AFRICA NEWS

Wagdy Sawahel

Despite the fact that two-thirds of African countries have policies and strategies in place for science, technology and innovation, the capacity of the continent’s higher education institutions and associated research centres to implement them remains very low.

Christabel Ligami

Only five African countries have made their pledges and committed to the World Bank's Partnership for Skills in Applied Sciences, Engineering and Technology programme since its launch three years ago.

Gilbert Nakweya

Teaching and learning is yet to resume at public universities across the country as the unions representing the teaching staff had not, by late last week, reached an agreement with the government over salaries, keeping the studies of thousands of students in 33 institutions on hold.

Tonderayi Mukeredzi

Government last week Wednesday contracted CBZ Holdings, one of the country’s biggest financial institutions, to raise US$2 billion through bonds to fund infrastructure facilities at the country’s institutions of higher learning.

Francis Kokutse

As pressure mounts on African universities to produce employable graduates, the quality of university teaching has been identified by the Association of African Universities as a key factor in improving outcomes.

Laeed Zaghlami

Algerian universities, usually enclaves of peace and perceived as bastions of reason and enlightenment, have in the past few weeks been the site of several acts of violence, raising concerns over the spread of physical violence from other sectors of society.

AFRICA ANALYSIS

Ngugi wa Thiong'o

There is a need to intensify resistance to the metaphysical empire of language, literature and scholarship and make African languages and what is produced in them more visible.

Nickanor Amwata

Properly and thoroughly implementing the recommendations arising out of the recent universities audit by the Commission for University Education presents an opportunity to restore the reputation of the country's university system.

AFRICA FEATURES

Munyaradzi Makoni

By focusing on the quality of their note-taking in and out of class, researchers from the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa, have established that poor English language competence is hindering the academic performance of a significant number of undergraduate students for whom the language is not their mother tongue.

Ramadhan Rajab

The president of the Somali National Commission for UNESCO and former Somalia education minister has called on her country’s fledgling national government and growing tertiary education sector to redouble its efforts to boost the presence of women in Somali higher education.

Wagdy Sawahel

The 57 member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, 27 of which are in Africa, have adopted a declaration for promoting lifelong learning in universities, but implementation is still challenged by attitudes which position lifelong learning as the 'poor cousin' in universities.

Munyaradzi Makoni

In order to be sustainable, successful tertiary institutions around the world have found ways to diversify their income streams so as to reduce dependence on public funds which are often tied to economic and political factors. How can this work in Africa?

AFRICA BRIEFS

An African index of scientific references and publications is being planned on the initiative of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa.

Vice-president Manuel Domingos Vicente has called for Angola’s higher education institutions to adopt a culture of hard work to encourage growth, innovation, modernisation and competitiveness.

NEWS: Our correspondents worldwide report

Brendan O'Malley

Universities in the United States and Europe have spoken out against President Donald Trump’s new travel ban issued on 6 March, voicing alarm at the impact it will have on international students but also on the US’s ability to attract the best talent.

Among institutions, Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology dominate the latest subject rankings. Among countries, the United States and the United Kingdom dominate the top echelons. Countries from Africa, Latin America and the Middle East are absent from the top 10 in almost every subject. But China has increased its share of top-50 places.

María Elena Hurtado

Brazilian university students who are awarded quotas for race and low income or receive specific scholarships or loans have similar or better academic results than their classmates, according to a recent study, thus disproving the argument in Brazil that quota receivers displace better-qualified students and become worse professionals.

Mimi Leung and Yojana Sharma

New guidelines are to be drafted by Taiwan’s Ministry of Education for university agreements with institutions in mainland China after a controversy erupted recently over universities signing agreements not to teach 'sensitive' subjects that criticise Beijing policies as a condition of taking in mainland exchange students.

International students studying in the United Kingdom now generate more than £25 billion (US$30 billion) for the economy and support around 206,600 jobs in university towns and cities across the UK, according to new figures. These students also paid an estimated £4.8 billion (US$5.8 billion) in tuition fees, accounting for more than 14% of total university income.

Brendan O'Malley

The Institute of International Education and the Catalyst Foundation for Universal Education have launched an online clearinghouse to connect displaced students with opportunities to continue their education in safety around the world.

Jan Petter Myklebust

Despite more than doubling the number of PhD students, Danish PhDs have maintained their high quality, according to new analysis, with three out of four international supervisors judging them to be 'very good' or 'good'. And an influx of international students has heightened the quality of PhD training, most supervisors say.

Jan Petter Myklebust

In Norway there is a growing resistance to university reforms and the present approach to governance, which is being dubbed 'New Public Management', is seen by academics as eroding autonomy in favour of increased central control that threatens risk-taking in research.

Paul Basken, The Chronicle of Higher Education

As automation threatens more American jobs, the idea of providing a universal basic income is gaining traction among businessmen and advocates on the left and right. Scientists, unsure of how to tackle the issue or get funding to do so, have largely been stuck on the sidelines. Yet if any policy question needs a thorough examination, experts say, it is this one.

