Gains in university access, but gains in social mobility still a concern – OECD

By Brendan O’Malley – Managing Editor. In News, Yojana Sharma unpacks the OECD’s Education at a Glance 2015 report, which shows rising higher education participation rates in OECD countries, but troubling indications that social background still plays a big role in university access.
In Commentary, Stephen Wilkins reflects on incidents that have led commentators to question the extent to which international branch campuses are able to operate ethically in countries that may not uphold Western values like civil liberties. Goolam Mohamedbhai says the recently adopted Sustainable Development Goals provide a unique opportunity for universities to play a meaningful role in national and global development. And Vangelis Tsiligiris suggests that transnational education will need to be innovative and flexible to address changing student expectations and market conditions.
In our World Blog this week, Patrick Blessinger looks at the challenges in preparing students for a hyper-connected, changing world – a world which has become a global knowledge society of interdependent human activity.
In Features, Jan Petter Myklebust reveals the findings of a Swedish report which looks at how 16 world-class universities are governed. Dror Ben-Naim describes how forward-thinking Australian universities are improving the design of their online offerings to boost student performance and stop disengagement. Reuben Kyama reports from the Young Africa Works summit that the agriculture sector will feature prominently in development in Africa and that universities have a key role to play.
In the Q&A section, Gilbert Nganga interviews Dr Simon Gicharu, the man behind East Africa’s thriving private Mount Kenya University. Read more...