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By Anne West, Jonathan Roberts, Jane Lewis & Philip Noden. Responsibility for meeting the costs of higher education in England has moved inexorably away from the government toward the family with the introduction of tuition fee and maintenance loans. Although an important public policy issue, there is limited research on how the policy impinges on the private sphere of the family. This paper focuses on financial support given by parents, including difficulties and constraints along with their perspectives of and responses to student loan debt, and students’ views of their financial independence. In-depth interviews with 28 parent–student dyads revealed different patterns of support. Some parents, contrary to policy assumptions, felt responsibility for their children’s student loan debt and acted to avoid, minimise or cushion the debt. There was evidence of financial stress for less affluent families. However, students with no parental support and high levels of government funding felt financially independent. The findings suggest that more affluent families were able to protect their children from student loan debt in different ways, whilst those with lower incomes were not able to do so, apparently creating a new form of inequality.
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The Higher Education Authority and Quality and Qualifications Ireland are delighted to announce the establishment of a memorandum of understanding. Reflecting a shared commitment to enhancing the performance and quality of Irish higher education, the memorandum of understanding provides a framework for cooperation and communication between the HEA and QQI, as well as for close partnership-working with the higher education sector, to ensure the coordination and complementarity of the two organisations’ activities. It sets out a range of actions, to be implemented over the period 2015–2017, to support the 4 key commitments presented in the document—commitment to coherence of approach, to alignment of activities, to Ireland in an international context, and to partnerships for enhancement.
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By Ivana Katsarova. The performance and quality of higher education has become a vital sign of a country’s capacity to foster its future economic development. The race for talent is currently open on a global scale. In spite of the fact that the United States is still the global leader with 17% of international students, the EU is increasingly popular with the United Kingdom, France and Germany accounting respectively for 13%, 6%, and 6% of world students. One of the elements accounting for the global attraction of EU universities resides in relatively lower tuition fees compared to American universities. Likewise, efforts made to develop quality and accreditation frameworks for mobility within the EU place Europe at the top of the most advanced global regions in this respect. While EU universities took more time to develop Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), they now account for approximately one quarter of MOOCs in the world and the numbers are constantly rising. Since May 2014, the EU has also its own global ranking system: U-Multirank. Even though it is difficult to predict in what ways technological change will affect higher education in the longer term, it is clear that sustained effort and on-going international cooperation will be required to improve current structures and take full advantage of the impact of new technologies.
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Islamic religious education in Europe and the United States has become a subject of intense debate after Muslims raised in the West carried out attacks against their fellow citizens. People worry their states are doing too little or too much to shape the spiritual beliefs of private citizens.
In her upcoming Brookings paper, Jenny Berglund explains the differences in publicly-funded Islamic education in Europe and the United States. Her report details existing religious education programs, teacher training, and ongoing political debates, grounded in the historical and religious norms of the countries. Berglund also recommends good practices for governments to further their citizens’ knowledge about Islam and promote inclusive citizenship and respect.
On April 2, the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World hosted Berglund and an American expert on Islamic religious education to discuss current programs and best practices in Europe and the United States. More...

By Gabriel Zinny. Many cities in Latin America have taken the lead in promoting education reform, demonstrating that city-wide reforms could have a greater impact and present less difficulty than attempting to reform the system at a national level.
One of the best examples may be the city of Buenos Aires, which undertook a comprehensive education reform five years ago led by Minister of Education Esteban Bullrich. More...

By Jenny Berglund. Islamic religious education in the United States and Europe has become a subject of intense debate after Muslims raised in the West carried out attacks against their fellow citizens. People worry their governments are doing too little or too much to shape the spiritual beliefs of private citizens. In a new analysis paper, Jenny Berglund explains the differences in publicly funded Islamic education in eight European countries and the United States. More...

