End of Empire for Western Universities?

world's young graduates

End of empire for Western universities? 

By the end of this decade, four out of every 10 of the world's young graduates are going to come from just two countries - China and India.

The projection from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) shows a far-reaching shift in the balance of graduate numbers, with the rising Asian economies accelerating ahead of the United States and western Europe.

The forecasts for the shape of the "global talent pool" in 2020 show China as rapidly expanding its graduate numbers - set to account for 29% of the world's graduates aged between 25 and 34.

The biggest faller is going to be the United States - down to 11% - and for the first time pushed into third place, behind India.

The US and the countries of the European Union combined are expected to account for little more than a quarter of young graduates.

Russia is also set to decline - its share of the world's graduates almost falling by half since the beginning of the century.

Indonesia, according to the OECD's projections, will rise into fifth place.

Degrees of change

Is this an end-of-empire moment?

Higher education has become the mirror and magnifier of economic performance - and in the post-World-War-II era, universities in the US, western Europe, Japan and Russia have dominated.

The US in particular has been the university superpower - in wealth, influence and until recently in raw numbers.

Up until 2000, the US still had a share of young graduates similar to China. And Japan had as big a proportion of young graduates as India.

Now China and India are the biggest players.

Their rise in graduate numbers reflects their changing ambitions - wanting to compete against advanced economies for high-skill, high-income employment.

Instead of offering low-cost manufacture, they are targeting the hi-tech professional jobs that have become the preserve of the Westernised middle classes.

Fivefold growth

As the OECD figures show, this is not simply a case of countries such as China expanding while others stand still.

Across the industrialised world, graduate numbers are increasing - just not as quickly as China, where they have risen fivefold in a decade.

The OECD notes that by 2020, China's young graduate population will be about the same as the total US population between the ages of 25 and 64.

This changing world map will see Brazil having a bigger share of graduates than Germany, Turkey more than Spain, Indonesia three times more than France.

The UK is bucking the trend, projected to increase its share from 3% in 2010 to 4% in 2020.

This push for more graduates has a clear economic purpose, says the OECD's analysis.

Enough jobs?

Shifting from "mass production to knowledge economy occupations" means improved employment rates and earnings - so there are "strong incentives" for countries to expand higher education.

But will there be enough graduate jobs to go round?

The OECD has tried to analyse this by looking at one aspect of the jobs market - science and technology-related occupations.

These jobs have grown rapidly - and the report suggests it is an example of how expanding higher education can generate new types of employment.

These science and technology jobs - for professionals and technicians - account for about four in every 10 jobs in some Scandinavian and northern European countries, the OECD suggests.

In contrast - and showing more of the old order - these technology jobs are only a small fraction of the workforce in China and India.

The OECD concludes that there are substantial economic benefits from investing in higher education - creating new jobs for the better-educated as unskilled manufacturing jobs disappear.

Quantity or quality?

The OECD forecast reveals the pace of growth in graduate numbers. But it does not show the quality or how this expansion will translate into economic impact.

There are other ways of mapping the changing distribution of knowledge.

A team at the University of Oxford's Internet Institute has produced a set of maps showing the "geography of the world's knowledge".

This measures how populations are consuming and producing information in the online world - mapping the level of internet use, the amount of user-generated material in Google, concentrations of academic activity and the geographical focus of Wikipedia articles.

And in contrast to the rise of the Asian economies, this tells a story of continuing Western cultural dominance.

"In raw numbers of undergraduates and PhDs, the Asian economies are racing ahead," says Prof Viktor Mayer-Schonberger, from the Oxford Internet Institute.

"But what's interesting is how the West persists in its positions of strength - because the West controls the institutions.

Mapping a new world

"There are more students in China than ever before - but they still use Western mechanisms to publish results, they accept the filters," says Prof Mayer-Schonberger.

"The big question will be whether the Chinese researchers can be as insightful as their Western counterparts - we don't know yet."

The maps also reveal how much Africa and South America are losing out in this new scramble for digital power.

Prof Mayer-Schonberger said he was "completely shocked" at the extent of the imbalance.

Another feature of the Oxford study is to show how research bases and their spin-out economic activity are clustered into relatively small areas.

In the US, says Prof Mayer-Schonberger, there is hugely disproportionate investment around Silicon Valley and the Boston area, with large tracts of "wasteland" between.

