EUROPE: Preparing PhDs for work – Also outside academia

Jan Petter Myklebust06 February 2014 Issue No:306

 

The League of European Research Universities, or LERU, has published an ‘advice paper’ on Good Practice Elements in Doctoral Training. It informs the academic part of research training and is a repository of good ideas and practices by some of Europe’s leading PhD training institutions.

The most important messages highlighted in the paper are these: PhDs are increasingly drivers of their own professional development; and the training model in which the PhD candidate is heavily dependent on one supervisor is no longer robust.

Being drivers of their professional development is important for the writing of PhD theses, even more so with regard to obtaining competencies during doctoral training in transferable skills.

Supply opportunities where candidates can engage themselves to acquire transferable skills are extensively documented, and are diverse at member institutions of LERU, which is an association of research universities.

The good thing about the report is that over and over again it demonstrates that some of the most research-intensive universities in Europe are prioritising transferable skills, which are now being built into training programmes for doctoral candidates and, most frequently it seems, as elective course options and often in collaboration with other organisations.

The introduction presents 29 such transferable competencies like ‘working in teams’, ‘persisting in achieving long-term goals’ and ‘understanding the working of a specific high-level research-intensive environment’.

Such competencies are found in different courses such as master-classes in promoting creativity and risk-taking in novel research, toolkits to help doctoral researchers with information management in research, monitoring work progress to support students to finish their PhD successfully and on time – such as University College London’s Student log – and many more.

Other examples of innovative courses are the PhD employer forum at University College London, where a panel of speakers who themselves are PhD holders are invited to talk about their sector, career progression and the best routes into their position.

The university has also developed Leadership in Action, an ‘open’ programme helping researchers to initiate collaborative and interdisciplinary projects and to develop the “mental toughness and resilience that is needed to sail through the PhD”.

The University of Zurich has a total of 280 courses a year on the acquisition of funding, teaching, writing-publishing, job application training and other topics, and Pierre-and-Marie-Curie University has since 2006 had a Doc’Up association of PhD students who organise events such as breakfasts, aperitifs, dinners or discussion forums.

At the University of Edinburgh, new PhD students in many schools are assigned a thesis committee. The committees have three to five members, including both of the student’s supervisors and at least one independent person who has not been involved to any significant extent, either academically or administratively, with the student.

Students have reported that they particularly value having an external member of the thesis committee.

The Royal Society (2010) is quoted in the report as having found that more than 50% of doctoral candidates in the UK take up employment outside academia after a PhD and that only 3.5% end up in permanent academic positions.

There is no Danish member of LERU. Therefore there is no inclusion of experience with the industrial doctorate that has been operating in Denmark since the 1980s and has now been incorporated in the Marie-Sklodowska Curie programme under Horizon 2020.
 

CANADA How should we measure student success?

Grace Karram07 February 2014 Issue No:306

 

There is little consensus among Ontario’s stakeholders on what constitutes ‘student success’. Should institutions focus mainly on high completion rates, ensuring that students are successful in attaining their degrees? Or should students be encouraged to engage in a wide range of campus activities beyond their academics to develop well-rounded individuals?

Should government work with institutions to produce graduates that meet labour market needs, ensuring that students can acquire jobs in their fields? Or should students be encouraged to pursue what interests them, embarking on post-secondary education as a means of self-discovery?

These are just some of the questions raised at a higher education research symposium hosted by the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, or OISE, University of Toronto, at an event on post-secondary education in Ontario – Canada’s most populous province – late last year.

It brought together a range of stakeholders from universities, colleges and the provincial government to consider how researchers should define and measure student success. Each speaker presented a different outlook on whether student success means degree completion, engagement on campus, relevant employment, personal fulfilment or increased salaries.

The event ended with working groups to facilitate research collaboration across sectors and chart a course for holistic student success.

Earnings vs social development

The research shows that attending post-secondary education in Canada is still a guaranteed investment that will increase employment earnings.

The 2011 National Household Survey indicates that the salaries of college (vocational) graduates are 61% higher than their counterparts who only hold a high school diploma. These findings were presented by Trent University’s Professor Torben Drewes, whose multi-year research provides strong impetus for individuals to attend post-secondary education.

Despite the allure of increased earnings, the student support group was quick to critique a solely monetary understanding of success.

Professor Tony Chambers, who developed OISE’s Centre for the Study of Students in Post-secondary Education, pointed out that post-secondary education offers individuals and communities numerous social benefits like decreased crime rates and increased civic engagement.

