US Education Bubble About to Burst

William Baldwin suggests a USA education bubble may be about to burst (The Scary Economics Of Higher Education, Forbes, 15 January 2013). He points to US universities and colleges investing in new campuses and buildings, funded by tax-exempt bonds. Baldwin suggests that also surplus educational places could drive down tuition fees to the point where educational institutions can't service their debts. While not as large as the previous the housing bubble, Baldwin suggests this is similarly caused by government subsidies and tax deductions encouraging over investment. Individuals  encouraged by government policies, are also investing in education which does not lead to jobs with high enough wages to pay back their loans.

The other risk pointed out is from on-line education providing low cost or free courses. Baldwin suggests that on-line courses do not provide the social experience of a campus, but my recent studies of education suggest that there are ways to provide the collegiate spirit on-line, with blended courses. University campuses are changing to look more like a mall, airport business lounge and a leisure center. Australian universities are turning their libraries into learning centers and providing on-campus accommodation and entertainment facilities, backed by private investment. There are fewer traditional lecture theaters being built, but labs and places for learning circles to meet are in demand.

Baldwin suggests a blended four year degree, with a 50% split between on-line and on campus study. I suggest this is more likely to be 75% on-line or more. The typical student will do most of their study on-line, visiting a campus only for essential lab sessions and intensive workshops. They may get together with other students, at a local learning center of a public library or a coffee shop.

One curious suggestion by Baldwin was the threat of the "European" three-year degree. Presumably Australia's three year degree and adoption of the European style Bologna Process for higher degrees would also be a threat to US institutions. However, the low US dollar may cushion US institutions from overseas competition, at least from Australia.

APEC Cross-border Mobility of Universities, Researchers and Students

The 20th APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting in Vladivostok has agreed on "Promoting Cross-Border Education Cooperation". The aim is to allow students and researchers to work at institutions in each others countries and allow institutions to provide courses across national boundaries. This will require considerable work on quality assurance and accreditation. But it should be noted that this will not necessarily require students or staff to physically travel between countries, as study and research collaboration is increasingly being done on-line.

Australia already has an education agreement with India, signed by the then Minister for Education, Julia Gillard,in 2010. However, there appears to have been little progress on implementation. Australia is also a signatory to the "Bologna Accords") for standardization of higher education qualifications with Europe. The only other APEC countries to sign the accords are NZ and USA, making implementation of a regional agreement more difficult. Also the mix of government and commercial education providers will complicate the process.

Promoting Cross-Border Education Cooperation

Education is the pre-eminent source of economic development in the 21st century, creating more and higher quality jobs and bolstering productivity growth. Education is also a fundamental component of economic activity. Cooperation in the education sectors of APEC economies fosters innovative growth as students, researchers and education providers build scientific, technological and linguistic communities.
All APEC economies stand to gain from enhancing collaboration on cross-border education. Many developing economies in the Asia-Pacific region are rapidly moving into higher value-added manufacturing and knowledge intensive industries driven by innovation. Access to a wide range of quality higher education services is critical for sustainable growth on this development pathway. The APEC region also contains some of the world’s largest exporters and consumers of education services. Facilitating the flow of students, researchers and education providers, and reducing the transaction costs involved provides opportunities for a significant expansion of cross border education services to the benefit of all economies.
Increasing cross-border student flows will strengthen regional ties, build people to people exchanges, and promote economic development through knowledge and skills transfer. High quality cross-border education equips students with the 21^st century competencies they need for their full participation in a globalized and knowledge based society.
Therefore, we, the APEC Leaders, agree that strengthening collaboration among APEC economies is crucial for facilitation of the work on specific policies, including those relating to quality assurance, accreditation, cross-border exchange and data collection. Such work will have a significant impact on the education sector in APEC economies. Important steps were made by economies in 2012 to enhance practical and sustainable educational cooperation, exploring a number of proposals for cross border education within the region as well as research, information, and knowledge sharing. We encourage further development, on a voluntary basis, consistent with individual economies' circumstances, of cross-border education cooperation and facilitation of exchange in education services within APEC in the following areas:
a) Enhancing the mobility of students. This may be achieved, but not limited by the following:

