Globalization & Higher Education: Challenges for the 21 st Century Presented by- Dr. (Mrs.) Lajwanti Chaturvedi Associate Professor (India)

Globalization Globalization is interdependence.

THE IMPACTS OF GLOBALISATION It is exactly what we do that decides the ethical decisions made in higher education from both a macro and micro approach that decides our course of actions. The globalization of the economy and its concomitant demands on the workforce requires a different education that enhances the ability of learners to access, adopt, and apply knowledge, to think independently to exercise appropriate judgment and to collaborate with others to make sense of new situations. Globalization is not the only factor behind the changes that are affecting education, and likewise it is not the only factor that motivates the local interest groups that formulate policy. Nevertheless globalization has posed challenges of a hitherto unknown nature to nation states, and much of the seemingly recent, never-ending change in education is a corollary of these challenges. The nature and complexity of the forces involved in globalization that any discussion of its impact upon education raises fundamental issues and should be a matter of considerable debate among educationists, researchers, and policy makers.

THE IMPACT OF GLOBALISATION ON HIGHER EDUCATION The impact of the various trends and challenges related to globalisation on higher education institutions and policies is profound, but also diverse, depending on the specific location in the global arena. An attempt can be made to define some general tendencies in higher education that in one way or another relate to globalisation: –create new and tremendously important demands and exigencies –an increase in the demand for higher education worldwide –erosion of the national regulatory and policy frameworks –the emerging ‘borderless’ higher education market

HIGHER EDUCATION CHALLENGES IN A GLOBALISED WORLD Globalization breaks down barriers and connects institutions across the world making universities in every country visible to each other, facilitating knowledge flows, values on global learning, and creation of new opportunities for advanced graduates. Challenges faced by universities and other institutions of higher education: –Changes in universities as institutions and at the level of internal organisation. –Changes in knowledge creation. –Changes in the educational model. –Changes aimed at tapping the potential of information and communication technologies. –Changes for social responsibility and knowledge transfer.

THE NEED FOR A NEW REGULATORY FRAMEWORK The impact of globalisation on higher education generates a number of crucial challenges, which ask for a new and international regulatory framework: a) The regulation of new providers and the various forms of transnational higher education. –an international glossary of common concepts, definitions and terminology, –some basic rules to grant providers the ‘licence to teach’, –an internationally standardised procedure of registration, –some rules concerning the correct use of the basic labels such as ‘university’, ‘doctorate’, ‘professor’, ‘master degree’, ‘accredited’, etc., –the removal of existing barriers to mobility of students and staff, not dealt with in international trade agreements, –some basic elements of a professional code of good, –a basic arrangement of the intellectual property issues associated with private higher education, and –an agreement on issues of consumer protection and rights of complaint.

b)Finding a comprehensive solution for the issue of the international transferability and recognition of qualifications and credits. c)Developing an international approach to quality assurance and accreditation. –an agreement on a common set of definitions and a glossary of concepts regarding international quality assurance and accreditation; –an agreement on a basic set of principles; –an initiative to convince the international higher education community, its key actors and its associations that it has to develop transnational forms of self-regulation with respect to quality itself, at the risk of giving away the initiative in this crucial issue; –an initiative to national authorities to convince them to seek international cooperation in the field of quality assurance and accreditation; –an initiative to seek the cooperation of the internationally organised professions in the development of an international regulatory framework with regard to quality assurance and accreditation.

EMERGING OPPORTUNITIES The information and communications technologies enabling the global knowledge economy–so-called cyber infrastructure (the current term used to describe hardware, software, people, organizations, and policies) evolve exponentially, doubling in power for a given cost every year. Many leaders, both inside and outside the academy, believe that these forces of change will so transform our educational institutions–schools, colleges, universities, learning networks– over the next generation as to be unrecognizable within our current understandings and perspectives. Some of the several possibilities are: –The Global University –Lifelong Learning –Meta University –Universal Access to Knowledge and Learning