Employment vs engagement

For Ontario’s college sector, which has traditionally focused on vocational or applied education, notions of success are often linked to student employment. College programming is designed with employers in mind and industry stakeholders provide information on both their employment needs and satisfaction with recent graduates.

Adrienne Galway, special advisor to the president of George Brown College, presented at the research symposium on her institution’s key performance indicators. She used these provincial assessment indicators to show that high employment and satisfaction rates are possible when multiple interests are considered in programme design.

While there is definitely a need to transition students efficiently into the workforce, there is an understanding across Canadian institutions that degree completion and student success more broadly cannot be realised without engaging students in all aspects of campus life.

Toward this end Chris Conway, director of institutional research and planning at Queen’s University, provided an analysis of the National Survey of Student Engagement, or NSSE.

NSSE is used broadly to assess undergraduate student behaviours and institutional practices, such as participation in extra-curricular activities, face-time with professors or experiences in residence life.

Complex measurements

As Conway was quick to point out, measuring an abstract concept like student success is complex and needs to be done with precision.

The above approaches tend to fall on opposing sides of a measurement-complexity spectrum. Those that offer effective measurement tools often simplify student success into one concept like increased earning or employment. However, more nuanced notions of success such as engagement or social development are incredibly difficult to assess.

What several researchers called for in response were multi-point research studies that consider numerous indicators like NSSE, key performance indicators and others to give a holistic picture of student success in the province.

Most importantly, as student success officers from around the province pointed out, there is a need to include students in these processes. Student participation may hold the key to identifying and measuring successful outcomes in post-secondary education.

* Presentation slides and a video of speakers is available here.

* Grace Karram Stephenson is a higher and international education specialist with the Comparative, International and Development Education Centre in the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto in Canada.

GLOBAL: The abuses of research evaluation

Yves Gingras07 February 2014 Issue No:306

The famous Shanghai Academic Ranking of World Universities, in which French institutions have not covered themselves in glory, made quite an impact when it was launched on the media and academic world in 2003. Since then, the debates around the various rankings of higher education institutions have continued.

Last August the French minister of research commented on this annual ranking, noting that French universities were slowly climbing the ladder, according to France Info – without explaining what that really meant in academic terms.

Many articles have, however, pointed out the perverse effects of the race to head rankings whose scientific value is almost zero.

An investigation by the American journal Science, published on 9 December 2011, showed for example that universities in Saudi Arabia had contacted highly cited researchers who were employed by other institutions around the world asking them to add the address of their institution to publications in exchange for a substantial fee.

Dummy affiliations

Such dummy affiliations, with no real impact on teaching and research in universities, allow marginal institutions to boost their position in the rankings of universities without having to develop any real scientific activities!

The researchers involved are complicit in practices that are more than ethically dubious. Bad faith allows some to defend themselves by saying that these ‘associate professor’ titles have only a symbolic value and promote collaboration, but few are really dupes since it is clear they are paid for lending their name and fame to institutions with which they have no really serious link – like months of local teaching or in situ research activities.

Less well known, and certainly less well documented publicly, is that accreditation bodies and rankings of business and management schools generate the same kind of immoral practices.

For although we could understand – even if we may disagree – that an academic institution might believe that it is useful to offer ‘productivity’ premiums to its researchers who publish in journals considered ‘prestigious’ to improve their visibility in a globalised scientific field, it is difficult to defend the negotiation of (formal or informal) agreements with researchers from other institutions simply so they can add an address to their publications in exchange for money.

I discovered this relatively hidden practice during the writing of my book Les dérives de l’évaluation de la recherche – The Abuses of Research Evaluation – just published by Raisons d’agir in Paris.

I learned in conversations with colleagues that some business schools and management faculties in France – and maybe elsewhere? – were using such practices, contacting some productive foreign researchers to ask them to add their addresses in exchange for relatively large amounts of money (several thousand euros per item!).

It is not surprising that business and management school staff, who are ‘knowledgeable’ in the field of commerce, have learned to monetise the symbolic capital of the most prominent researchers.

This is not a problem when the institution in question is really committed to this researcher and offers him or her a real job that allows the researcher to contribute directly to teaching and research that students of that institution can enjoy.

It is quite another thing when the goal is simply to improve their position in a ranking, or maintain accreditation, by artificially inflating the number of their publications in targeted magazines.

Intellectual fraud?

One wonders if this kind of activity does not in fact constitute a kind of intellectual fraud that is incompatible with the mission of an institution of higher education. Because even assuming that it is now necessary to engage in an academic boxing match, all blows should at least be above the belt...

