CHALLENGES OF BUILDING WORLD-CLASS RESEARCH UNIVERSITIES IN BRIC COUNTRIES Isak Froumin Academic Supervisor of Institute of Education, 1

The BRICs “Higher Education Project” 2 The State is the driving force behind Higher education expansion; The key to understanding why and how the State effects that expansion is the State’s need for enhancing its legitimacy domestically (and internationally, largely for domestic purposes) (Carnoy et al., 2013); Active and effective states are crucial to economic development.

Comparative growth of total Higher Education enrollment 3

Brazil: Spending/Student,

China: spending/HE student by type of institutions, Ministry HEIsLocal 4-Year HEIs 5

Russia: Public spending/student, by type of institution,

Increasing proportion of HE students in Private institutions in the BRICs 7

Why expansion? Not concentration? 8 Is this a wise strategy? China and Russia are increasing the spending gap between elite universities and “mass” universities that absorb the vast majority of students. This is part of an effort to develop “world class” universities. WHY? Push universities to compete internationally by setting the goals and offering additional funding Governments are not happy with slow evolution of the higher education systems and their global standing

Rationale for building world-class universities (1) 9 Universities could play significant role in the development of globally competitive innovation-based economies or in the global political and cultural competition; Governments want universities to bring the fruits of the innovation economy as fast as possible, preferably within the election cycle; Universities have direct economic impact producing significant part of the national GDP by selling the educational services; Universities attract foreign students and best professors (researchers) as future cadres of innovative economy;

Rationale for building world-class universities (2) 10 Governments want to come after the growing focus on research and development as the part of the public policy; Big countries like China, India and Russia want to solve the problem of the regional development; Some countries have the objectives for the development of specific sectors of the economy; Symbolic role of world-class universities: legitimation of the state like a football team or the national ballet; = =

11 Does the competition for “world class universities” enhance or undermine the overall quality of higher education? What are the advantages of BRICs in this competition? Should these countries invent their own model of the world-class universities? QUESTIONS OF BUILDING WORLD-CLASS UNIVERSITIES IN THE BRICs