Welcome to the first edition of The Friday Fifteen, bringing you fifteen interesting stories from around the world of higher education. This week, we’re checking out a new government in Bangladesh and ending on a rock band, with stops in New Zealand, North Korea, Norway, and the Netherlands along the way. Enjoy!

1. Starting with Canada, the headline across the sector right now is about the impact from the cap on international student visas. The Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) has published a noteworthy report on the under studied regulatory landscape for Private Career Colleges in Ontario, which are particularly affected as the regulatory landscape shifts. Read the report here. HEQCO, “Understanding the Regulatory Landscape of Private Career Colleges”
2. The OECD released its annual Education at a Glance report for 2024: The report’s theme for 2024 focuses on equity, examining how factors like gender, socioeconomic status, and regional location affect educational and labour market outcomes. Read in full here. OECD, “Education at a Glance, 2024”
3. New research from the US shows that state schools offer better ROI than their flagship counterparts, despite (or because of?) the fact that they consistently receive less funding per student. Read more here. Washington Monthly, “Those Colleges with ‘State’ in Their Name” (with research provided by the Upjohn Institute)
4. In Bangladesh, two students who were key figures in the mass protests that led to the prime minister’s resignation last month have been named to the interim government. It seems that student movements still carry important political weight in some parts of the world. Read about this historic first here. University World News, “In Historic First, Students Form Part of Interim Government”
5. MIT is reporting a decline in diversity following last summer’s Supreme Court ruling on race-based affirmative action, but at the same time, some institutions are seeing success with other strategies. Instead of freaking out about the demises of equality in universities, we probably should wait until everyone’s numbers are released so there can be an informed discussion. That said, you can read about the initial figures here. Inside Higher Ed, “Making Sense of MIT’s Diversity Decline”
6. North Korea apparently has one private university, the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, which actually allows foreign professors to teach. Who knew? Foreign profs are now returning to the country as intense COVID-19 restrictions lift. Read that story here. NK News, “Foreign Professors to Teach at North Korean University, First Time Since COVID”
7. In NZ, the new government has launched what seems like a very soft review of university policy. It’s not as formal as what we saw in the Australian “Universities Accord” process, but it could still be quite influential. Description of the project here. Best set of commentary/discussion so far, here. Roger Smyth, “Incentives and Policies to Promote Excellence in Teaching: A submission in response to number 4, part 1 of the University Advisory Group’s questions”
8. Ithaka S+R, a not-for-profit organization providing strategic advice and support services for PSIs, has published an interesting survey of faculty and open educational resources, which you can read here. Ithaka S+R, “US Instructor Survey, 2024”
9. A story about Russian tuition fees: Unsaid in this piece is that to the extent that student status protects young people from conscription, the value of a place at university has risen substantially since 2022, and this is now being shown in the price. Read it here. University World News, “Universities Hike Cost of Tuition for New Academic Year”
10. They’ve been talking about international campuses in India for decades now. But they might just actually have one–and it’s the UK’s University of Southampton. Read the story here. The Economic Times,”5,000 Students and 30 Courses in 8 Years: Southampton University draws up plan for India campus”
11. Big cuts are coming to campuses in the Netherlands (we’ll be dealing with this story on the blog towards the end of September), and in addition, the government is cracking down on English-language delivery of higher education. Here’s a view from the rector of a university that bet big on English language instruction and is now in serious peril. A strike is looming; read more about it here. The Pie, “Netherlands: Higher education protestors threaten strike action”
12. Just because you have zero tuition doesn’t mean you have low levels of student debt. Norway, it turns out, has some of the highest student debt in the world. You can read about it here. University World News, “Graduate Debt: Does Norway need more medical study places?”
13. In the US, (as in Canada), the aid-adjusted price of public higher education is actually going down. Nobody believes this is true: all the more reason to dig into the data; read it here. The Hill, “Forget that $90,000 Sticker Price: College costs are actually going down”
14. This cute little article, from our friends at WONKHE, compares what’s happening in Higher Education to the enshittification process in big tech. As our proverbial VC funding dries up, how are we going to resist the same compromises on quality, visa-a-vis 3x as many ads on Facebook? Read the full story here. WONKHE, “How to Resist the Enshittification of Higher Education”
15. Apparently, Public Community Colleges are turning to rock bands to fund new programs. Read about the Metallica Scholars program, which is now entering its sixth year, here. Westword, “How Mettalica is Helping Front Range Community College Students Get Jobs”