"Each era has its own distinct geography. In the information age, it's not dependent on roads or waterways, but on bases of knowledge.

"This is a new kind of industrial map. Instead of coal and steel it will be about universities and innovation."

Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18646423

http://www.languagecorpsasia.com

Jobs in Cambodia

Jobs in Cambodia.

Cambodia is becoming a popular destination with Western travellers because it has a stunning and diverse natural landscape, it has friendly people, it has enjoyed a rich and varied history and offers up a whole host of exciting and fantastic experiences to enjoy.

Many of those who visit Cambodia for an extended period of time fall in love with the country and its people and are determined to work to help the nation and either settle down or later return to work in Cambodia.

For people with a dream of helping the country and its citizens to progress there are various vacancies available annually for aid and charity workers as well as extensive job openings for teachers. An alternative to these industries for employment for expats is the tourism industry which is growing rapidly and bolstering the economy - this fact means that tourism is now helping to stabilise Cambodia and therefore jobs in Cambodia for Westerners can be found mainly in tourism, education or charity fields.

Anyone thinking about moving to live for a while in this fascinating and stunning country and who would like to know more specifics about the types of jobs available in Cambodia that expatriates usually take should find useful tips and insider advice in this article.

As stated tourism, charity work and education are the main employment sectors for expatriates but in recent months a significant amount of exploration has revealed extensive oil and natural gas reserves in the territorial waters of Cambodia meaning that this is an alternative field of employment that will likely open up to external Western contractors in the future.

In the meantime anyone determined to find employment in Cambodia will find it difficult to source anything remotely unless the individual in questions approaches a recruitment company specialist in either the field in which they wish to work or in the country of Cambodia itself - an alternative is to directly make contact with the aid agencies who work in Cambodia for example or international agencies which employ teaching staff for the country's schools.

In terms of teaching jobs there's one big complaint that you will hear from all those working in the education industry and that is that the level of pay is very low and consequently the standard of living that teachers can aspire to in Cambodia is correspondingly low...however you have to stop and ask yourself why you would want to teach in Cambodia in the first place - surely those who commit to teaching in schools in Phnom Penh or even in smaller towns such as Battambang aren't in it for the money!

The whole thing about working in a country like Cambodia is gaining invaluable life experience at the same time as enjoying the travel and adventure that goes hand in hand with working abroad temporarily in a country where Western expats all band together!

Teachers often find employment in one of the international schools located in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh or in one of the language schools dotted across the country, other's work alongside Khmer teachers in provincial schools mainly teaching English or teaching other key subjects through the medium of English.

For jobs in all other employment sectors there is a Khmer Website Directory which lists jobs in many diverse fields. When it comes to the better paying end of the scale of jobs available in Cambodia the charities and aid agency employees are relatively well remunerated which means that the standard of living they can enjoy is also correspondingly good. Having said that no job in Cambodia is going to make an employee particularly wealthy, in fact the main criteria that anyone who is committed to working in Cambodia should have is a desire to assist rather than to take and to facilitate development and improvement.

Read more at http://ezinearticles.com/?Jobs-in-Cambodia&id=234731

http://www.languagecorpsasia.com

No Quick Fix to Asia Literacy Crisis

No quick fix to Asia literacy crisis.

It is just a pity that this concern was absent when the decision was made not to renew funding for the National Asian Languages and Studies in Schools Program in the May budget last year.

Yes, NALSPP had its shortcomings but these were mostly a result of its low funding. Its predecessor, the National Asian Languages and Studies in Australian Schools, was funded for eight years at the equivalent of around $100 million annually today but NALSPP was given only about $20 million a year over half that period.

In any case, with NASLPP gone, the situation has now become very serious, exacerbated by decades of inconsistent policy and inadequate or unreliable funding support by state and Commonwealth governments.

The Asia Education Foundation report, Four Languages, Four Stories, and Professor David Hill's more recent report on Indonesian in universities make it clear that the market is failing to produce the expertise Australia needs, as power and wealth shift from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

In October 2011, The Sydney Morning Herald reported that NSW has just reported its lowest proportion ever of students enrolled in a second language _ nine per cent of 72,391 HSC students. French was most popular, with 1,471. Japanese  had 1376 and Chinese 1091.  Indonesia had just 232 and Hindi a mere 42.

