Education World

Archive for July, 2010

The Ateneo de Manila University is a well-known private educational institution serving the mainstream society of Metropolitan Manila. It has two other campuses in the Makati trade and financial district. Aside from the links with Ateneos in other major Philippine cities, the university has also established formal ties with other important universities in the country and abroad.

The University’s commitment to the promotion of Chinese Studies was strengthened with the establishment of the Ricardo Leong Center for Chinese Studies on September, 1, 2005. The center is supported by an endowment fund from Mr. Ricardo Leong an alumnus of the school.

Since the founding of Confucius Institute, it has successfully hosed the “Chinese Bridge” Competition and provided training courses for Chinese teachers teaching in Higher institutions. It also helps business people learn Mandarin and how to do business in China by offering courses in one of our campuses in the Makati financial district. The institue had held academic symposia, seminars and other Chinese cultural activities in the past few months too.

The training of Mandarin teachers is a tong-term Commitment of the Confucius Institute at Ateneo de Manila University. It will continually produce suitable teachers in order to promote Mandarin and Chinese culture in Philippines. At the same time, The Confucius Institute will organize language classes, support research in Chinese Studies, and work to increase the interest of college.

At present the institute is planning to develop a Hierarchy of courses towards the granting of the degree: Master of Arts in Chinese Studies.

In late 2005, Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Malaysian Global Education Management Group cooperatively established the Global Chinese Language Center. According to the Malaysian application, in September 2006, the Office of Chinese Language Council International (Hanban) agreed to list this center as an official Confucius Institute.

Located in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, the center was established under the influence of the Global Educational Administration Group in Malaysia.

Since its establishment, it has set up a variety of instructional projects and courses. The courses offered by the center include: China’s National Conditions, Cross Cultural Communication, Modern Chinese, Teaching Theories of Chinese as a Foreign Language, and Chinese Culture.

It has also successfully offered teaching and training courses targeted towards Malaysian students, teachers, school administrators, radio and television personnel, aviation workers, and the business community.

In order to meet the Malaysian people’s Chinese language needs, the center will set up a systematic teaching and training program as well as arrange activities designed to promote Chinese culture.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) kicked off its Board of Governors annual meeting here on Monday, highlighting post-crisis development for the Asia Pacific region.

Addressing the opening session, Uzbek President Islam Karimov warned that a “complex, painful and lasting” process of the economic recovery is lying ahead despite the consensus that the acute phase of the global financial crisis and the economic downturn has passed.

Anti-crisis measures such as long-term innovative projects of modernization, technical and technological re-equipment, which aims at deep structural changes and diversification of production, will definitely benefit countries in the post-crisis period, Karimov said.

ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda told the Board of Governors that difficulties remain although the situation has improved.

“One year ago, we met in crisis. Today, we meet in hope. As the world begins to emerge from recession, it is clear that Asia is leading the global recovery,” said Kuroda.

“Despite a robust recovery, challenges remain, with some of the region’s smaller and poorer economies still struggling.”

In order to improve long-term prospects, Kuroda said, Asia “should see itself as not only a producer and exporter of its goods and services, but also a consumer,” while pursuing a more socially inclusive growth by increasing investments in health, education and skills training, social safety nets, and infrastructure.

The distribution of subsidies has started in Yushu.

27 family members who lost relatives will receive 8,000 yuan each. They’re the first batch of victims to receive this assistance. Subsidies, will continue… until everyone eligible has been helped.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education has announced… separate arrangements for Yushu students taking national college entrance exams, this year. They’ll receive extra points, and colleges will give them enrollment priority.

Apart from his legendary contributions in the nuclear arena, the well-known scientist Qian Xuesen posed a challenging question: “Why do our schools always fail to produce outstanding talent?”

Although everyone may have an opinion or two regarding the issue, the common consensus revolves around bureaucratization of education. No matter how anxious we are to see “world-class” colleges mushroom here, it would be just wishful thinking so long as our institutions of higher learning are run like miniature bureaucracies by career bureaucrats.

So, when the authorities recently talked about “de-bureaucratization” of education, it came as a ray of hope, although it was immediately dampened by skeptical college managers.

Stripping colleges of their administrative rankings may hinder them further since Chinese society largely revolves around administration by the bureaucrats, they contended – a point not entirely unjustified.

Yet, the process is destined to be tricky, and difficult.

Even Premier Wen Jiabao has sounded a note of caution – colleges should be de-bureaucratized in a “step-by-step” manner, he said while commenting on higher education reform during his Youth Day (May 4) visit to Peking University.

Since educators themselves remain ambivalent or reluctant, it is anybody’s guess as to how long the process will take. The trouble is, if the schools are managed like government affiliates, the idea of encouraging colleges to be professionally run, too, would be unrealistic.

Not that there are no qualified educators in the bureaucratic set-up. But, the way college caretakers are being appointed, it seems people are always put in wrong places.

Administrative authority usually ranks above professional competence in performance evaluation. Under such circumstances, the emphasis seems to be more on being politically correct than thinking independently.

It will take years before the populous nation industrializes its vast rural areas and efficiently makes use of energy resources

China’s gross domestic product (GDP) touched $4,909 billion last year, according to the country’s National Bureau of Statistics. Yet, it is still $160 billion less than Japan’s $5,073 billion, as indicated by data from Tokyo.

Given its marvelous economic growth in the past few years, the $160 billion gap will soon be plugged by the world’s third largest economy. China is expected to overtake Japan as the world’s second largest economy this year if it manages to carry forward its past momentum.

