The Chronicle of Higher Education's most recent listing, by Nina C. Ayoub, includes several books we thought might be of interest to SCUP members:

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"The corporation acted on its own."

The YaleNUSCollege is a collaborative effort of Yale University and the National University of Singapore. An issue of governance has arisen late in planning for this new campus. We’ll flip the first two paragraphs of Whose Yale College, by Elizabeth Redden of Inside Higher Ed, because we think that makes the issues clearer.

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A fairly comprehensive view of current faculty-tenure issues and models in the US, from the perspective of the UK. Worthwhile:

"Some arbitrary volume of published papers, on some narrowly defined points of debate, is not necessarily more worthy than other activities," said Gee. Instead, Ohio State should value applied research that has an impact on people, he argued. "We can dare to say, 'No more' to quantity over quality. We can stop looking at the length of a vita and start measuring its heft."

Implementing the grand vision is challenging. Ohio State has more than 100 tenure-granting units, each with its own set of criteria. Donoghue says he welcomes a broader definition of scholarship, and hopes that digital publishing will be recognised. "But I still don't know what the president means by 'interdisciplinarity'," he says. "In the English department, we're baffled about how to interpret that."

Each year, SCUP's Pacific Regional Conference offers workshops, tours, and sessions to give SCUP members opportunities to learn, share knowledge and experiences, and connect with colleagues all over the region. Planning for the annual conferences starts months, even years in advance and is only made possible each year by a dedicated group of volunteers that make up the local host and conference planning committee. Our recent March 2012 Pacific 360 Newsletter acknowledges the contribution of some these individuals. Your membership dues underwrites the expenses of this volunteer work. If you're not a member, please join and contribute!

One such SCUPer is Michael Fung, Director of Planning & Institutional Research, The Hong Kong University of Science & Technology. Pacific 360's editor, Cheryl Lentini, of HMC Architects, interviewed Fung:

Cheryl Lentini | Tell us what first interested you in SCUP and why you became actively involved in the organization's leadership and program development?

Michael Fung | I was drawn to SCUP’s focus on integrated institutional planning, an emphasis that is not replicated in other higher education associations and networks. In face of increasing global competition and rapid developments in the higher education sector, especially in Asia, planners play an increasingly vital role in strategic development of institutions. At the SCUP national conference last year, I linked up with John White and a number of members from the Pacific Region, and we got really excited discussing the possibility of a SCUP-Asia link. We have since taken the ideas forward, working with Chris Shay and team, and have put together what we believe would be an exciting and meaningful link-up between US and Asia, in the upcoming Higher Education Planning in Asia Forum (HEPA) held in Hong Kong, and the Pacific Region conference at Stanford.

Cheryl Lentini | You have been instrumental in organizing the concurrent Hong Kong event and the video linkage with the SCUP Stanford conferences. What does that involve and how do you balance it with your duties at HKUST?

Michael Fung | Getting this inaugural Asian event off the ground takes a lot of work. I am blessed to have an enthusiastic organizing committee (Bhupinder Singh from NUS, Kevin Downing from CityU, Bruce White from U of Canterbury), a team of dedicated and capable staff (Joyce Lam, Natalie Chang, David Shiu and more), generous support from industry sponsors, and the faith, support and encouragement from SCUP Pacific Region (John White, Chris Shay, John Long, and more). It has been a wonderful journey, and we are all looking forward to a successful event.

Cheryl Lentini | What are some of the highlights of the Hong Kong event that you are most excited about bringing to your attendees?

Michael Fung | Some of the highlights of the HEPA Forum in Hong Kong that we are very excited about are: Live video-link with the SCUP Pacific Region conference, allowing a high degree of back-and-forth interactions Participation by University planners from all across Asia, including Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Korea, Australia, and New Zealand Senior delegation from 16 UK institutions participating in part of the Forum With the diverse group of participants, the Forum will offer rich international perspectives, and we expect lots of interactions, networking, and mutual sharing and learning amongst senior colleagues. We also have a set of interesting topics lined up, such as setting up overseas branch campuses in Mainland China, driving change within institutions, insights in institutional risk management and disaster recovery, and more.

Cheryl Lentini |What are some of the major initiatives underway at HKUST you are involved in that might interest our members?

Michael Fung | There will be a system-wide shift from a 3-year to a 4-year undergraduate system in the Hong Kong universities, starting in Fall this year. This translates to a breathtaking 33% growth in undergraduate enrolment from the next academic year onwards. It has been a hectic past few years planning and co-coordinating the growth, including the redesigning of all our undergraduate programs, hiring of faculty, constructing new teaching and research facilities, enhancing student accommodation and amenities, and stepping up student recruitment locally and internationally. The pace of development and change will continue to accelerate as we approach Fall 2012. These are exciting times for HKUST, and the substantial growth provides a rare opportunity for us to sharpen our strategies and to align our institutions to new growth areas.

Cheryl Lentini | Thank you so much, Michael, for this interview and for your energies devoted toward integrated planning for higher education.

We've been puzzled for decades by those who complain about the state of American education. Sure, you can point to students who underperform and yet are graduated. And that's only one theme of criticism. But we've always felt that it was unfair to be comparing the underperforming or average student of, say, 2010, with the average college student or high achieving student of, say, 1950. Instead, how do today's top students compare to those of yesteryear; and how many of today's students would never even have been able to matriculate in 1950?