Moreover, institutions that (wrongly) take their position in these rankings seriously do not seem aware of the unintended consequences and perverse effects they automatically generate, including the ironic result that some of their employees are contributing to improving the position of their ‘competitors’.

And if we cannot count on the moral fibre of directors and teaching staff to put an end to this situation, one would think that it is in the interests of institutions that are [artificially] in competition with each other in the rankings market to take steps to ensure that their researchers are not double agents.

After having worked hard to encourage researchers to clearly put their institutional address on publications so that the symbolic benefits are attributed to the right institution, it seems that the abuses of research evaluation will now force those same institutions to verify the validity and over-use of such addresses on these publications!

* Yves Gingras is a professor at the University of Quebec at Montreal, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche sur la science et la technologie (CIRST) and scientific director at l'Observatoire des sciences et des technologies (OST-UQAM). He has just published Les dérives de l'évaluation de la recherche. Du bon usage de la bibliométrie. This open letter was first published in Liberation.

UNITED STATES: Online learning comes of age

Richard Garrett07 February 2014 Issue No:306

 

Distance learning, not least the online version, has always been known for plenty of hype, a lot of growth and not much data. Even in the United States, where online higher education has boomed over the past decade, there were no comprehensive enrolment numbers.

In an attempt to address the gap, private outfits such as Sloan-C and Eduventures made do with special surveys and clever estimates.

Confirmation that online higher education has paid its dues and is here to stay, is the recent inclusion of distance learning data in the US federal government’s IPEDS – Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System – database.

The fact that inclusion comes 15 years after the online higher education growth ride began, means such decisions are not made lightly.

In the slow-and-steady business of official data collection, variables must have staying power, definitions must be commonplace and institutions must actually collect the numbers in reasonably reliable fashion.

While the federal data is concerned with multiple ‘distance’ modalities, all the US supply and demand evidence I’ve ever seen suggests all but a small fraction represents online delivery.

What the data reveals

What does the new data reveal?

In autumn 2012, there were just over two million undergraduates in the United States studying exclusively at a distance, plus about 650,000 graduate students. This represents about 11% of all undergraduate and about 22% of all graduate students.

We know from other sources that most of these students are in their late 20s and above, balancing college with job and family.

The ‘some distance’ students range from those taking one to many courses remotely, and it is not possible to distinguish majority from minority distance students. Overall, the ‘some distance’ students numbered about 2.6 million undergraduates and 225,000 graduate students.

Most of the ‘some distance’ undergraduates are just taking one or two courses online as part of an otherwise conventional experience, while many graduate students are enrolled in low residency programmes where the off-campus portion is conducted online.

It is reasonable to conclude that close to one-third of US graduate students are currently studying exclusively or majority online. Such a high ratio is testament to how far online learning has come.

Market concentration

A mere 20 institutions command one-third of the wholly distance market in the US – a mix of for-profit schools such as University of Phoenix, specialist distance learning non-profits such as Western Governors University, as well as one or two more ‘traditional’ universities such as Liberty University, a private religious institution that embraced online at scale, boasting almost 62,000 exclusively distance students in autumn 2012, the third highest total in the nation.

Market concentration by a handful of institutions emphasises that the majority are still wrestling with the medium, struggling with which programmes to offer, how to motivate faculty, which tools to use and how to thrive in an ever-more competitive environment.

Over the next few years, it will be interesting to see whether the big players lose ground, as some for-profits have already done, and the market fragments as a result, or whether leaders can make more of a virtue of scale from a student or regulator perspective.

In autumn 2012 more than 2,000 universities, colleges and campuses reported at least 50 distance learning students, suggesting plenty of institutions with further growth ambitions and an increasingly crowded market.

Local but at a distance

The IPEDS database indicates that exclusively distance enrolment in the US represents about 51% residents of the same state where the campus is located, about 45% residents from another US state, about 1.3% international and the tiny remainder unknown.

This distribution points to how ‘local’ so-called distance learning can be, propelled by the convenience of not having to attend campus rather than lack of access in rural areas. The onus is on institutions to demonstrate the benefit of studying at a far-off school, where online has to bear all or the vast majority of the instructional burden.

With online options at local institutions in every state, it may be more challenging for institutions to turn to online programming as a way to break out of local geography.

The very low international student ratio is a reminder that it has been very difficult for US or any other institutions to make a success of wholly online programmes across national borders.

It would be fascinating to know if the ‘some distance’ students are somewhat more international, suggesting that online alone remains too immature to truly break international markets.

There is no question that as the domestic online market gets more crowded, institutions are increasingly turning to international opportunities. The 1.3% international student share in autumn 2012 should caution schools that blended learning may be the way forward.

