Achieving social mobility through regional HE networks

Within the context of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals related to education, the global community has increasingly been focused on access, equality, relevance and quality of education. However, the standards for education in relation to gaining relevant employment, social engagement and enhancing living standards across the world have been increasing over the past decades.

Furthermore, the changing economic context (economic globalisation and regionalisation), increasing migration (including forced migration), ongoing phases of industrialisation (industry 4.0 and beyond), and changing (possibly lowering) standards of education in relation to the economic, social and cultural aspects of contemporary society have devalued the currency of education, especially when seen from the lens of value for money within nations and especially if seen in terms of different regions and the global society.

Access to education has significantly focused on increasing participation in national education systems, while the contemporary world has been rapidly changing to global and regional world orders.

Although limited scholarships to low- and lower middle-income students (mostly focused on higher education) partly address the access issue outside national education systems, the majority of students from low- and lower middle-income countries are still limited to education anchored in national contexts and limited by various constraints such as budget, quality and relevance, especially in a rapidly changing economic and global society.

Access to education for forced migrants is significantly more problematic given issues of documentation, alignment, quality and recognition of their home education systems in relation to their host country’s education systems and other issues such as language, teaching and learning styles, finance and the added challenges related to social integration.

Education equality in a globalised world

Equality of education should not be seen in terms of access to education in home countries, but in terms of equal quality of education across countries. Especially in a global and regionalised world order, education in one country should be of equivalent quality in another country and be recognised as such.

The employment opportunities of a graduate from a low- and lower middle-income country should be equal to those of a graduate from a middle- or high-income country. Local graduate employment opportunities should not be limited to lower management positions in multinational companies operating in the graduate’s home country as a result of their lack of international education opportunities.

This is on top of the equality issue operating at national levels, where the quality gap between urban and rural and private and public educational institutions remains challenging.

Relevance of education should be seen in terms of the level of education needed to access economic opportunities. Currently, a bachelor degree no longer grants the same opportunities as in the past and could be considered similar to a high school diploma at least two decades ago.

The majority of key employment opportunities require a postgraduate qualification, especially for those in low- and lower middle-income countries seeking to work in other countries.

Furthermore, the relevance of education, as perceived by the global community, should not be time-bound or limited to the economic and social contexts of previous and current economic, social and political realities.

An example is the increasing discussion and dialogues related to the fourth industrial revolution which highlight the challenges of contemporary education in relation to the rapidly changing skills and competency requirements required for contemporary and future employment opportunities and the failure of education systems to address the issue.

Although UNESCO has advocated and put forth regional recognition conventions in various regions (and is currently working on a global recognition convention), the challenges of implementation of these conventions are significant especially with regard to differences of quality, regulations (including access to gainful employment) and education systems between countries.

Value for money

The concepts of currency, value for money and purchasing power parity should be applied in discussions of the education-related UN Sustainable Development Goals. The currency of one’s education in gaining recognition and equally gainful employment across countries is related to the quality and recognition of education.

Value for money should be incorporated into public and private investment in education, taking into consideration that investment in education is beneficial to individual students, their home (and eventually host countries) and the global community. Purchasing power parity is a measure of equality which is seldom used within education dialogues, but clearly measures the value of education across national education and economic systems.

Overall, there is a need to support aligning quality standards of national education systems, ensuring recognition of education and the value of education in different countries within the global community as well as in their respective education systems.

Recent developments related to regionalisation of higher education and internationalisation of higher education may provide a light at the end of the tunnel.

Following European higher education developments, Southeast Asian higher education has developed regional frameworks including the ASEAN Qualifications Reference Framework, the ASEAN Quality Assurance Framework for Higher Education and the ASEAN Credit Transfer System, and discussions are ongoing towards developing an ASEAN Erasmus programme (similar and modelled on the European Erasmus programme).

Regional qualifications frameworks, which are anchored in learning outcomes, in conjunction with a regional quality assurance framework and a regional credit transfer system may help address the equivalency of educational qualifications, while a regional mobility programme can help to address issues of access and equity, at least at regional levels.

Challenges in terms of actual implementation and sustainable political and funding support still remain, especially for the development and implementation of a truly ASEAN mobility scheme which is not limited to selected institutions.

Another major issue that needs to be addressed is the adequate and effective assessment of learning outcomes which remains challenging across course, programme and institution and especially at national levels. With the shift towards student-centred and outcomes-based education, learning outcomes are what contribute to the underlying value of any educational qualification and directly affect the currency of any educational qualification.

At the risk of being perceived as naïve, I believe that discussions related to the education-related UN Sustainable Development Goals and other similar initiatives should consider access, equivalency, quality, relevance and recognition of education within regional and global socio-economic contexts, taking into consideration the currency, value for money and purchasing power parity of a national education system.

Similarly, indicators need to be developed or redesigned to capture this missing but important aspect of education to truly measure, enhance and develop new initiatives which will ensure that we can achieve the education-related UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Roger Chao Jr is an international education development consultant. He was formerly the senior consultant for the UNESCO International Centre for Higher Education Innovation, China.