Category: The Fifteen

The Fifteen: January 16, 2026

Hi all. It’s been over a month since the last Fifteen and you might think that the world of higher education would slow down over the holidays, but you’d be wrong. Buckle up, this is a big one. 1. Back in December the government in Bulgaria was forced to resign due to anti-corruption protests that were mainly led by students (although increasingly student protest is being called “Gen Z protests”, which is interesting and I would love to understand why). Iran is also currently undergoing a spasm of

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The Fifteen: December 12, 2025

Welcome to The Fifteen, a global round-up of the stories animating higher education institutions and systems around the globe. Let’s get to it. That’s it for now. The next Fifteen will return on January 9. See you then.

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The Fifteen: November 28, 2025

Welcome to The Fifteen, a global round-up of the stories animating higher education institutions and systems around the globe. Let’s get to it. 1. To Pyongyang, for a story about how a tightly-controlled, top-down, secretive admissions process leads to a system of rampant bribery, with parents paying party officials both for information and to get their children’s high schools added to the lists of potential admissions at the “right” universities. 2. Panjab University in Chandigarh is in a battle over its autonomy, and it

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The Fifteen: November 14, 2025

A quick reminder before we get to our regularly scheduled programming: On Wednesday, I told you about the National Defence Research Roundtable HESA is proposing to host on December 15 in Ottawa. We’ll be closing the expression of interest form at 3pm EST today. Interested in joining us? Click here and let us know. Welcome to The Fifteen, a global round-up of the stories animating higher education institutions and systems around the globe. Let’s get to it. 1. In Greece, the

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The Fifteen: October 31, 2025

Welcome to The Fifteen, a global round-up of the stories animating higher education institutions and systems around the globe. Let’s get to it. 1. From the US, an update on the Compact: of the nine original invitees, there are now seven “no”s, one “we’re not not saying no” (Vanderbilt) and one radio silence (UT Austin). In the face of near-universal rejection, Trump issued an open invitation to all institutions to sign the deal but none have yet done so, not even deep red-state public universities (yet, anyway). This

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