So now, finally, we have comprehensive student data for distance learning in the United States, even if enrolment by field of study still necessitates estimation.

With aggregated data also available for other big English-speaking countries like Australia and the United Kingdom, the global puzzle is a little less vexing.

The challenge for US institutions is to continue to hone a differentiated strategy, whether domestic or international, in this complex, crowded and now better-illuminated online market.

* Richard Garrett is director of performance analytics, North America, representing i-graduate and Benchmark +, both part of Tribal Group. He was formerly at Eduventures, where he led the company’s work in online higher education. Email: Richard.Garrett@i-graduate.org.
 

THAILAND: Leading the way on regional integration of HE in Asia?

Darren J McDermott07 February 2014 Issue No:306

 

Thailand is front and centre in the news again and unfortunately for the same political impasse and factional division that has defined much of its last decade. In another week of attrition for the incumbent administration and its detractors, international higher education and ASEAN integration will not be high on the agenda.

But perhaps it is worth reflecting on some positive developments that have taken place in Thai international education over the past while, including the expansion of a student mobility programme which, similar to Erasmus in Europe, could drive further integration .

With under a year to go until the much-vaunted formalisation of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC 2015), 2014 is a critical year. A recent Asian Development Bank, or ADB, study – the ASEAN Economic Community Business Survey – found the Thai business community’s awareness of integration running at 70%. This contrasts starkly with awareness levels in Singapore (14%), the Philippines (20%), Indonesia (23%) and Vietnam (24%).

The ADB explained these findings as being due to the “extent to which the firms are affected by regional, cross-border economic issues”.

Levels of awareness of AEC integration are most certainly greater within Thai than other ASEAN higher education institutions.

This is largely due to the activities of national and supranational bodies such as the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Regional Centre for Higher Education and Development, SEAMEO RIHED, and the ASEAN University Network or AUN, both of which have their regional headquarters in Bangkok.

In this sense, Thailand has become a seat of policy formulation in the ASEAN’s education integration efforts.

SEAMEO RIHED and the AUN are key partners in the fulfilment of the ASEAN’s Five-Year Work Plan on Education 2011-2015, in which one of the key priorities is the promotion of cross-border mobility and internationalisation of education.

This is providing the impetus to develop an ASEAN Common Higher Education Area in the same vein as that of the European Higher Education Area. The similarities are striking and it is not surprising that the European experience of harmonisation through the Bologna process has been seen as useful in charting a similar course in Southeast Asia.

European Union

In March 2011 the European Union launched the Thailand-EU Cooperation Facility with the Royal Thai government. The programme focused on furthering Thailand's policy dialogue and cooperation with the EU.

A major facet of the cooperation centred on developing capacity in Thai higher education as it moves towards ASEAN integration, leading to greater inter-regional cooperation between institutions, quality assurance agencies and international networks.

The policy dialogue components of the cooperation took the form of seminars and workshops by European and Thai education experts supported by the Royal Thai Government Office of the Higher Education Commission and the European Union Delegation to Thailand.

Among the themes presented were the tuning of higher education structures to support the development of the Thai Qualifications Framework, comparative studies on learning from the Bologna process and evaluation of Thai and ASEAN student mobility programmes.

The Thailand-EU Cooperation Facility concluded at the end of 2013, but the EU is renewing its engagement with Thai and ASEAN higher education in 2014 under the EU Support to Higher Education in the ASEAN Region – EU SHARE – programme.

EU SHARE will be launched early this year and its objectives are to strengthen regional cooperation and enhance the quality assurance, regional competitiveness and internationalisation of ASEAN higher education institutions towards AEC 2015 and beyond.

The five-year programme can draw on funding of over €10 million (US$13.5 million), of which around half will be committed to driving mobility intra-ASEAN states and from ASEAN to the EU.

Currently leading the charge in the expansion of regional mobility between Thailand and its ASEAN partners is the ASEAN International Mobility for Students, or AIMS, programme.

AIMS evolved out of the First Malaysia-Indonesia-Thailand (M-I-T) Meeting on Student Mobility held in Bangkok in August 2009.

The meeting was attended by education policy-makers from all three countries and the main thrust of discussions centred on priority curricula for mobility, the duration of the mobility period and the number of university participants and student participants.

Meetings have been held biannually since. The M-I-T programme was renamed AIMS in 2012. It is currently being implemented at seven universities throughout Thailand and 52 others in the region.

Taking AIMS

The AIMS programme has also caught the attention of the ASEAN Dialogue Partners, Japan, South Korea and China. Delegates from Japan’s Ministry of Education and universities were present at the Sixth Review Meeting of the AIMS programme in Chiang Rai, Thailand, in November last year.

