Have you ever wondered how higher education is financed in other parts of the world? No matter what country you choose, you will find that the topic of financing higher education is a contentious one. Over the last decade, there has been a worldwide shift of the burden of higher education costs from governments and taxpayers to parents and students. This is much to the chagrin of parents, of course. To find out more about current trends in international higher education financing, I sat down with Dr. John C. Weidman, professor of higher and international development education at the University of Pittsburgh. Without further ado, let’s begin the interview.
Q: Historically, how has financing higher education internationally differed from the American model?
The main differences stem from variations in the role of national governments with respect to education. In most countries, there is a national ministry that has overall responsibility for education. In some cases, there is a separate ministry for higher education, but it still tends to be a national entity. Countries also vary in level of funding provided to public higher education institutions.
In the federal system of the USA, education is the responsibility of the states so the influence of the national government is much more limited than in most countries. In the USA, responsibility for covering the cost of higher education has been shifting continuously to the individuals benefitting, namely students, through a variety of loan schemes. At the same time, states have been reducing their contribution. Consequently, there is considerable variation by state in the types and costs of available higher education. In the USA, the most highly regarded and, hence, most difficult for students to gain admission are private. It is just the opposite in most other countries in the world, with public universities having the highest status.
Countries differ in their approach to meeting increasing demand for higher education. Three main ways are expanding the numbers of government-funded institutions, enabling the expansion of the private sector without significant government investment and various combinations of public and private expansion. One reflection of such differences is the proportion of students attending private as opposed to public (government-funded) institutions. According to data collected by the Program for Research on Private Higher Education (PROPHE) at SUNY-Albany, this varies from less than 10 percent in several European countries (e.g., Austria, Germany, Czech and Slovak Republics, Ireland, Italy, Spain), Australia and South Africa to more than two-thirds in Brazil, Chile, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. In the USA, about 26 percent of all undergraduates are enrolled in private higher education institutions. This is actually below the worldwide average of 31 percent. All of the countries with very high private enrollments regulate student fees much more than the USA.
The third alternative is to charge higher tuition to less qualified students attending government-funded institutions. In Kenya, for example, the scores on the national secondary school leaving exam required for students to receive government scholarships to attend universities have been slowly increasing. Students whose scores to not reach the grade threshold are still eligible for university admission, but they have to pay tuition at an unsubsidized rate for “Privately Sponsored Students Programs” (PSSP).
