The Swedish government’s decision to abandon free higher education for all and replace it with a scholarship system has led to a huge decline in applications and fears of gifted students from developing countries being excluded. This autumn Sweden introduced tuition fees for non-EU students from SEK90,000 (US$13,385) upwards. Only 1,300 non-EU students were registered for the autumn 2011 term, compared to over 16,000 last year.

An estimated SEK90 million (US$13 million) per year has been allocated to help international students that lack the resources to pay. A third will go to 12 countries that Sweden has long-term aid cooperation with, covering tuition and living costs. The remainder will be allocated by the universities and while some are offering full scholarships, others will be issuing only part funding. Many universities are also arguing that it is very difficult to prioritise financial circumstances in the award of scholarships. Eva Malmström Jonsson, Vice President of Stockholm’s Royal Institute of Technology, told The Local newspaper it “would be very difficult to assess” economic situations. “What we can assess, reasonably, is students’ study results,” she added.

Meanwhile, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Chevy Chase, MA, has commenced a fellowship fund for international graduate students in the USA. The 48 fellowships will be worth up to US$43,000 per year for the third, fourth and fifth years of study, and will cover a variety of disciplines, including physics, chemistry, engineering and biomedical studies. The programme has been instigated because of the difficulties international students face in securing funding to support graduate study in the USA.

The University of Birmingham, UK, has launched scholarships for Chinese nationals to undertake postgraduate study at Birmingham in partnership with the China Scholarship Council. The university has also sought to strengthen ties with China by opening a collaborative research centre in Guangzhou with the municipality government, which it plans to develop into a graduate school. The initial research focus will be on translational medicine, population studies and cognitive neuroscience. Professor David Eastwood, said, “I believe that as we strengthen our presence through the Birmingham Centre that future prospects for deep and lasting collaborations, bringing benefits to the citizens of Guangzhou and beyond, are bright.”

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Korean universities to be inspected for international suitability

Universities in Korea that accept international students will need to undergo inspections and be certified by a committee of experts, the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (Mest) has announced.

Mest officials are concerned that the reputation of Korea’s higher education system is being damaged by universities that accept overseas students for financial reasons without facilities to cater for them and adequate cultural programmes to bring Korean and international students together.

A committee of 13 experts and university professors commenced inspections of four-year universities and vocational colleges in September. Institutes deemed accommodating to international students will be certified, allowing them to participate in the Global Korea Scholarship, a government-funded scheme that provides financial support to overseas students. Certified schools will also receive priority consideration for job fairs.

According to government statistics, there were 83,842 overseas students in Korea in 2010, a figure that has risen rapidly during the last few years. The Bank of Korea announced that Korean universities earned US$35 million from international student fees in the first half of 2011, twice as much as the same period last year.