Exporting education

Every year, thousands of foreign students come to UCLA and other
American universities to experience higher education
“American-style” ““ and to reap the benefits
associated with such experiences when they return home.

But in an era when obtaining U.S. student visas can take longer
than graduating from college, and as national borders disintegrate
under the pressure from the global economy, many American
universities are taking their education services and setting up
campuses abroad to serve these students.

U.S. universities are joining scores of institutions from the
United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, in establishing programs
taught in English and attempting to capitalize on growing markets
of students who are willing to open their wallets for a diploma
bearing a Western name.

Partly responsible for such markets are the lack of advanced
higher education systems in countries booming in the world economy,
said Robert Rhoads, associate professor for education at UCLA.

High demand has originated in particular from countries with
emerging economies such as China and its Southeast Asian
neighbors.

“In many cases, a Western degree from a higher education
institution has a higher draw for potential employers,”
Rhoads said.

Many of the students passing through these institutions are
snapped up by transnational corporations who seek locally based
employees with an American education.

Such is the case for Philadelphia-based Temple University, a
public institution which founded and developed its Tokyo campus in
the early 1980s with the help of private sponsors.

Adelaide Ferguson, assistant vice president for international
programs at Temple, said students in Japan are very keen to be
associated with a U.S. education, given the popularity of American
culture among the Japanese.

“Students are drawn to the university not only because we
offer classes that are not available elsewhere, but also because of
the critical thinking offered by American education which is not
replicated in Japanese institutions,” she said.

Despite the potentially massive costs involved in setting up a
campus abroad, Ferguson said that Temple University Japan breaks
even, adding that the goal in venturing overseas never was to
capture profits.

But other institutions are seeking to take advantage of these
foreign education markets, engendered by international corporations
hungering for local talent.

The University of Chicago Graduate School of Business has set up
executive MBA programs in Barcelona, Spain and Singapore.

Similar programs have been started by the University of
Pennsylvania’s famed Wharton School in Singapore and
India.

New York-based Cornell University also made headlines two years
ago when classes started at its medical school satellite branch in
Doha, the capital city of Qatar ““ the first overseas campus
of any U.S.-based medical school.

Houry Tcheroyan, manager of the New York liaison for the Doha
campus, said the emir of Qatar had met with Cornell administration
and talked about duplicating the Ithaca, N.Y. campus in Education
City, a zone of facilities outside the capital dedicated to
research and teaching.

“The same services are provided, the same teaching is
provided and the degree that students get in Doha is equivalent to
the one you would get in the U.S.,” she added.

The University of California, on the other hand, has not
investigated such possibilities.

“The UC is not considering campuses abroad,” said
Hanan Eisenman, spokesperson for the UC Office of the
President.

The recent increase in demand for American education services
abroad could also be related to the post-Sept. 11, 2001 environment
in the United States, which has seen fewer student visas issued to
foreigners and longer waits for those lucky enough to obtain
one.

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the number of
foreign graduate students applying to programs in the United States
dropped significantly in 2004.

The survey, published by five higher education associations,
found that the decline was most noticeable among the nation’s
25 leading research institutions ““ with 15 reporting drops of
more than ten percent.

This decline ““ attributed by the survey to national
security policies which have made these students feel unwelcome
““ could be fueling supply for education services provided
within the home countries of these students.

But while the export of higher education services may benefit
many countries in the process of developing stronger educated
workforces, some experts warn that the trend of “academic
capitalism” could have detrimental effects too.

“I am concerned about the degree to which academic
capitalism sponsored by U.S. universities abroad becomes U.S.
cultural colonialism,” Rhoads said.

The culture of a country tends to be imbedded in its
universities and programs, he said, and might not be compatible in
foreign countries without their own education structures and
systems in place.

Rhoads added that an acceptable solution would be for Western
universities to collaborate with higher education institutions in
foreign countries, building positive global interactions.

And while going global with educational operations may be an
emerging trend, Rhoads said such activity may be levelling off.

“Institutions are discovering that (these operations) are
not as productive as some had hoped,” he said. “People
are pulling back.”