Philip G. Atlbach writes (PDF), in the current issue of International Higher Education, about the inevitability of inequality that derives from increasing access. It's worth a read for perspective's sake:

The reality of postsecondary education, in an era of access combined with fiscal constraint and ever-increasing costs, is that inequality within higher education systems is here to stay. Most countries have or are creating differentiated systems of higher education that will include different kinds of institutions serving specific needs. This process is inevitable and largely positive. However, the research universities at the top of any system tend to serve an elite clientele and have high status, while institutions lower in the hierarchy cater to students who cannot compete for the limited seats at the top. Major and growing differences exist in funding, quality, and facilities within systems. Given financial and staffing constraints, institutional inequalities will continue. Students will come from more diverse backgrounds and in many ways will be more difficult to serve effectively.

All of these issues constitute a deep contradiction for 21st-century higher education. As access expands, inequalities within the higher education system also grow. Conditions of study for many students deteriorate. More of them fail to obtain degrees. The economic benefits assumed to accrue to persons with a postsecondary qualification probably decline for many. Access remains an important goal—and an inevitable goal—of higher education everywhere, but it creates many challenges.

We, as Americans, like to put decisions off as long as possible ... it's a strength ... it's a surprise to most experts that the desire to study in the US, for undergraduates, continues to grow worldwide ... relatively few American students study for a degree overseas.

Abroad, yes, but not for a degree. This is a very brief portion of an interview. Interesting but not deep.

This very interesting post at "BlogU" brings to light many of the issues and questions that we've been hearing about at SCUP events and via SCUP communications. It specifically looks at what some institutional associations are doing to collaborate in gaining and sharing expertise in internationalization. As might be expected, the author quotes SCUPer Ann Duin Hill as someone with much related expertise. Her comment to the author was about shared infrastructure development, something that is focused on during the latter half of the post:

[W]hy should universities establish their own IT systems in global higher education hubs when they could collaborate much more closely and reduce costs? Or why should universities from one country work on an individual basis to establish foreign presence via leased space in select city-regions when they could collaborate, via an associational or inter-associational relations, and build a purpose built structure?

After the following paragraph, the author raises a long list of questions to be answered: This list is probably worth accessing and keeping on hand or in your mind.

These associations, and their cousins in other countries and regions, have shown themselves to be adroit and supportive on an increasing number of levels despite constrained resources. This said, it seems to me that there is a growing disjuncture between well-intended associations of universities and the defacto (and often not expressed) needs of their membership bases, especially with respect to the deep internationalization agenda. Members are grappling (or not, which should be a concern!) with complex challenges and topics like: (See the article for the list of 12 itemized questions.)

He recognizes the good work of such groups as the APLU and CIC, but says that much more is needed:

Associations of universities are obvious candidates to build up the capacity of their members but they too are seeing enhanced obligations and mission creep as the denationalization process unfolds. Such associations are also grappling with fiscal constraints for they tend to reply upon membership fees as a main if not majority source of revenue. Thus there is an emerging disjuncture - universities have more on their plate, while associations have more on their plate, but the membership fee revenue foundation has intractable constraints and structural contradictions associated with it.

To access this full article, you may need a subscription or a day pass to The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Saudi Arabia intends to go from 860,000 college students right now, to 1,700,000 ... in four years! We forecast the need for some darned experienced planners, and a need for that planning to be done in an integrated way.

[It's] a gargantuan task. Creating better-skilled, employable Saudi university graduates, says Mr. Partrick, involves reforming the entire educational system, restructuring the country's labor market, and encouraging a "cultural shift in terms of attitudes toward work—what Saudis will do—and education—what it's appropriate to teach to Saudi children."

All that will have to take place at the same time that increasing numbers of young Saudis pursue higher education. "As we are expanding access," says Mr. Al-Ohali, "there is a lot of emphasis not to lose quality."

Perhaps because the Carnegie classifications created compatible categories of universities and colleges across the United States (and facilitated student transfers between institutions), American academics don't realize how programs and institutions are far from streamlined elsewhere, even within a single country. Americans sometimes make the parochial assumption that other people know the Carnegie system. They don't. I have seen European colleagues look blankly at American applicants' references to things like GPA and "graduate credits" ... .

The level of dependence on the state is another difference: In much of the world, universities are all public institutions. Students are accustomed to paying trivially low fees (even at elite institutions like the Sorbonne) and receiving a government stipend while they study. That helps explain the extended time to degree in some countries and the difference in student attitudes in Europe compared with the United States.

Depending on how large their stipends are, students attend the nearest university to their homes and commute, or they move out of their parents' houses into shared apartments and live on the student dole. But the idea that going to a university should cost a student (or a student's family) a significant amount of money faces entrenched resistance in Europe.

The BPP University College of Professional Studies, just created this week, is the first privately run university college in Britain in 30+ years and only the second in its history. A for-profit provider has been given the name and the institution. More.

So in steps the private sector, which can at least take those who can afford its significantly higher prices. BPP focuses on providing bankable qualifications such as law, accounting and business (the name refers to the initials of the three accountants who set it up). Students studying accounting at its business school in London, as well as those engaged in distance learning, reckon that its pricey courses are generally regarded by employers as being of higher quality than those in many public-sector universities.

BPP also competes in the lucrative market for postgraduate education. This is unregulated, so state-funded universities charge hefty fees for masters degrees and then use the money to help subsidise their loss-making undergraduate provision. BPP has no need for such cross-subsidies, so it can spend almost all of what postgraduate students pay on teaching them.