Some of France’s most illustrious scientists were outraged – and last week, their president listened. After meeting five Nobel laureates and a winner of the Fields Medal, French President François Hollande has cancelled more than half of an unexpected €256 million (US$286 million) cut in research and higher education budgets that had caused consternation in the country's scientific community, writes Martin Enserink for ScienceInsider. Read more...

The University of Helsinki has announced its decision to impose tuition fees of €13,000 to €18,000 (US$14,500 to US$20,000) on its postgraduate students from outside the European Union and the European Economic Area, reports Aleksi Teivainen for Helsinki Times. Read more...

The era of strong government-subsidised growth for universities appears to have ended with new figures showing the number of offers to students to enrol in undergraduate courses grew by only 1.2% in 2016, writes Tim Dodd for Australian Financial Review. Read more...

Universities and colleges are responding to the rapid growth in the population of older people in Ireland by offering retirees a chance to develop a second career, writes Carl O’Brien for The Irish Times. Read more...

Two major universities are set to allow students to earn course credits which will go towards their final degree through massive open online courses, or MOOCs, for the very first time in the United Kingdom, writes Aftab Ali for the Independent. Read more...

Facing budget constraints and demand for greater accountability in higher education, states are tying public college and university funding to the institutions’ ability to retain and graduate students. But a new paper from the Century Foundation argues that such performance-based funding models are reinforcing disparities within public higher education and doing little to move the needle on completion, writes Danielle Doublas-Gabriel for The Washington Post. Read more...

Scottish school leavers from poor backgrounds are being squeezed out of university by Scottish National Party government policies, according to a highly critical expert report that concludes the most eminent institutions are becoming more middle class, writes Simon Johnson for The Telegraph. Read more...

A government panel last week proposed the creation of higher education institutions offering vocational courses to address the need for specialists in sectors such as information technology and tourism, reports Jiji. Read more...

All publicly funded scientific papers published in Europe could be made free to access by 2020, under a “life-changing” reform ordered by the European Union’s science chief, Carlos Moedas, writes Nadia Khomami for the Guardian. Read more...

More than half of public universities in Malaysia have extreme disparities in favour of women, according to a new report by the Penang Institute, writes Ong Kian Ming for MalaysiaKini. Read more...