NATIONAL NEWS

R4m in jewellery stolen from university

The Cape Peninsula University of Technology is investigating its own staff after R4 million worth of jewellery was stolen, the Saturday Star reported."It's an in-house job and it's terrible. There was no sigh of breaking and entry. Someone came in, raided the place and locked up," jewellery design and manufacturing head Vassiliki Konstandakellis told the newspaper.

Back to school at TUT Soshanguve campus

Teaching at the Tshwane University of Technology’s Soshanguve campus is expected to resume on Monday.Students at the institution held violent protests during registration last week.Three people were injured as demonstrators stoned security guards.

‘We’ll sort out the education system’

The seriously flawed Mpumalanga education system, which is further crippled by maladministration and corruption, is going to get a total overhaul.In a wide-ranging interview with Sowetan on Friday, Premier David Mabuza said his administration wanted to deal with the provincial education system, which he described as “rotten to the core”.

Rhodes ‘chemistry magician’ dies

RHODES University is mourning the death its “chemistry magician” Douglas Rivett, who died peacefully late last month.Rivett was an internationally renowned organic chemist, but was especially known across the province for his Chemistry Magic Show which delighted and enthused generations of young scientists at the university.

REGIONAL & INTERNATIONAL NEWS

KENYA- Students can now transfer between EA universities

University students from the East African Community can now transfer their credits to another institution in the region.The university regulatory bodies under the Inter-University Council of East Africa (IUCEA) in collaboration with German Academic Exchange Service is reviewing courses and programmes being offered among member states.

ZIMBABWE- UZ Still the University of Choice in the World

THE University of Zimbabwe opened last week for the 2010 first semester amid growing concerns among students, parents and guardians over the deteriorating standards at the country's oldest and biggest learning institution. Our reporter, Fortious Nhambura (FN) caught up with the Vice Chancellor of the institution Professor Levy Nyagura (LN) to find out his thoughts about the college. Below is the question and answer session he had with Prof Nyagura on a variety of issues.

BANGLADESH- Helping the quality of higher education

There are two sides, basically, to improving higher education in Bangladesh. One involves expansion of educational opportunities or the quantitative factors. The other is the need for ensuring the quality of higher education. While the quantitative needs are lacking, the worse position is noted in terms of quality. Quality suffers from not having simply the sort of need-based educational institutions in sufficient number which are in high demand, violence in the campuses, the questionable standard of many of the private universities, etc.

CUBA- Havana Will Host Int’l Congress on Higher Education

Nearly 3,000 delegates from over 60 countries will participate in the 7th International Congress on Higher Education ‘University 2010’ that begins on Monday at Havana’s Convention Center.

INDIA- UGC may soon fund universities across India to digitise academic papers for online access

A national committee proposed the idea so that universities could digitise about 20,000 theses of the last five years.The University Grants Commission (UGC) is likely to fund universities across the country to digitise files that are five years old at least (including theses and dissertations) for open access if it accepts the recommendations of a national committee initiated by Inflibnet Centre, Ahmedabad.

INDIA- V-Cs discuss ways to raise funds

The newly-formed core committee comprising vice-chancellors of universities in state discussed a wide array of issues concerning higher education at Rajasthan University guest house on Saturday. They discussed ways to raise funds, introduction of new industrially-oriented courses, recruitment, better governance and mobilisation of resources.

LIBERIA- Faculty at Liberia’s 9 Universities, Colleges Numbers 1,137

The Director-General of the National Commission on Higher Education (NCHE), Dr. Michael P. Slawon, says his Commission has tallied 1,137 faculty and teaching staff at the nine recognized universities and colleges in Liberia.The statistics were released February 1 at the NCHE’s offices during an interaction with reporters in Monrovia.Of that number, Slawon said, 1,000 are males, while 137 are females.

MALAYSIA- Universities divided

It will take more than new student leaders to get public universities out of the political quagmire.NORMALLY as inscrutable as the Sphinx, the relief on Universiti Malaya (UM) vice-chancellor Prof Datuk Dr Ghauth Jasmon’s face spoke volumes when he announced the official results of the varsity’s campus elections on Wednesday, which handed victory to the Penggerak Mahasiswa camp.

PAKISTAN- PhD testing policy annoys students

Students of higher learning have expressed their annoyance over the GRE subject policy of Higher Education Commission (HEC) that classifies them in two different categories without any solid reason.The data provided by the students state that HEC allows students of some disciplines to take the local NTS test for admission to PhD while making it mandatory for some others to take the international GRE test.

SAUDI ARABIA- Academics urge private sector grants

University academics have praised Cabinet approval for the government to cover 50 percent of tuition fees for new students at private universities and appealed to private businesses to “take part in the development of the education process”.

VIETNAM- Education officials seek to raise university standards

Education departments in provinces and cities had worked with local universities to help them improve the quality of teachers and administrators, officials told a workshop held in HCM City on Thursday.Speaking at the workshop, which was attended by education officials and university and college representatives from the southern provinces, Bach Van Hop, principal of the HCM City Pedagogy University, said such co-operation helped improve the quality of training and education in the country.

CANADA- Student organization's report urges radical changes in post-secondary education

An organization that represents over 140,000 university students across Ontario on Friday recommended an ambitious agenda of long-term changes that included raising the OSAP (Ontario Student Assistance Plan) maximum to $175 per week, formal instruction in teaching methods and practices to Phd students at a cost of $1 million and regulating tuition fee increases at the rate of inflation.

UK- 15,000 university jobs at risk from Mandelson’s university cuts, warns union

More than 15,000 university jobs could be shed over the next few years as a result of Peter Mandelson's budget cuts, a higher education union has warned.Other plans include using post-graduates rather than professors for teaching and postponing major building projects, according to the Guardian. Some institutions may be forced to ditch courses and close campuses.The proposals have already provoked ballots for industrial action at many universities in the past week.

UK- University applicants face higher grade demands

Students who had already applied have found that the grades they were told they needed to achieve might not now be enough.The changes came as figures from Ucas, the admissions body, are expected to indicate that almost a third of students face missing out on a place this year.

USA- Harvard University links up with London

HARVARD University is considering backing an academy in London in what would be the first big link-up between an American Ivy League institution and a British state school.Southwark council, in the south of the capital, has opened discussions over the project with academics at the American university.

Powered by T-Host IT