• identifying, comparing and implementing best practices among APEC economies for course accreditation and quality assurance systems, as well as targeted capacity building projects;
• developing models to guide reform and implementation of good regulatory practices, drawing on case studies of domestic education providers;
• exploring ways to increase the transparency of student visa requirements.

b) Enhancing the mobility of researchers. This may be achieved, but not limited by the following:

• developing existing academic exchanges and joint research activities between and among universities in APEC economies;
• exploring ways to improve the mobility of the academic workforce.

c) Enhancing the mobility of education providers. This may be achieved, but not limited by the following:

• exploring ways to enhance transparency of regulation of foreign providers and to remove unnecessary barriers to market access;
• mapping of existing regulations for the establishment of foreign providers;
• benchmarking and identifying best practices in APEC on quality assurance systems.

d) Enhancing the existing network of bilateral agreements. This may be achieved by, but is not limited by the following:

• examining issues related to the flexible design and delivery of educational content (such as online courses) among APEC economies;
• enhancing availability of data on educational programs in APEC economies.

We instruct Ministers and officials to take forward these priorities on cross-border student, researcher and education provider mobility to develop cross-border educational cooperation in the APEC region while taking into consideration the circumstances of individual economies.
From: Promoting Cross-Border Education Cooperation, Annex D of the APEC 2012 Leaders' Declaration, (the "Vladivostok Declaration: Integrate to Grow, Innovate to Prosper"), at the 20th APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting in Vladivostok, Russia, 9 September 2012

Bologna reform problems for German higher education

Spiegel reports problems with the implementation of the Bologna reforms in German universities: "German Universities 'Share Blame' for Problems" (08/15/2012). German university students traditionally studied for much longer than the three year first degree in the Bologna model and complain they are now being hurried through the system.

Green e-Skills

The Final Report: Evaluation of the implementation of the European Commission's Communication on e-Skills for the 21st Century by TOBIAS HÜSING and WERNER B. KORTE
was released October 2010. "Skills for Green IT" were identified as an area requiring action. I assume that my "Green Technology Strategies" course is the sort of thing they have in mind:

There is broad consensus that "e-business skills" (also called e-leadership skills) and ‘hybrid’ type of skills will become of crucial importance with the advent of the latest and emerging developments in ICT (e.g. green IT, cloud computing) for which probably further and new skills and competences are required to support the proper and competitive operation of existing industry and business organisations as well as the emergence of new innovative businesses and entrepreneurship.

However, and in order to ensure these types of professionals to become available a clear specification of the type of skills and competences required and strengthened needs to be undertaken including a clear target definition of what is to be achieved. This requires close and continuous collaboration between different stakeholders in the definition and specification phase and (ICT) industry and the education sector to ensure its continuous development and provision. ...

1. Recommendation 1: Continue with focused activities to fill well identified gaps and further support the improvement of e-skills for competitiveness and innovation among the European workforce to match requirements emerging from new developments in the ICT area and industry and social demands.
2. Recommendation 2: Encourage and support all Member States in the development of their long-term e-skills strategy. This could be done through the use of different tools including an online knowledge base of good practices of Member States initiatives.
3. Recommendation 3: Increase the scale and reinforce the sustainability of e-skills and digital literacy activities as well as the visibility of the activities and initiatives started and of the results achieved.
4. Recommendation 4: Coordinate better skills, e-skills and innovation, employment, digital and media literacy related activities at European level (and between the relevant EC services and national Ministries) to achieve greater impact.


From: Final Report: Evaluation of the implementation of the European Commission's Communication on e-Skills for the 21st Century, TOBIAS HÜSING and WERNER B. KORTE for the European Commission and the European e-Skills Steering Committee, October 2010

was released October 2010.