COMMENTARY

Barney Glover

Universities have a vital role to play in standing up for evidence, dealing with disruption and above all asking questions about the complex problems we face today and in the future – and to never rest with the answers.

Paul Benneworth, Franziska Eckardt and Matt Bucholski

Ongoing research shows that students – and their universities – can gain from being allowed to undertake research. Through research, students develop many of the kinds of skills that can be used to contribute to innovation or solving social challenges.

Rosemary Salomone

The Italian Constitutional Court’s recent nuanced decision on teaching university courses in English has provoked a popular response in defence of Italian. Could the decision give momentum to a backlash against English and globalisation?

Lisa Unangst

The enrolment crisis in California caused by growing demand, neoliberal policies and budget constraints, is adversely affecting students of colour and those from lower socio-economic groups. California’s policy-makers should follow Clark Kerr’s example and lead the drive for equitable access.

WORLD BLOG

Margaret Andrews

As people live longer and technology evolves, universities should be at the forefront of innovation in teaching and addressing the fast-changing skills the workers of tomorrow will need in a life requiring more frequent retooling for multiple careers.

FEATURES

Kafil Yamin

Despite an election pledge to double funding, the government has cut the research budget for state universities by 40%, leaving researchers in poor parts of the country grappling with the challenge of how to produce meaningful research with little money – for some pooling resources between universities is the answer.

SCIENCE SCENE

Geoff Maslen

DNA in hair samples collected from Aboriginal people across Australia in the early to mid-1900s has revealed that populations of the first people have been continuously present in the same regions for up to 50,000 years – soon after their arrival in Australia, according to a paper published in Nature last week.

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WORLD ROUND-UP

A Science Council of Japan committee has proposed continuing a ban on military research by universities and other institutes, a stance based on remorse over such studies under Japan’s wartime government, writes Ryoko Takeishi for The Asahi Shimbun.

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem has become the first Israeli university to recognise the Palestinian Authority’s matriculation exam, known as the tawjihi, writes Dov Lieber for The Times of Israel.

New research reveals that incidents of sexual harassment, misconduct and gender-based violence have reached ‘epidemic’ levels at British universities, writes Richard Black for The Telegraph.

Amazon.com Inc has launched a new programme to help students build capabilities into its voice-controlled assistant Alexa, the latest move by a technology firm to nurture ideas and talent in artificial intelligence research, writes Jeffrey Dastin for Reuters.

Discussions are heating up within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party over how the government should procure funds to make universities and junior colleges tuition-free after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed his willingness in his January policy speech to make it happen, reports The Yomiuri Shimbun.

A former Trump University student wants to drop out of a recent US$25 million class action settlement and take President Donald Trump to trial, writes Nancy Dillon for the New York Daily News.

Over the last decade, students have fled the humanities. In response, universities have cancelled individual courses, or entire specialised humanities programmes. Instead of hiring tenure-track professors to replace retiring faculty, they make do with less, or turn to sessional instructors who teach when and if there is demand, writes Simona Chiose for The Globe and Mail.

All through the 160 years of its existence, the University of Mumbai has had one address. Now, it may soon have a second home – in Trumpland, writes Hemali Chhapia for TNN.

As digital technology continues to influence and disrupt how students learn and are taught, a new transcontinental research project by the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom and the University of Cape Town in South Africa will examine its effect on staff, students and employers, writes Megan van Wyngaardt for Creamer Media.

The University of Sydney has threatened to ban a high-profile financial markets economist and anti-sugar campaigner from its campus, accusing him of intimidating one of its top academics as they feud over the role of sugar in fuelling obesity, writes Adam Creighton for The Australian.

A University of Hawaii professor is working to get an entire curriculum at the university taught in Hawaiian to supplement the language courses taught to children across the state, reports Associated Press.

The National Assessment and Accreditation Council, which accredits and grades universities and colleges, is looking to revise its methodology at a time when it faces corruption charges and possible competition from the Indian Institutes of Technology, writes Basant Kumar Mohanty for The Telegraph India.

The Right2Know Campaign is putting pressure on the University of Johannesburg to come clean about using private security firms to spy on student protesters, reports Times Live.

The Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics has appealed to the federal government to upgrade all polytechnics to universities of technology to end discrimination against technological education in the country, reports the Nigerian Tribune.

Dr Carlo Croce, who is among the most prolific scientists in an emerging area of cancer research involving what is sometimes called the ‘dark matter’ of the human genome, has, over the past several years, been fending off a tide of allegations of data falsification and other scientific misconduct. He now faces new whistle-blower accusations, write James Glanz and Agustin Armendariz for The New York Times.

Controversial British journalist Milo Yiannopoulos is one of 12 names put forward by students for the role of Glasgow University's next rector, a role aimed at representing the interests of the university’s students, reports Douglas Barrie for Stv.

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