A New York Times story on higher education in China offers a fascinating look at the issues involved in China’s investment in developing human capital to strengthen its workforce and economy. The article lists the many challenges facing Chinese leaders, educators, and businesses in this effort. Among them are capacity and quality of higher education institutions. 

The article points to IIE’s Open Doors statistics to show that the number of Chinese students in U.S. higher education is at a record high. "In part, this reflects the prestige of studying abroad, and that more Chinese families can afford the cost and are looking for ways to get their money and their children out of the country as a way to hedge their risk against internal political or economic turbulence. But it is also because a Western college education is better, and Western universities do not require the same high marks as Chinese ones do on China’s famously difficult college entrance exams," reporter Keith Bradsher writes. 

Read the full article here. Access the full Open Doors data here.   

Educational institutions, governments and emerging market groups should partner to create a more prepared global workforce, a Financial Times blog says. The blog cites a McKinsey Global Institute study showing that by the year 2020, employers could face a shortage of up to 13 percent of the highly-skilled workers they need. 

"The new skills that today’s organizations require of their employees are, largely, not being taught by educational institutions," author NV ‘Tiger’ Tyagarajan of Genpact writes. "An illustrative point: many organizations spend as much money training university graduates as they would on people without a university degree. In effect, they operate their own universities. As a result, emerging market organizations must work with educational institutions and governments across the globe to ensure that relevant content is included in curriculums that help to create worldwide talent supply chains." 

Click here to read the whole post. 

As the United States weighs its strategic options in Afghanistan, investing in education should be high among those choices, Chris Taylor writes in Foreign Policy’s Best Defense blog. 

"While education is a strong soft power tool, it affects national security, too. Afghanistan's low literacy rate poses significant challenges to strategic training programs for its army, police forces, and government agencies, potentially impairing its ability to fully take responsibility for its own security in 2014," he writes.  

Investing in the American University of Afghanistan (founded partially thanks to a grant from USAID), Taylor says, will help to create educated leaders that reject extremism and corruption, and embrace equality and democratic values. 

Read the full piece here. 

IIE’s first-ever series of higher education fairs in Latin America will be held in Spring 2013. This fair series, developed in partnership with the EducationUSA advising network in Brazil and Chile, is specially designed to recruit Latin American students interested in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) fields.

Since 1982, IIE’s Higher Education Fairs in Asia have served as effective, trustworthy platforms for accredited institutions to connect with serious students and build their brand around the world. This IIE/EducationUSA STEM Fair Series in Latin America provides a unique opportunity for accredited U.S. colleges and universities to expand and widen their presence in the region; and for students to learn about the wide variety of educational opportunities available to them in the United States. Colleges and universities interact face to face with thousands of qualified students, expand academic exchanges by partnering with local institutions, and network with local governmental officials, U.S. Consulate and Embassy staff, and EducationUSA advisers.

Latin America Spring 2013 STEM Fair Schedule:

April 21 (Sun) - Mexico City, Mexico

April 23 (Tue) - Monterrey, Mexico

April 24 (Wed) - Guadalajara, Mexico

April 27 (Sat) - Sao Paulo, Brazil

April 29 (Mon) - Recife, Brazil

May 1 (Wed) – FAUBAI Conference-- Natal, Brazil

May 4 (Sat) - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

May 6 (Mon) - Santiago, Chile

To register or to learn more about the Latin American STEM Fair Series, please click here.

Please join us for the Annual IIE Best Practices in International Education Conference on March 22, 2013, in New York City. This event will feature high-level experts, including presidents, provosts, and international education administrators from institutions around the world. The conference will also honor the winners of the 2013 IIE Andrew Heiskell Awards for Innovation in International Education.

Click here for the conference agenda and registration information. Please register at your earliest convenience, as space is limited. IIENetwork members receive a special registration discount.

Conference sponsorship is available at various levels. Please email Shannon Harrison by January 31 to sign on as a sponsor. Sponsorship benefits include complimentary registration, brochure inserts in conference bags, highlight on IIE’s website, and a private discussion with IIE’s President Allan Goodman and other sponsors. 

There is a tremendous demand for a workforce educated in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) in both the U.S. and UK. Both governments have issued calls to action to urge higher enrollments in STEM subjects or risk falling behind in scientific and high-tech industries. 

To view the conference agenda and to register, please click here.  If you have further questions, please email Libby Rosenbaum. 

The Global Health & Innovation Conference is the world's largest global health conference and social entrepreneurship conference. The thought-leading conference annually convenes more than 2,200 leaders, changemakers, students, and professionals from all fields of global health, international development, and social entrepreneurship.  Register during January to secure the lowest registration rate.

Interested in presenting at the conference? Submit a social enterprise pitch abstract for consideration. Click here for registration or additional conference information. 

 

Stakeholders interested in international higher education collaboration are invited to submit presentation proposals for CONAHEC's 15th North American Higher Education Conference. The event will focus on how higher education institutions can contribute through their daily international engagement activities to creating more equitable and sustainable societies. 

While higher education institutions have been at the cutting edge of many technological developments, and have served as spaces for our communities to grow and develop, achieving sustainable societies is a goal which should guide all of our activities. The role of international education in this should not be underestimated.

Proposals should share innovative frameworks and approaches implemented by higher education institutions to provide a locally relevant global dimension within their teaching, research and public service activities, with special emphasis in their consideration of and contribution to sustainability. Case studies and original research will be considered. 

Click here to visit the online Proposal Submission Form. For more information, contact Sean Manley-Casimir at smanleyc@email.arizona.edu.

