Posts Tagged academic
Rise in STEM subjects disproportionately due to overseas students
Posted by Nick Cowen in Economics, Education, Press Release on 05/12/2011
Universities are educating 6,000 fewer British engineers a year than 10 years ago
British universities are adding fewer STEM subject graduates to the labour market than total student figures suggest, according to a new Civitas report. The STEM subject push by Stephen L. Clarke finds that the number of overseas students attending British universities to study engineering increased by 12,308 from 1997 to 2007, but that the number of British engineering students declined by 5,769. [p. 3] As a result, the British economy will struggle to find the skills necessary to drive a production-led recovery.
‘Independent’ QCA to be made… independent again
Posted by Nick Cowen in Education on 26/09/2007
Ed Balls, Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families has just announced that the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will be overhauled into an independent watchdog equivalent to the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England or the Food Standards Agency. This rather raises the question of what exactly the QCA is at the moment, considering that it is barely ever mentioned by ministers without the accompanying authoritative claim that it is an independent ‘guardian of standards’, and that an even more independent international panel has described the resulting exam system as one of the most tightly regulated in the world. Just how much more independent can you get? Apparently, much more.