NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report

Yojana Sharma

British universities and scientists say a United Kingdom government statement promising to underwrite funding for approved European Union science projects “applied for before the UK leaves the EU” will only partially address concerns that they are being excluded from EU consortia following the British referendum to leave the EU.

Yojana Sharma

Foreign students who received generous scholarships from the Singapore government could be banned from living and working in Singapore if they deliberately default on their ‘bond’ obligations, a senior education ministry official said last week after it was revealed that a number of students were in default.

Kudzai Mashininga

Malawi’s President Peter Mutharika has bowed to pressure and slashed university fees following nationwide student protests that began last month and resulted in the arrest of more than 30 students.

Eugene Vorotnikov

The Russian Ministry of Education and Science has officially denied reports in some Russian media outlets that the national government plans to fire about 10,000 scientists over the next three years, due to lack of funds in the Russian federal budget.

Maina Waruru

Prospective students with smartphones will be soon be able to access and undertake degree programmes from anywhere in the world under an innovative new distance learning initiative offered by a Kenyan private university and a United States company.

Brendan O'Malley

There was little change at the top of the 2016 Academic Ranking of World Universities, or Shanghai ranking, published last week, but China and Singapore both broke into the top 100 for the first time.

Munyaradzi Makoni

Two universities closed in South Africa last week following student protests against possible tuition fee hikes for 2017. Minister of Higher Education and Training Dr Blade Nzimande warned that universities could face financial crisis, retrenchments and operational cuts.

Ranjit Devraj

Indian officials say Australia is treating the country like a "rogue state" by barring its researchers, following the denial of a visa to a top Indian researcher seeking to take up a prestigious scholarship award at the University of Melbourne, ostensibly due to fears his work could be "associated with weapons of mass destruction".

Brendan O'Malley

After study abroad, United Kingdom students gain confidence, develop communication skills and seek to share experience with their peers, to the benefit of their peers and UK institution, new research has found. It concluded that the impact of study abroad is vast, varied and transformative.

Goldie Blumenstyk, The Chronicle of Higher Education

The US Department of Education has chosen four computer coding boot camps and the global conglomerate General Electric to take part in an experiment partly using unaccredited providers to supply higher education but also employing some very unusual quality assurance providers to measure quality.

COMMENTARY

John Kelly

Global rankings put too much emphasis on research and are undermining universities’ key educational mission.

Anand Kulkarni

While discussion papers around a new higher education policy contain some positive proposals, there is a lack of an overarching vision to address fundamental problems within the system.

Ka Ho Mok and Jin Jiang

A new governance system is needed to address concerns that massification of higher education is leading to a growing divide between rich and poor rather than the contrary.

WORLD BLOG

Grace Karram Stephenson

The influx of foreign private higher education providers is creating a new divide, where wealthy minority groups gravitate towards institutions that are linked closely to the business sector, reinforcing their position of relative wealth.

FEATURES

Brendan O'Malley

The growth of private higher education provision, especially via for-profit providers, requires better regulation to reduce the “often considerable” risk to students, according to a six-country study. It warns that there is little evidence that opening up higher education to more private providers, as proposed in the United Kingdom, will improve the quality of provision.

Jan Petter Myklebust

The factors behind Denmark's position as a leading producer of high-class scientific research are discussed in a report and conference comparing data from Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden, with the warning that future success cannot be guaranteed without recruitment of new talent, continuing international collaboration and maintaining an innovative research culture.

Unsoo Jung

Some 1,600 policemen gathered on the Ewha Womans University campus in Seoul in late July, some of them forcing past protesting students to escort four professors and a staff member out of the main hall where they had been trapped for almost 46 hours due to a student sit-in over plans to offer two-year degrees in new media, health, beauty and fashion in return for government financial aid.

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WORLD ROUND-UP

Turkey’s Higher Education Board has suspended a total of 5,342 personnel from state and private universities over the probe into the 15 July failed coup attempt, believed to have been masterminded by the Fethullahist Terrorist Organization, reports Hurriyet Daily News.

The Centers for Disease Control has decided to slap a fine of NT$1 million (US$31,800) on National Defense University for forcing an HIV-positive student out of university in 2013, reports Focus Taiwan.

Amid concerns over the Brexit vote and reports that the new United Kingdom Prime Minister Theresa May is set to make student visa norms even more strict, it is no surprise that Indian students are looking at other options when planning overseas education, reports The Economic Times.

BRICS will be unable to launch its showpiece network university in 2016 as foundational issues are yet to be resolved, writes Kallol Bhattacherjee for The Hindu.

The vice-chancellor of the University of Sydney says it is “immoral” that Australia relies on high-fee paying international students from poor families to prop up a broken funding system, writes Harry Pearl for the Daily Mail.

Dr Lee Adam, education research fellow at the University of Otago, finds that universities might need to consider their plagiarism policies and how they might “influence or confuse students in counterproductive ways”, writes John Elmes for Times Higher Education.

The recently inaugurated University of Rojava in Syria’s northeastern Qamishli city called on qualified academics to join its staff in order to help in accomplishing its ambitions as the first university in Syria’s Kurdish region, reports ARA News.

Controversial new proposals to increase the powers and influence of faculty deans at the University of Hong Kong in the hiring of academics have been watered down, but still keep power in the hands of top management, writes Danny Lee for South China Morning Post.

The Ministry of Education and Training has set itself an ambitious goal of making English the second language at universities across Vietnam, reports VietnamNet Bridge.

A strong push towards becoming more ‘international’ is drawing more Malaysian students to enrol in Taiwanese universities, writes Rebecca Rajaendram for The Star.

While Brazil counts the cost of hosting the Olympic Games, the country is shutting its biggest universities due to a lack of funds, reports ABC Net.

Earning a college degree can be a pathway to higher wages and better employment opportunities, but for those who fail to graduate, those prospects quickly fade. And at a time when a majority of students finance their education with loans, dropping out comes with greater risks, writes Danielle Douglas-Gabriel for The Washington Post.

Half of young people who say they are likely to go to university are worried about the cost of higher education, according to a recent poll published by the Sutton Trust educational charity, writes Sally Weale for the Guardian.

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