Transcript Globalization, Quality Assurance and Higher Education

Globalization and Higher Education:
Quality Trends in Asia/Pacific
IFE 2020
Feb 23-March 6, 2009
John Hawkins and Deane Neubauer
The Capacity Continuum
• Expanding HE populations--China,
Malaysia, Indonesia
• Contracting HE populations-Japan,
Korea, Taiwan,
• Conflicting dynamics--e.g. US, Europeslowing birth rate of some populations,
first university-goers in other
populations
Capacity Issues
• Physical capacity: where are we going to put
the bodies?
• Financial capacity: who pays for what, and
how much is there?
• Human capital capacity: who prepares the
new staff required for this expanded
capacity? To what standards?
• Managerial capacity: preparing managers for
expanded and refined managements tasks,
including innovation and adaptation, and
development of HE systems.
Quality Issues
• Creating and sustaining capacity
• Creating and assuring quality
• The continuing story of public and
private
• The “urge to know”--league tables
Definitional Issues Affecting Quality
• Shifting ground of market definitions
• Linking HE standards with those of
particular industries
• The compulsion toward equality of
application for quality standards
• HE contestations of quality by discipline
• Multiplicity of measures provided by
society for HE quality
Sanyal and Martin (2007): ten core
meanings of quality
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Providing excellence
Being exceptional
Providing value for money
Conforming to specifications
Getting things right the first time
Meeting customers’ needs
Having zero defects
Providing added value
Exhibiting fitness of purpose
Exhibiting fitness for purpose
Four QA Trends
• Where no quality assessment existed-build it-the 1990’s as the decade of HE quality
assessment program development
• Refining measurement to reflect
differentiations of quality
• Shifting from inputs to outputs--from capacity
for quality to demonstrations of quality
• The rise of cross-border quality assessment
and accreditation
Underlying QA Factors
• Conceptual
– Defining HE environments through neoliberalism
– Shifting relationships between state and
HEI’s
– Changing methodologies and methods for
applying QA to HEI’s
– Internationalization and Globalization
QA Factors
• Structural
–
–
–
–
–
Privatization and “incorporation movement”
Changes in funding patterns and sources
Autonomy
Rapid expansion of HE in given environments
Rise of national agencies dedicated to quality
assessment
– Diversification of HE systems
– Curricula changes and “alignment” issues
– Proliferation of multi-campus systems
QA Factors
• Social/Policy
– Public accountability movements
– Extension of managerialism
– New types of students
– Public policy responsibility for QA
Cross Border Education
• Two views of education: reactor to globalization;
actor of change
• Demand for higher and adult education--especially
professional--increasing in most countries
• Information and communication technologies
providing alternate and virtual means of delivery
• New types of providers: international companies, forprofit institutions, corporate universities, IT and media
companies
Education as a Good and as a
Commodity
• Trade talk renders education a service and not a
commodity
• Education sector often resents language shifts that
move initiative and regulation away from education
policy centers and into trade centers
• GATS a wake up call: It has forced education to
carefully consider (a) significant growth in
crossborder education that is happening irrespective
of trade agreements and (b) reality and impact of
multilateral trade rules on both domestic and
crossborder higher education and commercial trade
in education services
Growth and Shift to Commercial Crossborder
Education
• Crossborder education=movement of education
(students, researchers, professors, learning
materials, programs, providers, knowledge, etc.)