By Brad Hershbein, Melissa S. Kearney and Lawrence H.Summers. Mainstream labor economists as well as several public commentators have argued that trends in the economy over recent decades—including technological developments, globalization, and trade, among others—have weakened the relative earnings power of those with lower levels of skills, especially those without a college degree. In recent decades, the earnings of those with a college degree or more have risen steadily, while the wages of those with lower levels of education have stagnated or fallen. Furthermore, lifetime earnings of workers with a college degree are nearly twice as high as those without one, a point made by a number of previous Hamilton Project analyses, including one from this past year. More...

By Harry J. Holzer. Views on what is happening to labor demand in the middle of the U.S. labor market are strongly divergent. Many economists argue that the middle is “hollowing out” as a result of digital technologies and globalization that make it easy for employers to replace workers doing routine tasks. But many employers argue they can’t fill the middle-skill jobs they have. My own calculations based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that the traditional middle of the job market – composed primarily of construction, production and clerical jobs that require fairly little education – has indeed been declining rapidly. But another set of middle-skill jobs – requiring more postsecondary education or training - in health care, mechanical maintenance and repair and some services - is consistently growing, as are skill needs within traditionally unskilled jobs. Among these are the ones that employers have had trouble filling. While many employers have done little to attract new workers by raising wages or investing in training, some employer reluctance to invest in skill-building on their own makes economic sense; and our educational system has done too little to generate employees with these skills as well. A new set of education and training policies and practices are hopeful in this regard, though policies to more directly expand the numbers of middle-paying jobs might also be needed.
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By Harry J. Holzer. Employment of Americans in middle-wage jobs has been declining, due to trends both in employer demand and worker skill attainment. Workforce development in the US now mostly occurs in community and forprofit colleges, as well as the lower-tier of 4-year colleges. Enrollment rates are high, even among the disadvantaged, but completion rates are very low and earnings are uneven for graduates. Community colleges lack not only resources but also incentives to respond to the job market (while the for-profit colleges need stronger regulation). Sectoral training and career pathway models show promise but need scaling and maintenance of quality, and employers also need greater incentives to participate and create more good jobs.
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Le domaine des Sciences Humaines et Sociales rassemble de nombreuses disciplines scientifiques qui ont en commun l'étude des femmes et des hommes et des sociétés dans lesquelles ils vivent (bien que les disciplines qui étudient le comportement animal puissent être considérées comme appartenant au domaine). Elles ont pour caractéristique de recourir à des théories et à des méthodes très différentes, d'avoir des histoires scientifiques distinctes, d'être pratiquées par des chercheurs appartenant à des institutions dont les règles divergent. Longtemps pratiquées selon le mode de l'engagement personnel sur un thème de recherche, elles ont progressivement évolué vers des approches plus collectives au sein de laboratoires.
L'ANR a contribué à modifier ce paysage de la recherche. La culture des projets collectifs  s'est généralisée. Le nombre de 700 projets déposés annuellement témoigne de l'adhésion des chercheurs. La construction de partenariats entre équipes de recherche s'est développée : la part des projets portés par une seule équipe s'est réduite au point de ne constituer qu'une part résiduelle des demandes, cela quelle que soit la discipline. La pluridisciplinarité s'est accrue au sein du domaine : près des deux tiers des projets sont déposés par des chercheurs d'au moins deux horizons disciplinaires.
Les choix de programmation reposent sur les besoins exprimés par les chercheurs et par les divers partenaires institutionnels intéressés par la recherche en SHS. Les Appels à Projets, d'abord consacrés aux recherches fondamentales du domaine s'étendent au partenariat avec les  autres disciplines scientifiques et  avec les institutions de la vie économique, sociale et culturelle.
L'apport de l'Agence au renforcement de l'internationalisation des SHS relève de deux priorités : ouvrir largement l'ensemble des processus, que ce soit la programmation, à travers le Comité sectoriel, ou l'évaluation, à travers l'expertise et les comités d'évaluation, à des scientifiques étrangers ; développer les programmes en coopération bi ou multi latérale afin de permettre aux chercheurs français de coopérer avec les meilleurs partenaires internationaux pour leurs projets. Voir l'article...