Today and tomorrow, the anniversary of the Bologna Process is celebrated. Actually…it is celebrated by most and protested against by some. A consortium of CHEPS, INCHER and ECOTEC was given the task to prepare an independent assessment of the Bologna process. The study was conducted together with experts from the University of Bath, the Bayerisches Staatsinstitut für Hochschulforschung and NUFFIC (i.c. myself). Below is Don Westerheijden (CHEPS) presenting the part of the assessment I’ve been working on: recognition and mobility.

The report is published by the European Commission and can be found here (pdf). Today’s programme was in Budapest; tomorrow, the rest of the programme is brought to you from Vienna. Watch the live stream here.

Filed in: Europe, Higher Education, Internationalisation, Mobility, Politics | Comment »

The last edition of the Economist in 2008 included an interesting article on the growth of international education. International education has witnessed an enormous growth in the past decade, a growth that comes with risks and benefits for both developed and developing countries.

The 20th century saw a surge in higher education; in the early 21st century, the idea of going abroad to study has become thinkable for ordinary students. In 2006, the most recent year for which figures are available, nearly 3m were enrolled in higher education institutions outside their own countries, a rise of more than 50% since 2000.

The article emphasises the risks of international education, illustrated by the examples of Australia and the UK as receiving countries (the risks of over-commercialisation) and China as one of the main sending countries (the risks of brain drain). But fortunately, the benefits of international education education are not neglected. Read the rest of the article here.

Filed in: Higher Education, Internationalisation, Mobility, World | 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 »

Last week, at Global HigherEd, Peter Jones reported on a forthcoming European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling in the case of Jacqueline Förster v IB-Groep. This is one of a range of recent cases handled by the ECJ that might have substantial effects for higher education policies throughout Europe.

In a forthcoming paper for the European Journal of Education I identified the ECJ as one of the main actors in the institutionalisation of the European Higher Education Area. In earlier posts in this blog I discussed recent cases on the German medicine students in Austria and French students in Belgium. In both cases, the principle of non-discrimination plays an important role. The same was the case for the Grzelczyk Case and the Bidar Case, which can be seen as a predecessor of the Förster case.

The Grzelczyk judgment suggests that EU students are entitled to claim maintenance grants when they find themselves in the same situation as nationals of the host Member State. Before the Maastricht Treaty, the Court refused the right to obtain loans and grants while studying in another member state. The Bidar Case changed this. Here, the Court argues that it is legitimate for a host Member State to grant such assistance to students who have demonstrated a certain degree of integration into the society of that State (although the Court made clear that Member States have a right to protect themselves against ‘grant-tourism’).

This ‘certain degree of integration’ is now being tested in the Förster Case. German student Jaqueline Förster went to the Netherlands to study in 2000. She did the minimum number of hours of work in order to be eligible for the Dutch student support. This amount of work apparently provided a substantial enough degree of integration. The Dutch scholarship board initially granted the student aid to her but asked for a partial refund in 2005 because Förster had not worked in the second half of 2003. She took the case to court saying the move was discriminatory as Dutch students do not have to work (see also this article in EU Observer).

An additional issue came up in the Netherlands after Nuffic presented its annual mobility monitor. This showed that the outgoing number of students was lower for the Netherlands than the incoming students and that the largest source of incoming students was Germany. While at least 16,750 German students were enrolled in the Netherlands, only 2,100 Dutch students were enrolled in Germany. A few days later, the ‘Dutch equivalent of the Financial Times’ carried a headline saying that German students cost the Dutch government at least one hundred million Euros. Reason for this is of course the fact that – because of the non-discrimination principle – EU universities can not charge higher tuition fees for foreign EU students than they charge for their own students. Considering Dutch higher education is still heavily subsidised by the government, German students are indeed partially funded by Dutch tax payers money.

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

During my years in Sydney, the issue of language skills and foreign students has come up repeatedly. The claim was that the financial reliance on foreign students had forced Australian higher education to accept students that lack even the basic English language and communication skills.

Most critical on this issue is probably Bob Birrell, Director of the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University in Melbourne. Last year he published a study finding that one in three overseas students which were granted permanent residency after graduating from an Australian university does not have good enough English to handle a professional job.

