DrEducation: Trends and Insights on Global Higher Education

The SAGE Handbook of International Higher Education, edited by Darla K. Deardorff, Hans de Wit, John D. Heyl and Tony Adams is the most comprehensive collection of articles on internationalization of higher education. It brings together leading experts on the topic to take deep into issues, developments and trends related to international higher education. It is available for sale on amazon. Here is sample chapter entitled "Bridges to the Future The Global Landscape of International Higher Education" available for free download and a blog on the Handbook.

The handbook comprises five sections, covering key areas: internationalization of higher education in a conceptual and historic context; different thematic approaches to internationalization; internationalization of the curriculum, teaching and learning process, and intercultural competencies; the abroad dimension of internationalization and the mobility of students, scholars, institutions, and projects; and a concluding se…

Four year enrollment trends of leading destinations indicate a stagnancy or decline, except with Canada. What explains this trend? What are the future enrollment trends expected for 2013?

Note: above data includes all levels of enrollment. For example, VET level enrollment in Australia and OPT in the US.
The post-recession scenario hit the mobility of Indian students quite hard and uncovered two primary segment of students--immigration-driven and career-driven. Each destination has a mix of these two segments. It ranged from majority career-driven Indian students going to the US at master's degree level, to majority of immigration-driven students going to Australia and enrolling at vocational and technical colleges.

Due to recession, the US as a destination lost some of its attractiveness due to a lesser availability of financial assistance from universities and poorer prospects of finding jobs after completion of education. This is the time when one-year master's programs in …

Growth of engineering and management institutions in Indian have come to a screeching halt, confirming the trend predicted in my earlier posts--Engineering Pipeline: Disproportionate and Disconnected in August'09 and Indian B-School Bubble? in July'11.


The percentage growth in number of engineering institutions in India have came down from high of 43% in 2008-09 (academic year) to 3% in 2012-13. This translates into slowdown in starting of new institutions from 720 in 2008-09  to 105 in 2012-13. Likewise, for business schools, growth declined from 33% in 2008-09 to 3% 2012-13. In terms of absolute numbers, the number of new B-schools declined from 417 in 2009-10 to 82 in 2012-13.

This decline is a combination of two primary factors--weak regulatory mechanisms and profit motives of some private players. During the years of high growth in engineering and management institutions corruption in regulatory authorities was also riding high and many institutions were approved by ove…

Wish you a very happy, healthy and prosperous new year! 

2012 was a year when higher education sector faced increasing regulation but gained energy from technology and innovation.

In the US, rising debt-level and default rates, continued to increase the scrutiny of the for-profit sector and more recently there are still reports of emerging malpractices in the sector. One clear indicator of the pessimism around the sector is the stock prices of two leading for-profit companies--Apollo Group and DeVry--which are hovering close to their 52-week low. Earlier this year, both Apollo and DeVry announced job cuts and Apollo is shutting down some campuses to manage cost and switch students to online education.

The most “buzzing” technology-enabled educational innovation of the year was the concept free online education or MOOCs. It is putting pressure not only on traditional universities but also on for-profit institutions to assess their value offering and how to respond to MOOCs. As the E…