BRICS – Partnering to build education for the future

The five BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – have initiated a process of mobilising investment and collaboration that will provide quality higher education to around 40% of the world’s tertiary students.

According to a UNESCO report published last month, BRICS Building Education for the Future – Priorities for national development and international cooperation, while the development of mass higher education in those countries is still in its infancy – except in Russia – there has been a dramatic shift in the global distribution of students.

“The number of higher education students has increased dramatically, with Brazil, China, India and the Russian Federation accounting for 39.1% of the global total in 2012,” said UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova on launching the report.

In 2012, the report reveals, China accounted for about 17% of global tertiary students compared to only 7.4% in 2000. Russia has one of the longest established higher education systems, with a gross enrolment ratio of over 76% in 2012.

Brazil – with a population of 200 million – aims to increase its gross enrolment ratio in higher education to 50% of the population aged 18-24, and the net enrolment ratio to 33% by 2020*.

Improving higher education

With more than one in three students in the world today living in a BRICS country, a major challenge is not just continuing massification but at the same time enhancing quality through, among other initiatives, establishing centres of excellence.

As part of its efforts to improve the quality of higher education, Brazil plans to award 60,000 masters degrees and 25,000 doctorates locally every year by 2020.

Through the government’s Science Without Borders initiative, 100,000 Brazilian students – mostly in science, technology, engineering and maths fields – are between 2012 and 2015 being awarded full scholarships to study abroad.

“The move is expected to boost Brazilian science and technology as well as produce highly qualified staff to teach in local universities,” says Jorge Almeida Guimaraes, president of the Brazilian Federal Agency for Support and Evaluation of Graduate Education.

The expansion of quality postgraduate studies in science and technology is also intended to increase the presence of Brazilian researchers and students in leading institutions in other parts of the world.

“Brazilian institutions will also open similar opportunities to foreign scientists and students as well as attract young scientific talent and highly qualified researchers to work in the country,” says Guimaraes.

Also on the cards is China’s aggressive plan to expand its emerging academic leadership by establishing world-class research universities.

According to the document Outline of China’s National Plan for Medium and Long-term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020), higher education in China will vastly sharpen its global competitive edge

“Raising quality is at the heart of this task through investing in infrastructure and restructuring of courses and disciplines,” says China’s blueprint for higher education in the next decade. According to the UNESCO report, the ambition of China is to have world-class universities and be a powerhouse in the global higher education landscape by 2020.

In its efforts to improve higher education, India has launched a 25-year plan Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan – an initiative to improve access, equity and quality in tertiary education by establishing new institutions and expanding enrolment in existing ones, as well as upgrading infrastructure and creating state higher education councils.

“The goal in India is to enrol 10 million more students in the next five years,” says the report.

Worried about the decline in its student population, Russia will concentrate its efforts on raising quality in its universities. According to the UNESCO report, between 2006 and 2012, upper secondary graduate numbers fell by 46%, creating a situation that led to institutional mergers.

Federal public universities and national research universities have been established in Russia to optimise resources available in each region and strengthen links between universities, the economy and society.

According to Denis Nikolaev, a World Bank education consultant, the main strategic mission of each federal university is to generate knowledge and provide for the effective transfer of technologies in the economy.

“Universities are also required to conduct primary and applied research, preparing postgraduate students and developing retraining and professional skills improvement programmes,” wrote Nikolaev in a World Bank study, The Education System in the Russian Federation.

Student mobility

BRICS countries have stepped up student mobility not just among themselves but also in providing opportunities for their students to seek quality education in the global higher education market.

Currently, China has almost 700,000 students studying abroad, India 211,000, Russia, 51,000, Brazil 31,000 and South Africa 6,400.

According to the UNESCO report, the main destination of foreign students from the BRICS alliance is the United States, where China has over 210,000 students, India 97,000 and Brazil 9,000. Other key destinations for BRICS students are Britain, Japan, Australia and Germany.

However, in the last 10 years the BRICS alliance has increasingly become an important destination for foreign students with Russia currently hosting the largest contingent of 174,000 students, China 99,000, South Africa 70,000, India 31,000 and Brazil 14,000.

Working together

Plans are underway to establish a BRICS Network University, an initiative that will enable universities in the group to jointly develop and teach courses and facilitate the mutual recognition of qualifications and the transfer of credits between participating institutions.

BRICS is making use of UNESCO-backed regional conventions on recognition of degrees and other academic qualifications in higher education. According to the report, BRICS has kicked off a process for developing its own regional convention through UNESCO.

“The efficient use of international standard-setting instruments and qualifications frameworks is crucial to ensuring quality in cross-border higher education and coherence across bilateral and multilateral efforts to increase student mobility,” says the report.

In order to build a stronger global presence in cross-border education, BRICS countries have started positioning their universities to open branches overseas and to undertake international exchanges. In this regard, in the last few years China has elevated the number and quality of its Confucius Institutes that are the conveyors of Chinese language and culture abroad.

BRICS countries are also determined to increase international aid to education, in order to build linkages with other developing and emerging countries.

To avoid duplication, a hub to share data and information on development cooperation in higher education will be established at UNESCO.

Given that Africa is the region that needs the greatest assistance in higher education, a joint funding programme will soon be established and housed at UNESCO. “The programme will draw support from the proposed BRICS Development Bank,” says the report.

Still far from world-class

While there is no doubt that BRICS have made progress in higher education, there are still many obstacles to their ambition to achieve world-class status.

According to Elizabeth Fordham, an education specialist at UNESCO, the BRICS countries will need to focus sharply on the quality and equity of education in the quest for academic excellence in higher education.

“So far, many South African students are lagging behind in numeracy and literary skills, while India’s success in expanding access to education risks being undermined by inadequate education infrastructure and poor teaching,” says Fordham.

Even though education is compulsory in Brazil until the age of 17, statistics show that most children do not progress beyond lower secondary school, denying them access to higher education and the skills needed for decent jobs and labour productivity.

The BRICS countries are also confronted with deepening disparities in the quality of schooling at all levels, especially between rural and urban areas and in schools serving poor households.

“Too much talent is being wasted through overlapping inequities that deny millions of young people the opportunity to participate in the bloc’s academic and economic progress,” says Fordham.

* The gross enrolment ratio is the number of students enrolled in higher education – regardless of age – expressed as a percentage of the population in the 18-24 age group, while the net enrolment ratio is the number of the 18-24 year age group enrolled in higher education as percentage of the total population of that age group.

** The BRICS report relied to a considerable extent on the Outline of China’s National Plan for Medium and Long-term Education Reform and Development, and The Education System in the Russian Federation.