An analysis of government visa testing, the first of its kind, found 34 per cent of 12,116 graduating international students who received permanent residency in 2005-06 did not have the English standard needed to be admitted to university, let alone to be awarded a degree. For students from China, the fastest growing international student market for Australian universities, the proportion with poor English leapt to 43 per cent.

The question is of course: how did they get into an Australian university anyway? And even more: how did they ever get a degree? With respect to the second question, Birrell claims that universities dealt with the poor English language skills of their students by lowering teaching and assessment standards. On the question of how they get in, Birrell has another explanation.

Applicants for a higher-education student visa must score at band-six level, rated as “competent”, under the International English Language Testing System, if based overseas when they apply. But international applicants can avoid the testing by basing themselves in Australia earlier to complete either year 12 or an intensive language course. Dr Birrell found that about 40 per cent of overseas students followed this path.

Professor Peter Abelson – a visiting scholar at the University of Sydney at that time – summarised the issue correctly:

“These figures are a very stunning result, but not entirely surprising to people who are in tertiary education.”

Former Minister of Education, Julie Bishop, and former president of the Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee Gerard Sutton basically denied the problems. Sutton didn’t accept that there is a problem in universities in terms of soft marking of international students. Julie Bishop rejected claims that a large number of foreign students graduating from Australian universities have poor English skills:

“Australian universities only enroll foreign students once they have achieved international standards of language proficiency. This has been an extraordinary attack by Professor Birrell on our universities. International students must meet international benchmarks in English language in order to get a place at a university in Australia.”

The denial of the problem is astonishing. Yes of course, there is a lot of money involved and the stakes in international education are high. If the international student market would plummet, so would much of the Australian higher education sector. But denying the problem while more and more foreign graduates fail in their job search because of their language skills, does obviously not help in the long run.

And now the debate has moved up north…

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Filed in: Australia, Higher Education, Internationalisation, UK | 2 Comments »

As you might know, I changed countries and positions in the last month, hence my lack of posts (now and probably in the very near future). As some of you might know, I left academia to work at the Nuffic, the Netherlands Organisation for International Cooperation in Higher Education. This week I started in the department of studies of their Knowledge and Innovation Directorate. One issue I’m currently looking at is the way foreign students choose their preferred study destinations. Market research organisation i-Graduate seems to have found all my answers already… or hasn’t it?

The Guardian reports on a study that looks at what motivates international students to study abroad and what influences their choice of study. I haven’t seen the study and I can’t link to it because it is not available on their website, but looking at the article of the Guardian, it seems to be a case of over-simplification and over-generalisation. According to i-Graduate, the international student population can be divided into five tribes:

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Filed in: Higher Education, Internationalisation, UK, World | 2 Comments »

I’m not sure whether this is a bad thing for education or for tourism. The Australian reports that education has replaced tourism as Australia’s biggest services export and has become the country’s third top export overall, increasing by 21 per cent in 2007 to AUD 12.5 billion. The Australian Bureau of Statistics released figures that show that revenue generated by foreign students in this country overtook tourism and was just behind coal and iron ore. I remember that – when I became interested in international education about eight years ago – Australians used to say that it was the fifth or sixth biggest export, up there between lamb and wool.

When you read the words of Tony Pollock, chief executive of IDP Education, you wonder when Australia will start using the slogan of its tourism campaign in promoting higher education. Pollock states in the Australian:

“Education is a bigger drawcard for visitors to Australia than Uluru, the Great Barrier Reef and all other tourist attractions put together. Nearly half a million people are living in Australia who would not be here if we stopped educating international students.”

I am getting rather skeptical about all these ‘successes’ of the Australian international (higher) education industry. I guess there’s a saturation point even in the education sector, and Australian education is close to reaching that point. And at some institutions that point was already crossed quite some time ago. Have a look for instance at this Australian documentary with the title that says it all: The Degree Factories.

Filed in: Australia, Higher Education, Internationalisation | 1 Comment »

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.

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

What defines a global ‘superpower’? In the past, it was the size of national armies or possession of nuclear weapons. But now there is a more important (and peaceful) benchmark: the size and prestige of university systems. And, while the US is still the global higher education ‘superpower’, China will soon be knocking it off top spot if current trends continue.

