Global Connections and Exchange Program Combines Technology and In-Person Exchanges

Midlothian High School Exchange

Midlothian High School students planted trees in honor of their guests. | photo courtesy of Jamie Schlais Barnes

Here’s an interesting item from Midlothian Exchange, a local paper in Midlothian, in Chesterfield County, Virginia and a part of the Richmond Metropolitan Area.

Two weeks ago, three men walked into Midlothian High School looking for a better understanding of American culture. Ten days later, they left having changed their own perceptions of U.S. citizens and their students’ perceptions of Arabic culture. Their challenge and that of the students at Midlothian High School is to continue spreading what they learned.

Abdulwahab Albaadani, a teacher at Ibn Majed in Sanaa, Yemen, Amine Slimani, a teacher from the Secondary School of Nedroma in Nedroma, Algeria and his pupil, Mohamed Belmeliami, traveled to the U.S. as a culmination of nearly a year’s worth of video conferencing, cultural lessons, and web logging with social studies classes at Midlothian High School…

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SAR ACADEMIC FREEDOM MEDIA REVIEW

Academic Freedom Media Review
April 3 – 9, 2010
Compiled by Scholars at Risk

Tariq Ramadan Gets the American Debate He Says He Craved
Peter Schmidt, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 4/9

UCSD prof turns meeting into protest rally
Eleanor Yang Su, The Union Tribune, 4/9
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Higher Education, Collaboration, and Education for the 21st Century

TALIM

In a few days I am off to Morocco for a seminar at TALIM on higher education and employment in Morocco. But the job market in the United States is also very challenging of college graduates right now, and American educators may well be asking themselves if higher education in this country is adequately preparing students to enter the work force of the global era.

We still function in terms of national economies, but those economies are increasingly connected so that a crisis in one affects many others.  We also live in a world in which graduating students in America compete for employment, directly or indirectly, with their peers in Mexico, Morocco, India and Taiwan. And the whole lot of them are also competing with graduating students in Pakistan, Costa Rica, Tunisia, Israel and Poland. Continue reading

Academic Freedom Media Review, March 12-19

March 12-19, 2010

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Compiled by Scholars at Risk
Thomas H. Benton, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 3/19
Education International, 3/18
John Bojarski, The Duquesne Duke, 3/18
Scott Jaschik, Inside Higher Ed, 3/18
Mike Shuster, NPR, 3/17 Continue reading

Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Media Review

I am late with this this week, due to a number of commitments Friday, over the weekend and Monday. Please accept my apologies.

February 26 – March 5, 2010
Compiled by Scholars at Risk

Book of the week: No University Is an Island
The Times Higher Education, 3/4

Darwin Foes Add Warming to Targets
Leslie Kaufman, The New York Times, 3/3

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“Internationalized Academe Is Inevitable,” but Will We Do it Well

“The internationalization of higher education is inevitable,” Mr. Levine, a former president of Teachers College at Columbia University, said in a speech on Wednesday to the Association of International Education Administrators whose members are meeting here this week.

In internationalization, “some bold universities will lead,” Mr. Levine said. “Others will be populizers. And others will hold onto the past and will be destined to fail.”

via “Internationalized Academe Is Inevitable, but Its Form Is Not,” The Chronicle of Higher Education.

The quotation above is from a short version of a longer article the was published in the February 26 print edition of the Chronicle.  A recurring point of tension at that meeting, and one that is also clear from the comments on the report linked above, is that there is a tension between the need to internationalize curricula and the costs of doing so. Like so many sectors of the economy, higher education is experiencing significant financial challenges and this is the problem.

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Academic Freedom Media Review, February 19-26, 2010

Compiled by Scholars at Risk
(It was released by SAR on Friday. I apologize for posting it so late.)

Science-Rights Coalition Has Global Impact in First Year
Benjamin Somers and Becky Ham, Science Magazine Vol. 327. no. 5969, p. 1097, 2/26

Simon Singh and the silencing of the scientists
Sarah Boseley, The Guardian, 2/25

British Court Rules for Professor Whose Decision to Fail Students Was Overturned
The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2/25
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Academic Freedom Media Review, February 12-19

Compiled by Scholars at Risk

Alabama Shooting Puts Spotlight on Tenure Process
The Associated Press, The New York Times, 2/18

Publish and be dumped?
Laurie Taylor, The Times Higher Education, 2/18

Is Heckling a Right?
Scott Jaschik, Inside Higher Ed, 2/17

Education is the key for the future of Belarus
Bertel Haarder, Cristina Husmark Pehrsson, Rigmor Aasrud, Jan Vapaavuori, Katrin Jakobsdottir and Halldor Asgrimsson, EuObserver, 2/17

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Academic Freedom Media Review

January 30 – February 5, 2010
Compiled by Scholars at Risk

Terror and academic freedom
Rizwaan Sabir, The Guardian, 2/5

China snubs U of C over Dalai Lama, Accreditation lost after honour for spiritual leader
Gwendolyn Richards, Calgary Herald, 2/4

Quebec physicians urge Charest to call for end to silence on asbestos
Rhéal Séguin, The Globe and Mail, 2/4

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