Higher Education Funding And Access In International Perspective

This book explores the way in which the twin pressures of globalisation and localisation play out in higher education across the developed world, often reflected in more specific debates on fees regimes, access and culture.

Higher education is increasingly important to the labor market success of individuals and the prosperity of nations, yet, as this book shows, public funding for higher education is declining. It presents innovative approaches to increasing funding for universities through closer ties with business and through privatization of universities.

The purpose of this volume is to help jump-start an urgently needed conversation about fairness and justice in access to higher education to counteract the ubiquitous mantras of neoliberal globalization and managerialism. The book seeks to carve out a strong moral and normative basis for opposing mainstream developments that engender increasing inequality and market-dependency in higher education. The book’s chapters consider how different national communities channel access to higher education, what their “implicit social contracts” are, and what outcomes are produced by different policies and methods. The book is essential reading for scholars of higher education and students concerned with increasing inequality in a globalizing educational marketplace.

The underlying theory of cost-sharing as well as the description of its worldwide reach were developed from 1986 through 2006 mainly by the works of Johnstone and his Ford Foundation financed International Higher Education Finance and Accessibility Project at the State University of New York at Buffalo. The principal papers from this project are reproduced in this volume. They examine the worldwide shift in the burden of higher education costs from governments and taxpayers to parents and students, and the policies of grants, loans and other governmental interventions designed to maintain higher educational accessibility in the face of this shift.

This insightful collection of essays explores the ways in which open education can democratise access to education for all. It is a rich resource that offers both research and case studies to relate the application of open technologies and approaches in education settings around the world. A must-read for practitioners, policy-makers, scholars and students in the field of education.

Research on higher education has yielded many insights that have improved our theoretical and practical understanding but there are still many themes that continue to appear on research agendas, provoking renewed focus on these complex questions and problems. Researching Higher Education explores these issues, examining topics such as equity in access and participation, the relationship between higher education and society, how and what students learn and the professional development of academics. In this volume, contributors from Europe, Australia, Africa and the US critically address ongoing issues with a set of key questions to guide their analysis: What do we know? What are the missing links and gaps in past research? What are the implications for further research? Key themes include: The nature of higher education Higher education and society Staff and students in higher education Teaching and learning Curriculum and assessment Critical, engaging and international in scope, Researching Higher Education will be a valuable guide for academics, researchers, postgraduate students and policy makers in the higher education community.

Responding to the emerging needs of lifelong learners arguably represents one of the most fundamental challenges facing higher education systems of the countries of the developing world. At the start of the new century the concept of Lifelong Learning may indeed be counted as one of the the key organising concepts underlying public policy in many countries. The interpretation of the concept, however, remains highly contested. This timely book throws new light on the dramatic changes taking place in higher education through an exploration of the participation of "non-traditional" students in ten countries. Among others, the following areas are explored: * the complex reality behind the statistics on participation in higher education in five European countries (Austria, Germany, Ireland, Sweden and the United Kingdom), North America, Japan, Australia and New Zealand * contrasting perceptions of lifelong learning * changing patterns of participation by adults in higher education * national and institutional policies and innovations to accommodate non-traditional students and new forms of study * conclusions for policy, practice and research Higher Education for Lifelong Learners will be of interest to academics, researchers and students involved with higher education, lifelong learning, and comparative education as well as policy makers, educational managers and administrators. The contributions reveal a remarkable transformation in the student body and in the way learners pursue their studies, highlighting the international impact of increasing marketisation and differentiation on the nature of the higher education accessible to potential lifelong learners.

Tremendous changes are affecting the structure and funding of higher education in many countries. This volume attempts to identify and analyze the principles, structural features and modes of work of the different higher education policies operating in eleven countries, as well as their commonalities and differences in the light of both general international trends and country-specific factors. In order to gather the relevant information for the project, national correspondents were provided with an overarching framework to guide them in their work and to ensure maximum comparability of the resulting reports. Each country report is broken down into four sections: the structure and goals of higher education systems; authority in the system; higher education policy; and the impact of each on institutional governance and management. The final chapter draws together the general trends which have emerged: a move towards less state control; a strengthening of institutional autonomy and increased governance; competition between institutions; privatization of funding; greater market orientation and growing institutional accountability for quality and service.