…a dramatic insight into just how rapidly China is moving in the higher education race… anything anyone in the West can easily imagine… a wake-up call to universities and governments around the world…The UK is in danger of slipping back…

So states a report of BBC news, with the alarming title China’s bid for world domination. A bit over the top if you ask me. The rise of India and China as doom scenarios for the future competitiveness of developed nations: an image frequently used by current university leaders to appeal to their national governments and ask for additional funding. And by the media to spice up a story.

That being said… the BBC report is based on presentations of a recent conference of the Worldwide Universities Network, a partnership of 17 research-led universities from Europe, North America, China and Australia. In my view, it’s one of the most active networks of its kind, with many activities in the field of research cooperation, research mobility, e-learning and the organisation of virtual seminars and many other events.

Also in the field of higher education there has been quite some cooperation. There have been initiatives like ‘Constructing Knowledge Spaces’, concerned with researching and theorising the globalisation of education, the ‘Ideas & Universities‘ project and the ‘Network Horizons Virtual Seminar Series‘ of 2006. Cooperation between Wisconsin and Bristol has even led to a new addition to the higher education blogosphere.

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Filed in: Globalisation, Higher Education, Internationalisation, World | Comment »

The UNSW debacle in Singapore and the exit of Johns Hopkins last year, have dealt a serious blow to the Global Schoolhouse strategy of the Singapore government. Singapore’s neighbor Malaysia announced a similar strategy last year. With this strategy, Malaysia becomes one of the most interesting examples of the way that higher education is globalizing nowadays. A major exporter as well as importer of higher education, with foreign universities within its borders and Malay universities establishing branches outside Malaysia.

First of all, Malaysia has long been sending many of their students and university staff abroad, especially for postgraduate studies, because their own system could not absorb the increase of students in the last decades. In addition, the racial quota for public universities to enroll Malay forced a lot of students from Chinese and Indian backgrounds to pursue their higher education abroad. The last decade has seen a sharp rise in private universities and colleges that have been able to absorb many of these students and the Malay that were not accepted in the public sector. Despite this, the flow of Malaysian students abroad – especially to the English speaking countries – has remained substantial (see table).

Malaysian students abroad 1999-2004

In addition to sending students abroad to pursue their education, the Malaysian government has also admitted higher education institutions into Malaysia in order to meet the increasing demand of higher education in the country. The establishment of such branch campuses has to fulfill a wide range of legal requirement (on ownership issues, but also on the content of education), but this has not kept universities from establishing these branches. The best known examples are Monash University, Curtin and Swinburne from Australia and Nottingham University from the UK. Although these partnerships were usually based on so-called sandwich programmes (where part was done in the home country of the university), they now also offer full degrees in Malaysia.

But in recent years, both the flows of students as well as the flows of institutions are no longer one way but now go both ways. Although public universities in Malaysia do not undertake activities abroad – and probably they are not allowed to – the private ones seem to become more and more active. You can now actually obtain a Malaysian degree in London, offered by the Lim Kok Wing University, well known in Malaysia for its IT and Design programmes. And this university is not just a little office somewhere in London but is established in a beautiful old English building. But Lim Kok Wing did not stop in London. It’s also the first Asian university to establish a branch campus in Africa, in Botswana to be precise. Recently, other education institutions are following and are also expanding abroad.

And now the Malaysian government wants to make Malaysia a true education hub for the region, more or less like its southern neighbor. The Ministry of Higher Education has set a target of 100,000 students for 2010. Growth will probably mainly be sought in the region and in the Middle East. Together with Singapore, Malaysia probably offers the best quality higher education in Southeast Asia, although Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia are catching up. Due to language (and cultural/religious) issues, Malaysia is popular for Indonesian students, especially for those that cannot get into the local public universities in Indonesia and cannot afford the top private ones or higher education abroad. For Chinese students Malaysia might be popular because of the widespread Chinese influences in Malay society, more apparent though in the private institutions than in the public ones. More recently, especially after 9-11, Malaysia has also become a popular destination for Middle Eastern students. Yesterday, the Star reported on an agreement between Higher Education Minister Datuk Mustapa Mohamed and his Saudi counterpart Dr Khaled Mohamed Al-Anqari on sending the Saudi students to Malaysian universities(*). In addition to the Middle East, students coming from Africa (especially Libya, Sudan and Kenya) are also on the rise (see table; click to enlarge).