Since the start of the 21st century, China’s economic might has successively surpassed that of several developed nations such as Canada, Italy, France, Britain and Germany.

The country’s growing economic clout on the world stage, along with the sterling economic growth shown by some of its big cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and other eastern coastal regions, has raised a question: Is China a developing or developed nation?

Any trivial matter multiplied by 1.3 billion will turn into a big problem, and any astronomical figure divided by 1.3 billion will be reduced to a tiny number, as Premier Wen Jiabao put it during a press conference at the conclusion of this year’s National People’s Congress session.

As a country with a population of 1.37 billion, there are few reasons to take pride in the fact that our country’s economic bulk has surpassed those countries with populations or land areas much smaller than ours.

Canada has only 2.5 percent of China’s population. The proportion is 4.4 percent, 4.6 percent, 4.6 percent, 6.2 percent and 9.5 percent respectively for Italy, France, Britain, Germany and Japan.

China’s huge economic aggregate has not changed the fact that its per capita GDP still ranks very low globally. In 2008, the country’s per capita GDP was $3,263, which ranked it 98th in the world.

Ailing Nigerian President Umaru Yar’Adua died on Wednesday in Abuja, following a protracted illness, presidential spokesman Olusegun Adeniyi has announced.

The President died at about 9 p.m. local time (2000 GMT) in his official residence where he was recuperating from his illness, Adeniyi said.

Yar’adua’s aides have briefed Acting President” Goodluck Jonathan on the former ruler’s transition.

The late President Yar’Adua had a serious kidney complaint in 2000, and tried to dismiss rumors of continued ill health in 2007 by challenging his critics to a game of squash.

He interrupted his presidential election campaign months later to seek medical care in Germany.

The European Commission (EC) on Wednesday brought charges against Poland to the European Union Court of Justice for failure to fully introduce EU anti-racist laws into its legislation, local media reported.

Explaining the move, the EC said that Poland has introduced the laws in the employment sphere but not in areas like social welfare, accommodation trade union and other organizational membership, or education.

EU anti-discrimination legislation was markedly strengthened by the 1999 Amsterdam Treaty and the racial equality laws introduced in year 2000.

Poland was obliged to enforce the legislation by the date of its EU accession in May 2004.

The EC also noted that Poland has failed to introduce anti- victimization laws in spheres besides employment.

The American Museum of Natural History in New York City displayed on Thursday an innovative mobile navigation app on new wireless network to provide visitors with a new-generation museum experience.

Based on three years of research, the Explorer APP works with iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, and uses WiFi to function as an ” indoor GPS” within the museum, pinpointing a user’s location and offering turn-by-turn directions through its 45 permanent exhibition halls, theaters, restrooms and cafes.

“The Explorer enables the Museum to connect the public, whether they are visiting on site or online, to its extensive resources in new and engaging ways and to redefine what it means to be a museum in the 21st century,” said Ellen V. Futter, President of the American Museum of Natural History.

In addition to serving as a guide, the Explorer is also an educational resource that provides visitors with additional information on more than 140 specimens and objects on display. The Explorer also features customized tours, a fossil treasure hunt, and social media links for posting to Facebook and Twitter.

Visitors will be able to download the free app to their own iPhone, iPod touch, iPad or to borrow one of more than 350 devices the Museum is making available at no charge.

Earlier this year the Museum launched its first iPhone app — Dinosaurs: The American Museum of Natural History Collections, which showcases the Museum’s world-class fossil collection through more than 800 images and stories about eight popular specimens’ discoveries.

The American Museum of Natural History is one of the world’s preeminent scientific, educational, and cultural institutions. The Museum houses a permanent collection of more than 32 million specimens and cultural artifacts.

A newly-published national education outline says Chinese schools need to tighten fund management in a bid to prevent financial risks.

The Outline of China’s National Plan for Medium and Long-term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020) was published in full text on Thursday.

The outline says that a consultancy commission for higher education funding would be established to improve the supervision of fund distribution.

School financial and accounting systems would be tightened and internal auditing and control of fund use shall be improved, the outline says.

The post of chief accountant would be set up in colleges and universities, so as to raise the professional level of fund use and asset management. The chief accountants of public universities and colleges would be appointed by governments, it says.

After Jilin University was found to have a debt of as much as 3 billion yuan in 2007, university and college debt has drawn much public attention.

In the first half of 2009, the local audit office in Hangzhou City, east China’s Zhejiang Province, disclosed that the city’s five universities and colleges, including Zhejiang University City College and Hangzhou Normal University, had carried 1.311 billion yuan of debt by the end of 2008.

Among them, Zhejiang University City College had a debt of 828.51 million yuan. The college was in a swirl of controversy, after media reported that it attempted to sell land to get out of the debt.

Yang Jianhua, vice director of the Social Institute of Zhejiang Provincial Academy of Social Sciences, said that enrolment expansion and fund squandering left some universities and colleges debt-ridden.

“The government should launch a special audit on university’s debt management, and strictly control university’s infrastructure construction and debt scale,” said Yang.

The outline says monitoring over fund spending would be stepped up.

It also says an evaluation mechanism for fund use shall be set up and funding of major projects be put under intensified evaluation and examination.

Management of state assets in schools would be tightened. The state assets allocation, use and disposal systems would be improved in schools, so as to prevent loss of state assets, it says.

The outline requires schools to be run without extravagance or waste.