scholarly journals Toxic Academic Culture in East Asia

2016 ◽  
pp. 15-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rui Yang

East Asian societies’ recent progress in higher education has been severely tarnished by a toxic academic culture. With the exception of Japan where academic culture has been substantially better developed, an academic culture that is based on meritocratic values, free inquiry, and competition is largely absent in East Asian societies. The rotten academic culture has casted a blight over East Asia’s ambitious aspiration to world-class universities, despite the region’s recent strides on the research stage and huge investment in higher education. 

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Keenan Daniel Manning

PurposeThe management of higher education institutions (HEIs) is undergoing a period of rapid development around the world and particularly in Asia. Competing forces of neoliberal decentralisation, increased government oversight, internationalisation and regionalism are creating difficulties for managers and stakeholders alike. This paper aims to look at the ways in which universities have institutionalised their strategies for coping with these forces, in the form of their mission statements (MSs), particularly within an East Asian context.Design/methodology/approachSeveral major international university ranking tables were used to compile a list of “world class” institutions in East Asia. Those with available MSs in English were examined for reference to factors existing within the literature, as well as those which were not previously identified.FindingsEast Asian universities placed a high degree of emphasis on aspects related to university management, as well as social, cultural and historical foci. Far less emphasis was placed on aspects such as engagement of stakeholders and inclusion.Originality/valueThe paper draws on previous research from other regions and attempts to provide some insights into the particularities of higher education in East Asia from a management perspective.


Author(s):  
Futao Huang

Since the start of the 21st century, the building of world-class universities has been viewed as an important and relevant means to enhance the quality of teaching and research, governance and management arrangements, and further internationalization of higher education in a growing number of countries. It is increasingly conceived as a top priority and the primary foundation for restructuring and reforming various higher education systems, especially in several East Asian countries and societies. Through implementing top-down national strategies featuring a concentration of resources in selected institutions, several East Asian countries, and especially China, have successfully established research-oriented universities and driven the rise of these universities in global university rankings. Despite numerous challenges, in the context of increased international competition in higher education worldwide, development initiatives that seek to form world-class universities are becoming more common, and this is particularly evident in the fierce competition between Asian countries.


Author(s):  
R.V. Vaidyanatha Ayyar

This chapter outlines the exceptional composition of the landmark Kothari Commission, and its blend of idealism and realism. It offers a succinct account of the recommendations of the Kothari Commission, and the ferocious opposition to its recommendations regarding elementary and higher education, language policy, and the establishment of world class universities. It presents a candid critique of its recommendation that has become a hardy perennial of Indian educational discourse, namely that Government allocate at least 6 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to education. It gives a crisp account of Independent India’s first National Policy on Education (1968). It also outlines the Constitutional Amendment of 1978 which made education a ‘concurrent subject’, and the educational initiatives of the short lived Janata Government (1976–8), India’s first non-Congress Party Central Government. It also outlines the key role played by J.P Naik in the Kothari Commission and Janata Government and evolution of his thinking.


2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 295-317
Author(s):  
Anatoly V Oleksiyenko ◽  
Sheng-Ju Chan ◽  
Stephanie K Kim ◽  
William Yat Wai Lo ◽  
Keenan Daniel Manning

A major cluster of economic engines that have changed Asian higher education, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan have all developed high-income societies as well as world-class universities which linked local “knowledge economies” to global science and created hubs for international collaborations and mobility. However, there has been limited analysis of interdependencies between the rise of world-class universities and changes in the flows of international talent. This paper elaborates on the concept of higher education internationalization that aims at enhancing geopolitical equity in global mobility and re-positioning local students for improved access to the world-class excellence. The paper compares key themes and patterns that define the Tiger societies’ unique positions in the field of global higher education.


2008 ◽  
Vol 6 (5) ◽  
pp. 629-640 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jun Oba

For a very long time the Japanese government concentrated its higher education investment on a handful of national institutions, until the policy came to be called into question in the late 1980s in the face of globalisation and other factors. Higher education reform was significantly accelerated in the 1990s: the government has continuously deregulated the higher education system including the incorporation of national universities, and has brought more and more competition through diverse competitive funding schemes. Some policies – not only higher education policies but also science and technology ones – were explicitly designed to develop ‘world-class’ education and research centres, such as the 21st COE programme. This article suggests that although a funding policy based on competition, with a strict evaluation, seems to be a move in the right direction, a right balance of budget allocation between competitive funds and basic education-research funds should be sought. Furthermore, the programmes of the government have to be offered in a more consistent manner, and more concerted and integrated efforts will be required, to address the critical problem of building world-class universities.


2016 ◽  
pp. 10-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiang Zha

China recently launched a new stage of world-class university campaign, and emphasized developing the “Chinese characteristics” this time. Arguably, global rankings remain the most powerful illustration of who can claim world-class standing, which in turn renders the “Chinese characteristics” in question. This article argues that China would benefit from a kind of explicit “Chinese standards” to help establish a clearer direction for higher education development in the country.


2017 ◽  
pp. 26
Author(s):  
Edward W. Choi

While regional actors in the East Asian higher education sphere share a history of collaboration, they implement regionalization schemes largely based on different needs, goals, timetables, and customs. This piece presents a summary of key regionalization efforts and intitial indications for a path forward.


2017 ◽  
pp. 88-92
Author(s):  
Prerna Pandya

The Indian higher education system is facing a crisis that is affecting its ability to build world class higher education institutions. Indians have the ability to cope up with that crisis but sometimes they fail to do so because of the ‘EDUCATION SYSTEM’. This paper will focus on issues and challenges related to quality, access and integrity of the higher education system in India.The government is responsible for the overall development of the basic infrastructure of Higher Education sector, both in terms of policy and planning. The combination of these two will expand the access and quality improvement in the Higher Education, through world class Universities, Colleges and other Institutions. The paper will throw light on the Vision, Mission, Objectives and Functions for making Higher Education peculiar by using public policies.


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