faculty’ into the Barclays Financial Centre. This will be announced by the university later today.

This is quite a unique development in the Netherlands. It might be getting slightly more common to name chairs or buildings after their sponsors, but a whole department or center… I am sure it will cause some protests and resistance from students and academics. I am particularly interested in the reaction of the academic staff in the faculty.

I wouldn’t mind too much if someone gave my department 20 million euros, as long as the deal included the necessary clauses on academic independence. I would suggest another name though, something more…academic. This way it sounds more like a branch of Barclays than a center of the University of Amsterdam. Why can’t they just call it something like the Barclays School of Finance?

UPDATE: (more…)

Filed in: Economics, Higher Education, Netherlands | Comment »

In both the Netherlands and Australia the salaries of the top university leaders lead to controversy. The Australian reports that all but one of the leaders of Australia’s Group of 8 Universities earn more than 600,000 Australian Dollars (378,000 Euros). Top earner was John Hay of the University of Queensland with 655,000 Euros. But the Australian found even higher figures for La Trobe University where someone (probably the former VC) received over 930,000 Euros!

In the Netherlands, the salaries and bonuses in the public sector are a hot issue as well. Many claim that the Prime Minister’s salary should be the norm for others in the public sector. In the Netherlands that is a mere 171,000 Euros (John Howard’s salary was recently increased to 208,000 Euros). But most university leaders in the Netherlands make significantly more than that.

The new Dutch Minister for Education this week showed his discontent about the managerialism in education and the accompanying rise in salaries. He observes that most of them enjoyed enormous salary increases when they came into their current positions. And I am sure he is right about that (although that is not the case for all of them). One of the most visible cases has been the one in my own Alma Mater. Their top level managers were given a 31% salary increase, which sparked a reaction of the Minister claiming that this was ‘unbelievable’. This increase brought the salary of the Chairman of the Executive Board (more or less the CEO of the University) to 171,000 Euros. In comparison, the lowest earning VC in Australia, David Battersby of the University of Balarat (poor guy), earned over 200,000 Euros!

So how do the Dutch university CEOs compare with the Australian Vice-Chancellors? Basically, compared to Australia, the Dutch salaries are still very modest. Here is the list of the top 6 for both countries: (more…)

Filed in: Australia, Competition, Higher Education, Netherlands | 3 Comments »

Two days ago I had a post on the Dutch report Excellence for Productivity of the Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis. A good study that deserved some more attention. I wrote a Dutch article on the outcomes of the report for ScienceGuide:

Adriaan Hofman van de RuG presenteerde recent nog een pleidooi voor meer evidence based discussies in het onderwijs. In dit licht, moet het onderzoek ‘Excellence and Productivity’ verwelkomd worden door belanghebbenden en belangstellenden in het Nederlandse onderwijs. Terwijl vaak maar aangenomen wordt dat excellentie bijdraagt aan economische groei en dat in Nederland het ‘niet-boven-het-maaiveld’ syndroom de ontwikkeling van talent in de weg staat, is het goed dat deze assumpties kritisch onder de loep worden genomen door het CPB. Kort samengevat laat het onderzoek zien dat ‘top skills’ belangrijk zijn voor productiviteit en dat Nederland gemiddeld gezien zeer goed scoort op skills maar dat het toplaagje het relatief slecht doet. Met andere woorden: we hebben relatief slimme domme leerlingen en relatief domme slimme leerlingen. Daarover later meer; eerst even de media aandacht.

Ten eerste werd mij al snel duidelijk dat ook ‘evidence’ niet altijd tot de juiste discussies leidt. In de media leek het of het hoger onderwijs hier ter discussie stond. Een paar voorbeelden. De Volkskrant: “niet het vmbo is het probleem van het Nederlandse onderwijs, maar de universiteiten en hogescholen“; Nederlands Dagblad: “op de universiteiten in Nederland is middelmatigheid troef“; en dan Elsevier: “ als het hoger onderwijs geen ruimte schept voor toptalent, dan wordt Nederland een tweederangs natie“. Nou nou…

Wat is echter het geval? (more…)

Filed in: Higher Education, Netherlands | Comment »

The Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis (CPB) published an interesting study yesterday. The report – Excellence for Productivity? – investigates the position of the Netherlands vis-a-vis other OECD countries in terms of their skill distribution.

The findings in short:

• The Dutch perform very well on average
• The ‘not so bright’ Dutch students are smart compared to their ‘not so bright’ counterparts in other countries.
• The smartest students in the Netherlands (the top (99th) percentile) are less brilliant than their brilliant counterparts in other OECD countries.

The findings mainly refer to pre-tertiary education. According to the CPB, the findings indicate that there is scope for improvement of skills at the right-hand side (the ‘smart side’) of the distribution. Therefore, policies that raise the Dutch performance at high- and top skill levels may improve Dutch productivity.

The (problematic?) balance between egalitarianism and excellence has been an issue in Dutch politics for the past years. And history shows that shifting the balance is easier planned than done, also in higher education. Measures like the selective admission of students or differentiation in student fees have not (yet) had the desired effects. However, various initiatives are being experimented with such as honours programmes and ‘elite’ colleges. Elitism isn’t really a Dutch thing, I guess… Or is it?

Filed in: Higher Education, Netherlands | Comment »