Foreign Students in Malaysia 1999-2003

To reach the goal of 100,000 international students, the government will need to double the intake of foreign students. There are obviously pros and cons to a strategy like this. For many, a first reaction would be to ask why a government wants to increase the number of international students if it barely has the capacity to meet the demand of its own people? On the other hand, it can generate extra financial resources (if the fees for foreign students are profitable) by which the education of the Malaysian population can be supported. Obviously creating more multicultural campus will also have more intangible positive effects. And the quality of education can increase if these foreign students will be of such quality that they will positively influence the academic atmosphere and quality in the universities. And of course there are the economic effects through spending and consumption from the students and through the new jobs that are created for such an expanding higher education sector.

So…should the Singapore case make the Malaysian government nervous? Maybe not yet, but they better keep an eye on the developments in their neighboring city state. Malaysia’s plans are not as ambitious as Singapore’s ‘grand’ strategies and they are less dependent on foreign providers than is the case in Singapore. But I hope they will not become obsessed with the projected number of 100,000, and instead just focus on the overall quality of their higher education. Then the foreign students will follow automatically…

Saudi government officials have been traveling the world for the past months in order to find ‘a conducive environment’ for their students to study. Especially because it was getting harder for them to get visas in the UK and the US. I remember that one of their officials visited Australian campuses as well, in order to ‘ínspect’ the universities here. I have not heard anything about this issue since…maybe the Australian culture was not considered very conducive by these government leaders, that always know best what is good for ‘their’ citizens…

But even Malaysia was not perfect. Saudi female students had specific requirements: “They have to travel with their chaperone who are either their male family members or husbands, so visas can be a problem. Another issue is dressing – some female students want to keep their faces covered.” The Minister said he would look into these issues… Covering the faces is not allowed in Malaysian public universities. And I think universities shouldn’t change their values just to benefit more from the international higher education market. Believe me, I work in Australia, so I should know!

Filed in: Asia, Globalisation, Higher Education, Internationalisation, Malaysia | 1 Comment »

The Fifth Ministerial Conference on the Bologna Process – a bi-annual event where the progress of the Bologna Process is monitored and new actions are decided upon – took place in London last week. This basically means a bombardment of papers, reports and speeches about what’s been going on and what needs to be done, coming from everyone that is somehow related to higher education. All this has culminated in the London Communique (pdf).

I haven’t had the time to go through all the documents yet, but the Communique does’nt seem to hold many surprises (which is not surprising of course for an inter-governmental document set up by over 40 countries). I did however read about an interesting option by Franck Vandenbroucke (in Dutch), Flemish minister of education and host for the Sixth Conference in 2009. He argues that the difference between the late and early adopters of the Bologna principles is too wide and that it is better for the early staters to explore the next frontiers for European cooperation, instead of waiting for the rest to catch up.

Euractiv has an article about the different perspectives on the outcome of the 5th Ministerial Conference. Here’s my interpretation:

The European Union:

We want universities to be liberated from the shackles of state domination (you’ll be better of with us)!

European Students:

It’s all about us so you better take us seriously! Or else…

European Universities:

If you give us more freedom and more money we will give you whatever you want (and pay for)

European Business:

Actually, we have no clue what we want so we’ll just repeat that we want your graduates to be interdisciplinary, process oriented and adaptable problem solvers that can work in teams. You figure it out…

The Brits:

We should all adopt similar standards… preferably the British ones

Filed in: Europe, Higher Education, Internationalisation | Comment »

Robert Birnbaum, professor of higher education at the University of Maryland and author of some very interesting books on higher education (How Colleges Work; Management Fads in Higher Education) has written an interesting (and amusing) article in International Higher Education (the Quarterly of the Center for International Higher Education (CIHE) in Boston College).

