Category: Internationalization

Canada’s International Education Strategy Mark II (bis)

A couple of people have pointed out that I may have rushed to some conclusions about the meaning behind the International education strategy.  Isn’t it possible, some asked, that this wasn’t about a new strategy to attract students, but a strategy to send students abroad? (Small aside: that this question is still open five days after the announcement is a little bizarre. If the government had its act together on something like this, we’d know the answer by now.  Certainly, the usual suspects like

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Canada’s International Education Strategy Mark II

Tucked away almost unnoticed on page 67 of Finance Minister Bill Morneau’s Fiscal Update last week was a fascinating little statement: “To build more skills and provide training that will help support Canada’s international trade and increase global ties, Global Affairs Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada will work together to develop a new international education strategy.” What should we make of this? The initial impression made by this phrasing is not very good.  Sure, it makes sense that within the Government

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France’s New International Education Strategy

On Monday, Campus France (which is roughly equivalent to Canada’s CBIE, if CBIE were an arms-length government agency) published its new Stratégie d’attractivité pour les étudiants internationaux.  It’s an intriguing document for a couple ofreasons so I thought I would talk a bit about it today. It starts off run-of-the-mill, with some gee-whiz stats about the growth of the international student market.  Then, on page 6, we get to the heart of the matter.  The page is titled “La France, 4ieme pays

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Understanding Higher Education in the Gulf

On my way home from India last week, I stopped off in Dubai to take a quick peek at what was going on in the Gulf (which, just to define our terms a bit, consist of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, the last of which is a confederation of seven tiny statelets, including Abu Dhabi and Dubai).  Here’s my quick primer: The Gulf basically has four kinds of universities. First, it has “public” universities.  The

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Notes on Canada’s International Advantages (and Disadvantages)

During my brief trip to Asia, I spent a fair bit of time chatting with people who one way or another are in the international education business.  Two somewhat connected thoughts: Canadians Continue to be Not Very Good at the Whole International Campus Thing.   I spent a couple of days in Dubai, where there are now somewhere on the order of 100-odd institutions operating, a substantial portion of which are international.  The only “semi”- Canadian one is an outfit called

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