SCIENCE & EDUCATION

India's technical education regulator has come up with a policy that allows foreign institutions to set up campuses anywhere in the country even before a law to allow them entry has been enacted, writes Basant Kumar Mohanty for The Telegraph.

Regarding the Kyodo article "Former JETs defend program": Japan must get away from the teaching-by-osmosis style that the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program seems to be part of. Other countries around the world are demanding a thorough English education, and so should Japan. Having a university graduate play a few games is no substitute for a methodical system of learning authentic English, which is what Japan is sorely lacking.

Cambridge University has announced proposals to charge students the maximum £9,000 in tuition fees from next year, prompting warnings that more institutions will rush to follow suit.A report by Cambridge's working group on fees argues that it would be "fiscally irresponsible" for the elite institution to charge less than the maximum, adding it expects "most if not all of our peers" to do the same.

University tuition fees in Northern Ireland should increase to up to £5,750 a year, according to a review. Students would not be required to begin repaying the loans until they were earning £21,000 a year. More students would benefit from a maximum grant, which should be maintained at £3,475, to ensure participation of less well-off groups.The review was ordered by the Department for Employment and Learning following changes to the student support system in England and Wales.

JAKARTA. - United Nations' Children Fund (UNICEF) said that it has allocated 4 million U.S dollars for the development of education programs in Papua and West Papua provinces for the 2010-2012 period, local media reported here on Friday. The support is being provided in efforts to improve the quality of education offered in the two provinces, Sri Karna, a member of UNICEF's education staff in Biak, Papua was quoted as saying by the Kompas.com.

In what seems to be becoming a trend among business schools, future MBAs at the University of California, Berkeley are being given two free days on one of the school’s executive education programmes. The offer will be open for five years after their graduation.

The George Washington University School of Business (GWSB) in Washington DC has launched a new "World Executive MBA" program that will begin this fall. The 16-month program will be delivered via bi-weekly classes on Fridays and Saturdays at GW, as well as four residencies: two in Washington DC, and two six-day residencies abroad.

CEU Business School in Budapest, Hungary has announced that it will offer a new MBA concentration in entrepreneurship. Along with its General Management program, CEU already offers concentrations in Finance, Marketing, and Real Estate as options for its 11-month, full-time program.

Private Indian universities setting up campuses in Mauritius are helping the island nation off the African coast to realise its vision of transforming into a knowledge hub, reports Sify.Two of the largest private universities in India, the DY Patil Medical College and Amity University, are in the process of setting up campuses in Mauritius. The JSS Mahavidyapeetha, a Karnataka-based educational foundation, established the JSS Academy of Technical Education in Mauritius in 2006.

The Higher Education Ministry announced a plan to establish an electronic university, reports PK Abdul Gafour for Arab News. "We have been trying to establish an electronic university for the last one-and-a-half years to provide bachelor and masters degrees," said Muhammad Al-Ouhali, Deputy Minister for Education Affairs.

A recent study shows that moving up in the ranking list is a general ambition of China's universities, and the rankings affected their strategic planning. The study was conducted by Liu Niancai, Dean of Graduate School of Education (GSE) in Shanghai Jiao Tong University, who completed a report "Empirical Research of University rankings in China and abroad: Index, Weight, and Impact" by researching 16 Chinese and international rankings, according to the report.University principals and departments have made pushing up the university ranks a common aim.

Many universities are facing crises in their direct admission systems, as many students who passed have not reported for enrolment, writes Wannapa Khaopa for The Nation. To cope with the worsening problem, the Council of University Presidents of Thailand will hold a meeting next weekend to find out the proper proportions of direct and central university admissions.

Tanzania: - Three colleges have teamed up to award doctorate degrees from this month to ease the problem of lack of such courses in the country’s higher education institutions.The Institute of Finance Management (IFM) and Open University of Tanzania (OUT) will this month sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with a Netherlands-based university, Groningen, to cement the partnership.According to the project coordinator, Dr Jim Yonazi, the MoU will pave the way for establishing the programme at OUT. The institution has been accredited by the National Council for Technical Education (Nacte) to offer PhD programmes. On the other hand,  the IFM is still processing its accreditation.

Two leading universities have announced their intention to work more closely together to meet the challenges of the future.The Universities of Birmingham and Nottingham intend to share some academic appointments, research initiatives and facilities. They will also work together on management, administration and improving teaching, learning, and the student experience. Both are insisting it is not a merger.

Kyocera Corporation announced that it has proudly installed more than 1,200 solar power generating systems at public schools in Japan - ranking Kyocera as the No.1 supplier in this segment of the Japanese market.The use of solar power at schools in Japan has grown exponentially in recent years with the government's "School New Deal" initiative, which aims to broadly enrich the nation's educational facilities.

Japan's top university and business leaders have announced they will come together for the first time to reverse a steady slide in the country's global standing. The government-sponsored plan will focus on what corporate executives warn is a growing mismatch between the needs of industry and academe, which is damaging Japan's ability to compete abroad.

The European Commission has taken steps to simplify EU funding for research and innovation to cut costs and attract more participants, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), reports EurActiv.com.Accounting burdens and costs for SMEs in the EU's FP7 research programme have been reduced immediately, said Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, EU commissioner for research, innovation and science.

Prime minister Mark Rutte has no plan to amend the government’s plans to cut spending on higher education, he said after the weekly cabinet meeting.‘I am not going to give the impression that the plans will change dramatically,’ he is quoted as saying in the Telegraaf after a massive demonstration by students in The Hague.The cabinet has decided to get the government finances in order and improve the quality of higher education. This makes the savings necessary, the prime minister said.

President Barack Obama pledged support to reestablish America as the global leader in higher education in his State of the Union address last night.The president decried higher education budget cuts, which have become all the more common as states try to balance their coffers.

Nearly 5,000 students have been caught trying to cheat their way through their university course in the past five years, new figures have revealed.Hundreds of cases of academic “misconduct” are being detected at higher education institutions every year. Most of the incidents related to plagiarism, which has risen in recent years with essays becoming easily available to purchase online.