Birnbaum is worried about the World Class University ranking crisis. Universities around the world are either proclaiming that they have attained or try to achieve this mythical status. But actually, we have no clue what it means. Philip Altbach, leader of CIHE, has written before on the cost and benefits of the race towards world class:

Everyone wants a world-class university. No country feels it can do without one. The problem is that no one knows what a world-class university is, and no one has figured out how to get one. Everyone, however, refers to the concept. We are in an age of academic hype in which universities of different kinds in diverse countries claim this exalted status-often with little justification.

Birnbaum gives some suggestion on some alternative ways to identify world class universities:

1. The Bentham System – this scheme, based on the 19th century English philosopher Jeremy Bentham’s principle of Utilitarianism, proposes that the best universities are those that bring the greatest happiness to the greatest number.
2. Olympic System – In the Olympic System, teams of university faculty would compete every four years in head to head competitions combining athletic and intellectual prowess to determine their world rankings
3. Borges System – our scholarly task is merely to identify the book of true ratings from among the infinite number of books that contain very similar, but false, ratings which also exist
4. Sausage System – Throw U.S. News, the Gourman Report, the Times Hiigher Education Supplement, and other rankings created by systems of all kinds into the same bowl, add and average out the results and voila! Just as we do not know how a sausage is made (or, more to the point, we don’t want to know) the Sausage System makes it difficult to understand just what has gone into any particular set of ratings.
5. Lake Wobegon System – in Lake Wobegon, you will remember, all the children are above average. This suggests the possibility of significantly expanding the number of institutions that can be ranked as world class merely by increasing the number of institutions in each category.

But he continues on a more serious note. Building on a metaphor by Daniel Dennett, he argues that such World Class Universities can only be built if they are firmly grounded in strong and indigenous educational and social foundations Trying to develop them by using imported rhetoric, imported models and large sums of money is destined to fail:

“Attempting to build World-Class Universities without attending first to the educational and social ground on which such institutions might stand is, as Ivan Illich once said, is “like trying to do urban renewal in New York City from the twelfth story up.” Rather than more World Class Universities, what we really need in countries everywhere are more world-class technical institutes, world-class community colleges, world class colleges of agriculture, world class teachers colleges, and world class regional state universities.”

A similar conclusion was drawn by Altbach. He concluded that as universities around the world seem to be orienting themselves to this single academic ideal, institutions and nations need to assess carefully their needs, resources, and long-term interests before launching into a campaign to build world-class institutions:

“Universities operate in both national and global contexts. The world-class idea falls into the global sphere. It assumes that the university is competing with the best academic institutions in the world and is aspiring to the pinnacle of excellence and recognition. National and even regional realities may differ. They relate to the need of the immediate society and economy and imply responsiveness to local communities. In these contexts, the nature of academic performance and roles may differ from what is expected at institutions competing in the global realm. To label one sphere world class while relegating the others to the nether regions of the academic hierarchy is perhaps inevitable, but nonetheless unfortunate.”

I wholeheartedly agree with both conclusions. Universities are one of the oldest institutions and are clearly embedded in a nations’ cultural, political and social context. This is not just the case for the Oxbridge-like universities, but also for the more recently established universities. However, this should not be a reason to avoid learning from each others experiences or models. Even copying models from other parts of the world does not necessarily lead to failure. It’s just a matter of adaptation. And it is this process of local adaptation that is made difficult by the pressures on universities to adhere to so-called global world class standards.

Filed in: Globalisation, Higher Education, Internationalisation, Ranking, World | Comment »

A cross between ‘University Challenge’ and ‘The Apprentice’. That’s how The Times describes a new TV show in India: Scholar Hunt – Destination UK. In the show, students will compete for full scholarhips to the universities of Leeds, Warwick, Cardiff, Sheffield and Middlesex. They will follow the students going through the exams, interviews and other tests for the scholarships. Each of the British universities will award one scholarship for a 3 year degree worth 45000 Pounds.

“It’s survival of the fittest, but hopefully this will provide someone with a life-changing opportunity. “We’ll be doing things that will be very engaging. The drama — the laughter and the tears — will be a key part of it.”

Filed in: Asia, Europe, Higher Education, Internationalisation | Comment »