Ukraine’s law on education – “linguistic racism”
PARIS (tass) -- Russian education and science minister, Olga Vasilyeva has used the 39th congress of UNESCO’s highest governing body, the General Conference in Paris, to come down hard on the Ukraine’s new law on education. The law envisages that all secondary education will be undertaken in Ukrainian, to the anger of the Russian minority in the country. Vasilyeva condemned the law as “linguistic racism” ... read more 07.11.2017
Bulgaria: a sponge for EU funds
SOFIA (mediapool) -- According to the European Commission, Bulgaria is a ‘golden’ environment for absorbing EU funds. The country’s “Smart Growth Science and Education” initiative is outperforming other programmes. To date, over 120 million leva (61 million euros) have been invested in the sector, mostly in the area of student support ... read more 07.11.2017
New Murcian university law in jeopardy
MURCIA (opinión de murcia) -- A new regional university law in Murcia, capital of the eponymous southeastern Spansh region, which promises ‘more freedoms’ to the education sector, is under threat. The spokesperson for the Murcian Executive, Noelia Arroyo announces that the regional government will not accept the law reform if it does not obtain necessary consensus among the difference actors that will have to participate in it ... read more 08.11.2017
Oxford and Cambridge in Paradise
LONDON (independent) -- The universities of Oxford and Cambridge invested millions of pounds in offshore funds, according to revelations contained in the Paradise Papers. Money was separated into two funds, one directly from the universities and the other from individual colleges. They are the only European higher education institutions known to have cheated the public in that way. No scientific organisation, neither universities minister Jo Johnson, nor any ranking agency or university association has called them to account so far ... read more 08.11.2017
Automation forces education to change
WASHINGTON (world bank) -- Automation is heralding a renewed race between education and technology. However, the ability of workers to compete with automation is handicapped by the poor performance of education systems ... read more 09.11.2017
Irish universities under scrutiny
DUBLIN (irish times) -- Irish universities accused of wrongdoing face the prospect of being investigated by Government-appointed inspectors with the power to access sensitive internal records. Generous severance packages to employees on one side, and the treatment of whistleblowers on the other side are part of the reasons for higher education minister Mary Mitchell O’Connor to insist on stricter assessments of the universities ... read more 06.11.2017
Eastern Olympiads in natural sciences
CHELYABINSK (kremlin) -- The XIV Interregional Cooperation Forum in Chelyabinsk with Vladimir Putin and Nursultan Nazarbayev focussed on the development of human capital. Mr Putin came forward with a proposal of establishing joint Russian-Kazakh research centers on the basis of the leading higher educational institutions of two regions. Also discussed by the two Presidents was the organisation of cross-border Olympiads for school students in Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry and Biology ... read more 09.11.2017
Danish employers exploit foreign students
COPENHAGEN (uwn) -- Students from Eastern Europe in Denmark receive public student aid while they are working in restaurants and cleaning floors for a pittance. According to a report, 31.3 percent of EU students in the survey who are engaged as migrant workers earn significantly below the minimum wage. The share of foreign students earning only 40 percent of the minimum wage is highest among Bulgarians, Lithuanians and Polish ... read more 8.11.
France cuts through complicated admissions
PARIS (europe1) -- The French education minister, Frédérique Vidal has launched a new higher education admissions procedure, which will be operational by January. French students will no longer have to ‘rank’ their choices in order of preference, or wait too long for a response from universities. The plan, with funding of nearly one billion euros, also aims to cut the high first-year failure rate while it avoids overt pre-entry selection ... read more | and here 09.11.2017
Maccharini is guilty
STOCKHOLM (the scientist) -- Sweden’s Central Ethics Review Board (CEPN) has found evidence of scientific misconduct in all six of the synthetic trachea transplantation publications made by Paolo Macchiarini that it reviewed. The papers reported on the implantations of three patients with artificial tracheae - all of whom died. In addition, Swedish prosecutors considered pursuing manslaughter charges against Macchiarini, but these were dropped earlier this month ... read more 05.11.2017
Maltese government keeps a foot in the door
VALETTA (independent) -- The Maltese government has made a controversial move to establish a ‘governing board’ for the University of Malta. The board members are to be selected by the Prime Minister, and the Rector must attend meetings when summoned. Education minister, Evarist Bartolo has clarified that the government has “no intention of crushing the university with some kind of heavy hand” ... read more 08.11.2017
“All in” for the right to study in Italy
ROME (orrizonte scuola) -- A broad alliance of Italian associations, trade unions, PhD students, NGOs and MPs from several parties collected 57,000 signatures in favour of the “right to study”. They handed their petition for the amendment of next year’s budgetary plans and safeguarding of sufficient funding for student support structures to the Senate: 200 million euros more for scholarships, building repairs, a higher exemption threshold for tuition fees, VAT exemptions for canteens and public student housing ... read more 9.11.
Dutch universities living off charity
ROTTERDAM (advalvas) -- The Erasmus University Rotterdam has raised over 26 million euros in donations from its alumni, to the ends of financing research and scholarships. Their goal is 100 million euros by 2025. Vrije Universiteit of Amsterdam professor René Bekkers has called the plan “ambitious”, but is not surprised: “It is the only way for Dutch universities to survive, as student numbers increase and government funds stagnate” ... read more 09.11.2017
Time for Citizen Science
VIENNA (nature) -- A cross-university group by the name “Austrian Citizen Science Network” calls for the standardisation of citizen science. This would optimize quality and ensure openness in the science, in communication and in cooperation, and enable compliance with legislation in areas like data privacy ... read more 08.11.2017
Hungary’s unusual internationalisation
BUDAPEST (444) -- Hungarian science and education minister László Palkovics, has announced plans to make the Hungarian higher education system “as international as possible” after his visit to Iran, where the two countries agreed to offer one another 100 places for international students. They are expected to be in the fields of artificial intelligence, laser physics, medicine, transport, and water use ... read more 16.10.2017