University news from the West

In Study Abroad, Dispute Over Roaming
Students and parents sue cell phone provider popular among study abroad participants, alleging unfair billing practices

Understanding Students Who Were 'Born Digital'
Authors of a new book talk about technology in the classroom, digital literacy and changes in the library.

Trickle-Down Economic Duress
Months of national fiscal strain have had little direct impact on colleges so far. As liquidity crisis intensifies, a few signs of actual distress begin to emerge in higher education.

Border-Crossing Universities
Europe is seeing new models for foreign institutions. In Britain, a Malaysian university opens to serve immigrant students.


The long and the short of it
Britain's one-year masters is proving a sticking point in the Bologna Process, but the equivalence issue is raising difficult questions about length of study for other degrees, too.

Lecturers fear anti-terror laws
Academics instruct students not to download sensitive material

Pass the exam hall to enter Dragons’ Den
Innovative assessment techniques are being used to challenge students.

REF could penalise those working across disciplines
Study says interdisciplinary researchers might lose out as their work is less cited

US: Poor students miss out in some universities
A new study by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, has found that selective institutions in America differ markedly in the number of low-income students they admit. John Douglass and Gregg Thomson investigated the divide between poor and rich students, comparing a group of selective institutions and their number and percentage of Pell Grant recipients.

UK: Widening participation debate heats up Diane Spencer
The debate on widening participation in Britain's universities heated up last week with the publication of a report on special schemes to encourage pupils from poorer backgrounds to enter higher education, and inflammatory remarks by the Chancellor of Oxford University. Lord (Chris) Patten told a conference of independent school heads that his university should not be treated "like a social security office" to help disadvantaged pupils from state schools.

ROMANIA: Investment boost for higher education Karen MacGregor
Higher education in Romania has undergone huge changes in the past two decades, from a small and stifled sector during the communist era to a competitive system with seven times more students, more than 100 institutions and burgeoning research. There are challenges, including raising quality, but investment in higher education has increased 30-fold in the past seven years, says Professor Paul Serban Agachi, president of the academic council of Babes-Bolyai University and a member of a team that crafted reforms

JAPAN: University crime experts on call Gavin Blair
The second article in a special series on how universities are helping fight crime. Though the number of academic specialists in commercial crime in the Asia-Pacific region may be fewer than in the US or Europe, many of the leading figures are willing to work with corporate clients and have a great deal of experience outside the ivory towers.

FRANCE: Higher education and research are budget priorities Jane Marshall
Higher education and research are the government's chief priority in the 2009 budget. Next year's allocation will rise by EUR1.8 billion (US$2.57 billion) to a total of EUR24.16 billion, up 6.5% compared with 2008. But the sector has not escaped 900 job cuts although these are proportionally less severe than those imposed on other ministries.

UK: Teacher gender gap widens Diane Spencer
Despite government efforts to attract men into teaching, the latest figures show the gender gap is widening. The Higher Education Statistics Agency found that males made up less than a quarter of all teaching qualifications obtained from higher education institutions in 2006-07, the lowest number for five years.

EUROPE: Young scientists promise a bright future Alan Osborn
Three young researchers, from Poland, Slovakia and Britain, were awarded the top prizes in the EU Contest for Young Scientists in Copenhagen on 25 September, against competition from national scientific prize-winners from 39 European countries plus Brazil, Canada, China, Mexico, New Zealand and the US.


Economic Crisis Rapidly Changes MBA Education steven bell
Business schools are responding with counseling, classroom analysis, curriculum changes, and case studies to the convulsions that have led to the bankruptcy or fire sales of leading US financial firms and a federal bailout. At schools that have long funneled graduating MBAs to Wall Street, professors are teaching about the crisis, even as their students ponder what it will mean for their careers. Many longtime faculty members and administrators say they have never seen a series of events with greater potential to transform the focus of business education - and the career trajectories of their students.

iTunes University Lets IHEs Spread Their Messages steven bell
To keep up with the growing presence of all things online, universities are now aiming to reach students, prospective students, and anyone else with a love of learning through a forum that is both popular and recognizable. In other words, they're looking to iTunes. Conceived as a collaboration between Apple and various universities in 2004, iTunes U launched in the spring of 2006. The site, which began with only 16 institutions, has ballooned in recent months as more schools join up to post their content. Usage, too, is growing quickly.

Researchers Say Partial Lecture Notes Are Better For Students Than Full Notes steven bell
Course management software programs make it especially easy for instructors to provide students with a set of complete lecture notes. It seems that more instructors are doing this, as witnessed in the regularity with which students ask that the instructor’s notes be posted. But is giving students a complete set of notes a good idea? Based on their findings, these researchers recommend providing students with partial notes.