Since 2009, IIE’s Center for International Partnerships has assisted over 70 U.S. colleges and universities to think strategically about developing partnerships with a number of focus countries through the Center’s flagship initiative, the International Academic Partnership Program (IAPP).  Past and current focus countries include India, China, Brazil, and Myanmar. To address the growing need for academic partnerships in key emerging economies, and in response to the interests of the U.S. higher education community, the Center is looking to continue expanding the IAPP portfolio. We want your input! Please take five minutes to let us know about how your institution manages strategic partnerships and where you are interested in seeing future partnership programs by taking this short survey. 

Link to the survey: http://iie.vovici.net/wsb.dll/s/6cg3b2

Teacher Treks, sponsored by Hilton HHonors, the loyalty program for Hilton Worldwide’s 10 distinct hotel brands, and administered by IIE, will provide 15 teachers with a grant to travel overseas during their summer vacation. With this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, teachers will have the chance to see the world and bring their experiences back to the classroom. 

We encourage you to please pass this information along to your friends and family who are teachers, work with teachers, or know teachers. 

Apply online here. For more information, email teachertreks@iie.org.

Application Deadline: February 6 

 

The Japan-U.S. Teacher Exchange Program for Education for Sustainable Development will provide 24 U.S. teachers and administrators with the opportunity to travel to Japan, and 24 Japanese educators to travel the U.S., to learn about ESD efforts and strengthen ESD curricula in both countries. ESD is "a vision of education that seeks to balance human and economic well-being with cultural traditions and respect for the earth’s natural resources," according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). 

 

The 24 teachers from Japan will travel to the U.S. in late April and the 24 teachers from the U.S. will travel to Japan in late June.

 

The Japan-U.S. Teacher Exchange Program for ESD is administered by Fulbright Japan and jointly funded by the Educational and Cultural Affairs Bureau of the U.S. Department of State and the Japanese Government’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.

Please visit the website to access the application. 

During this tour for representatives from universities, research institutions, and funding agencies in the United States and Canada, some of Germany’s top institutions of higher education will present their internationalization strategies and initiatives, and will outline best practice examples. The tour will run from June 16 through June 22, 2013.  

 

During stops in Berlin, Bremen and Braunschweig, participants will visit different types of universities, including an "Excellence University" and a university of applied science (both in Bremen), one of the leading technical universities in Germany (TU Braunschweig), as well as one of the prestigious Berlin universities.

Topics of focus include:

• Institutional internationalization strategies
• PhD programs/training and transatlantic mobility
• MA/MS dual degree programs
• Select areas of research where our hosts co-operate with North American partners
• Accreditation of courses taken abroad in BA/MA programs 

For further information, please click here or contact Uta Gaedeke at 212-758 3223 x:209 or via e-mail at gaedeke@daad.org. 

The Graduate School of Science of the University of Tokyo offers summer research internship opportunities to qualified undergraduate students. The grant program, named UTRIP (the University-of-Tokyo Research Internship Program) offers a six-week research-centered program for students who wish to obtain a Master’s or Doctoral degree in natural science areas. UTRIP provides financial support to all participants including housing for the full period of six weeks, coverage for traveling costs to and from Japan (up to 100,000 yen) as well as a stipend of 60,000 yen to cover some personal expenses in Japan. No program fees will be charged.

The program details are available here. For more information, please email Sachiko Soeda at soeda.sachiko@mail.u-tokyo.ac.jp.

We encourage you to invite recent study abroad students to participate in a short survey on global awareness. The survey is being conducted by author and international careers expert Stacie Berdan. Students can access the survey here. 

 

The objective of this survey is to gather information on how people develop a global mindset in their formative years, infant to 18. The survey’s author is interested in hearing from undergraduate and graduate students who have studied abroad in any capacity, for any length of time, during the past five years.

All survey responses are anonymous. The results of the survey will help inform the upcoming IIE/AIFS Foundation publication A Student’s Guide to Studying Abroad. For more information, please email Stacie Berdan at stacienberdan@gmail.com.   

Global E3, the Global Engineering Education Exchange, is a program for engineering students that allows students to study abroad while continuing to pay tuition at home. With member universities in 20 countries, students at nearly 60 universities have the opportunity to study abroad. 

Through participation in the program, Global E3 graduates gain the necessary foreign language ability, cross-cultural skills, and professional experience to excel in the multinational/multicultural business environment of the 21st century. 

The importance of this unique program has been recognized by the National Science Foundation, AT&T Foundation, and the U.S. Department of Education, all of which provided the start-up funds for the program. The program is sustained with membership fees from participating universities and from corporations.

Click here for more information and application. Or email Sabeen Altaf at saltaf@iie.org.

The Whitaker International Undergraduate Scholarship Program provides funding to increase the number of undergraduates in biomedical engineering who go abroad. The program provides the opportunity for these students to see biomedical engineering from an international perspective early in their educations and prepares them to become future leaders in the field. 

Undergraduate grantees must meet the basic eligibility requirements and must

• Be currently enrolled as a second, third or senior year undergraduate Biomedical or Bioengineering student from a U.S. institution at the time of the scholarship, with at least one semester remaining at their home institution upon completion of the award.
• Have the consent of the home institution to participate in the selected study abroad program.
• Demonstrate a need for financial support to participate in a study abroad program. 

Note: applicants do not need to be receiving financial aid to be eligible; however, any funding received toward study abroad program costs any amount of financial aid received towards the program, must be reported.

Applicants to the program can take BME coursework, intern, conduct research, or directly enroll at an international institution that offers outstanding academic training in biomedical engineering. 

For more information and to apply, visit the website.