across national/regional or geographic borders
• Demand will increase from 1.8 million international
students in 2000 to 7.2 million in 2025
• 70% of demand will come from Asia Pacific
• Exponential growth predicted for programs and
institutions/providers
Global Higher Education Index (GEI)
• Companies that offer education programs
and services publicly traded on a stock
exchange
• 49 Companies in five groups:
–
–
–
–
–
Brick and Mortar
E-learning
IT training
Publishers
Software and consultancy firms
Category
Forms and Conditions of Mobility
Development
Cooperation
People
Students
Professors/scholars
Researche rs/
Experts/consultants
Pro grams
Course, pro gram
sub-deg ree, degree,
post grad uate
Providers
Institutions
Organizations
Compani es
Projects
Acad emic projects
Services
Educational
Linkages
Commercial
Trade
Semester/year abroad
Full deg rees
Field/researc h work
Internships
Sabbaticals
Consulting
T winning
Franchised
Articulated/ Validated
Joint/Double Award
Online/Distance
Branc h Campus
Virtual University
Merger/Acquisition
In depen dent Institutions
Research
Curric ulum
Capacity Building
Educational services
1
Harvard USA
11
Yale USA
2
Cambridge UK
12
Cornell USA
3
Stanford USA
13
UC San Diego USA
4
UC Berkeley USA
14
UC Los Angeles USA
5
MIT USA
15
Pennsylvania USA
6
Caltech USA
16
Wisconsin, Madison
USA
7
Columbia USA
17
Washington Seattle
USA
8
Princeton USA
18
UC San Francisco USA
9
Chicago USA
19
Tokyo Japan
10
Oxford UK
20
Johns Hopkins
2/3’s the Shanghai Jia
Tong top universities
are from English
speaking countries
Rankings Intensify Global Competition
• Universities are widely judged by research performance. The
Jiao Tong data shape reputations
• Marketing (‘we are world-class’, ‘we are a research university’
etc.) is no longer enough - the data must confirm the university’s
claim •
• Many governments/nations now want ‘super-league’
universities, leading to greater concentration of research,
selective investment, more stratification
• Every university wants to lift its rankings
• The competition for high quality researchers leads to price
effects (salaries rise) and intensifies brain drain (Simon
Marginson 2007)
The Urge to Know and Excel
• The rapid emergence of “league tables”, e.g.
London Times and Shanghai Jiao Tong data
• Issues of which indicators are employed and
what kinds of institutions will rank best on
these indicators
• Leads to engagement of the policy process in
the quest to have globally competitive
universities
Financing of Higher Education
• Universal trend of declining public sector
support
• Creates possible double bind
– Declining public support draws private funding-accelerated by liberalization
– When private funding increases, often public
sector response is to let support fall even more.
• Trade enters as countries without capacity or
will turn increasingly to foreign investors,
creating dependency nexus
Quality Assurance
•
•
•
•
•
•
Significant new activity--over sixty countries in last decade
Historically countries have not been concerned with imported education
Sectors other than education (e.g. business, accounting, etc.) also
pursuing quality standards (e.g. Baldridge Awards)
High level of non-commercial cross border activity also drives quality
questions.
Commercialization of accreditation through:
– Export and contracting of existing agencies (e.g. Regional and
specialized accreditation in the US.
– Invention of new international accrediting mechanisms
– Quality control of HE accreditation itself an issue
Accreditation an important part of branding for trade
Diversification and Diversity Issues
•
•
•
•
Which courses are offered and why? Market selection can lead to
significant bias toward high return courses (business, information
technology, communication)
What gets left behind and must the public/non-profit sector make up the
difference?
What happens to HE overall when research is left out of the equation?
Two faces of commercialization and cultural diversity:
– English language dominance
– Conflict over “fusion” or “dilution” of culture.
– Will commercial providers spend “extra” for relevant local content?
Human Capacity or Brain Gain Drain?/Trade
Creep or Trade Choice?
• Trade offs as private sector provides capacity and crossborder
exchanges increase. Who goes where for what and stays where
for how long? Including migration out of HE to private sector.
• Trade creep=“the quietly pervasive introduction of trade
concepts, language and policy into the education sector.”
(Discursive shifts)
• Trade choice=the welcome investment of resources into HE as
an export industry and its promotion.
• Mixed benefit packages for differentiated recipients
Traditional HE
• Trinity of teaching/learning, research and service
guided evolution of universities and contributions to
social, cultural, human, scientific, technological and
economic advancement of nation
• And--total development of individuals
• To what extent can these attributes be disaggregated
and rendered by different providers?