In 1972, when the White Australia Policy was still in place and our population less by a third, 1,190 students did Indonesian language at year 12. Just 1,100 did so in 2010.

Studies of Asia other than languages have fared just as badly too. By any measure, this decline in Asian studies is a failure of policy. Our national dumbing-down in Asia literacy over the last four decades may mean that the only Western country in Asia may instead find itself marginalized in the coming regional debates over trade, security, environment, regional identity, culture and religion.

This has not happened because no one knows what to do.

NALSAS managed to double enrolments in Asian studies in its 8 years before it was axed by the Howard government. Many of its ideas were re-run -- with some success -- by NALSPP in its short life and there are plenty of clear and practical suggestions for further reforms in the AEF and Hill reports, many of which have  backing from school and university groups.

No, the problem is lack of consistent, reliable and substantial funding support for Asia literacy from state and Commonwealth governments. Asia literacy programmes will inevitably cost money, because the market hasn't worked. Unfortunately, support for Asia expertise in Australia has been inadequate for decades. When limited resources have been available, their impact has been weakened by short duration, policy flip-flops and a sense of complacency.

Like it or not, if Australia is to be able to engage effectively with Asia in the years ahead a very large investment by the Commonwealth in Asian studies in schools is urgently required _ and it must be maintained for years to come. There are no quick fixes.

If this big investment doesn't happen soon, the cumulative damage wrought by years of inconsistent, low-scale and short-term policy support for Asian studies will be so great that it will take decades to locate and re-train the teachers and Asia specialists necessary to get us back up to speed.

Ultimately, failure to invest now will cost us a great deal more in terms of national prosperity and security in the future -- and it will greatly diminish our national cultural life.

This is all playing out against the backdrop of our deep-seated and longstanding preference for our Western history over our Asian geography. These are wrongly assumed to be incompatible, when our future depends on demonstrating we can reconcile them.

Yes, the government is at last asking for suggestions, but it is also warning that it has little money to spend. This won't work. There are now no cheap and easy solutions to our national Asia literacy wipe-out. Let's hope the forthcoming Australia in the Asia Century White Paper will make governments get more serious, before it is too late.

Read more at http://www.theaustralian.com.au/higher-education/opinion/no-quick-fix-to-asia-literacy-crisis/story-e6frgcko-1226344055816

http://www.languagecorpsasia.com

Western Pupils Lag Asians by Three Years

Western Pupils Lag Asians by Three Years.

Western schoolchildren are up to three years behind those in China's Shanghai and success in Asian education is not just the product of pushy "tiger" parents, an Australian report released Friday said.

The study by independent think-tank The Grattan Institute said East Asia was the centre of high performance in schools with four of the world's top systems in the region -- Hong Kong, South Korea, Shanghai and Singapore.

"In Shanghai, the average 15-year-old mathematics student is performing at a level two to three years above his or her counterpart in Australia, the USA and Europe," Grattan's school education programme director Ben Jensen said.

"That has profound consequences. As economic power is shifting from West to East, high performance in education is too."

Students in South Korea were a year ahead of those in the US and European Union in reading and seven months ahead of Australian pupils, said the report, using data from the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment.

The PISA, pioneered by the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, has become a standard tool for benchmarking international standards in education.

The study said that while many OECD countries had substantially increased funding for schools in recent years, this had often produced disappointing results and success was not always the result of spending more money.

Australian schools have enjoyed a large increase in expenditure in recent years, yet student performance has fallen while South Korea, which spends less per student than the OECD average, had shot up, it said.

"Nor is success culturally determined, a product of Confucianism, rote learning or 'tiger mothers'," the report said, the latter a reference to ethnic-Chinese parents who push hard for their children to succeed.

It said Hong Kong and Singapore had made major improvements in reading literacy in the past decade, while the test by which the students were ranked was not conducive to rote learning as it required problem solving.

The report said the best systems focused on a relentless, practical focus on learning and teacher education, mentoring and professional development, rather than greater spending.

The four systems were also unafraid to make difficult trade-offs to achieve their goals, with Shanghai, for example, raising class sizes to up to 40 pupils but giving teachers more time to plan classes and for their own research.

Read more at http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/world/280307/western-pupils-lag-asians-by-three-years-study

http://www.languagecorpsasia.com