Asian University Leaders seeking to Improve International Ties

Gold Coast, Australia 

At a conference here on Australia's east coast that drew hundreds of higher-education leaders from the Asia-Pacific region this week, educators called for equal partnerships with Western institutions and agreed that they needed to become more flexible to adapt to a rapidly changing economic environment. 

Asia Pacific Association of International Education's annual meeting was generally positive, with many feeling that Asian higher education is coming into its own, university representatives from China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, and elsewhere agreed they need to step up their international activities. 

Asian universities have to be very domestically oriented, and their self-esteem is very high within the nation. But they are very limited and their standards are not global.On the contrary, Western universities still set the standards, and Asian universities are always falling behind. 

To tackle those problem, Asia Pacific Leaders program will be created, in which top university students will study, volunteer, and learn the local culture in a neighboring country's university,as declared by Mr. Lee. Mr. Lee said 15 Asian countries and 22 universities are participating. 

The association, which is only five years old, has grown each year—a sign that Asian universities are increasingly interested in developing a regional identity. This year's annual conference drew 900 attendees—300 more than expected—and more than double the sponsorship of the previous year, organizers said. 

Arun Sharma, deputy vice-chancellor for research and commercialization at the Queensland University of Technology, in Australia, gave the opening address. He called for an end to what he described as a mercantile approach to higher education, in which Western countries export their programs to Asia and then repatriate the profits. 

For the Australian universities in attendance here, much of the talk was about restoring the country's international reputation, particularly in India, following several highly publicized attacks against Indian students last year. Many university representatives here said they were also eager to draw in students from outside their home country. Some universities are doing so by creating Western style institutions or programs within existing universities. 

Mr. Lee noted that while American universities have time-tested academic programs, Asian universities are in an age of experimentation. But there was one area in which American universities could improve, he added: outreach. Only about 30 Americans attended the conference. Some Asian educators, he said, feels that American higher education could risk insularity if it does not also start to innovate and get involved with Asia. 

We know very well that Asia is a big market in which all economic giants have already participated so as American Universities need to do.