18 September 2022  Issue No: 708

Against the views of their Ukrainian counterpart, international science experts at a recent conference raised doubts about the efficacy of blanket sanctions against Russian science and scientists, and argued the need to preserve all knowledge-producing capacity that helps society to address global challenges.

A new masters programme in black public health at Canada’s University of Toronto aims to produce graduates who understand the correlation between anti-black racism/violence and health outcomes, and can actively work towards dismantling the unjust colonial systems that continue to support it.

At the heart of the programme of the upcoming conference of the International Association of Universities, taking place in Ireland in October, is the belief that universities are vital agents of change that have the ability – and moral duty – to shape local and global agendas.

Differences between Eastern and Western teaching and learning norms can cause difficulty for Asian students in dealing with the kind of reading expected at Western institutions, but by incorporating higher-order learning strategies into daily practice students can enhance critical reading skills and improve efficiency.

A new framework showing how micro-credentials can fit into the European Higher Education Area shows that the Bologna tools are applicable to micro-credentials, and can give a boost to their full implementation, for example, regarding recognition of prior learning and a learner-centred approach.

African universities must resist the blandishments of short-sighted politicians, wealthy donors and the advocates of radical change in higher education if they are to deliver on their core mandate of supporting local and national development, according to higher education researcher Nelson Masanche Nkhoma.

Higher education institutions are conduits through which reparative futures can be cultivated by enabling people to increase their personal agency and by creating an educated citizenry better equipped to forge viable solutions to social and economic problems and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

This week sees the most significant political event for education in recent years: the United Nations Transforming Education Summit. Young people have fought hard for the inclusion of climate education and, hopefully, this will be visible in the results of the summit.

Changing geopolitical dynamics marked by China’s increasingly nationalistic internal policies and assertive foreign relations will undoubtedly affect global higher education to the detriment of collaboration and research, but they will also carry a significant cost for higher education and research within China.