9 February 2020  Issue No: 584

A well-known academic in China has this week criticised the government’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak, adding to emerging criticism by academics, medical personnel and netizens that could herald a new strand of political dissent with the potential to outlast the current emergency.

The economic and social foundation of higher education is being eroded by a sense that it has not delivered on meritocracy and social mobility and is losing its grip on assessment, an OECD expert warned higher education quality assurance officials last week.

In a world of disruption and unpredictability, and given the United States’ falling market share of international students amid continually rising competition from other destination countries, international deans and recruiters at American universities should be open to new ways of doing things.

What are the geographies of internationalisation? Who do we think of when we say ‘international student’? How does this affect how we teach? There are many examples of how internationalisation is embedded in and increases global inequalities and these should be critically examined.

Twenty-six-year-old Marceline Gato became visually impaired when she was seven and was unable to attend mainsteam schools. Today, she is a third-year journalism student at the University of Rwanda, where students with disabilities are supported in line with the national inclusive education policy, but resources remain limited.