This year, universities in Japan including Tsukuba University and Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology will be among the first non-ASEAN institutions to offer the programme to their students.

Much as Erasmus has been intrinsic to driving mobility and the provision of support structures through the Bologna process, the expansion of the AIMS programme across the ASEAN is seen as a significant catalyst for greater integration and the engendering of quality at the core of member states’ education systems.

The seven Thai universities participating in the AIMS programme are keen to see its expansion and welcome the opportunity it provides to develop stronger regional partnerships.

Thailand is very well placed along with its neighbours in Malaysia and Indonesia at the intersection of developments in the further integration and harmonisation of ASEAN higher education provision.

There is still work to be done on formalising and aligning structures of quality assurance, credit transfer and qualifications frameworks, but this is continuing apace.

Thailand too has the potential to promote itself as a regional hub for education, so the establishment of a national brand for Thai higher education with a defined strategy on driving inbound mobility is also salient at this point.

Once Thailand exits this latest political cul-de-sac, one hopes it can put factional politics away for a more regionalist approach, which will surely 'raise all boats'.

* Darren J McDermott is an international education development consultant.
 

Anti-Vietnam talk by CNRP ‘alarms’ envoy

Fri, 17 January 2014

Kevin Ponniah

UN human rights envoy Surya Subedi yesterday said he was “alarmed” by anti-Vietnamese language used by the opposition party to rally its supporters, a message he said he had conveyed to Cambodia National Rescue Party leaders during his visit.

Speaking at a press conference to conclude his visit, Subedi said he had told CNRP leaders that tolerance and racial harmony would be crucial for the future of Cambodian democracy.

“I am alarmed by the anti-Vietnamese language allegedly used in public by the opposition,” he said.

Subedi also noted attacks on several Vietnamese-owned businesses during violent clashes between striking garment workers and authorities on January 3.

“Dissemination of ideas based on racial superiority or hatred, incitement to racial discrimination, as well as acts of violence or incitement to such acts against any race or group of person of another colour or ethnic origin … have no place in a democratic society,” he said.

In talks with him, CNRP leaders had denied they meant what others had inferred from their statements, Subedi added in response to a question, without specifying what those inferences were.

“Whatever measures other people [had] inferred from their statements, it was not their intention. They were not implying that,” he said. “People were perhaps inferring different conclusions from that, but they [CNRP leadership] assured me they will [work], and they have worked, within a democratic framework and respecting tolerance and racial harmony.”

Vietnamese illegal immigrants living and working in Cambodia, as well as Vietnamese companies holding economic land concessions and alleged Vietnamese land-grabbing, have been a frequent theme of CNRP rhetoric both before and after the election.

In December, the Cambodian Center for Human Rights criticized the opposition initially for using “harmful language” against Vietnamese and later, in a follow-up statement, for singling out Vietnamese for criticism.

During Subedi’s last visit to the Kingdom in May, senior minister and Cambodian Human Rights Committee head Om Yentieng complained that Subedi never targeted the opposition. At the time, Yentieng said Subedi’s reports were weaker than European football arbitrators for not mentioning racial discrimination by the opposition and compared Subedi’s work to “an arrow shooting at one side of the government”.

Perhaps in response, Subedi’s press statement following that visit urged all sides to “refrain completely from exploiting racial sentiments” but did not specifically name the CNRP, in contrast to yesterday’s much stronger statement.

CNRP leaders Sam Rainsy and Kem Sokha could not be reached for comment yesterday, but a statement from the party released August 27 clarified its position on the Vietnamese issue.

“The CNRP opposes violence, racism, xenophobia and discrimination,” it said.

US Passes Bill to Suspend Some Aid to Cambodia

By Zsombor Peter - January 17, 2014

The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a spending bill that would suspend some funding to Cambodia until the government carries out an independent investigation of July’s disputed national election and reforms its electoral system, or until the opposition ends its boycott of parliament.

The bill also instructs the World Bank not to “reengage” with Cambodia until the election dispute is settled and to report to U.S. lawmakers regularly on what the Bank is doing to help the thousands of families evicted in recent years from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak neighborhood. 

The bill, if approved by the U.S. Senate in the coming days, would follow through on threats some U.S. lawmakers had made to cut aid funding over Cambodia’s flawed election, which returned Prime Minister Hun Sen to power but tainted the ruling CPP’s win due to evidence of widespread irregularities.

While the U.S. hasn’t rejected the results of the election, it has conspicuously avoided endorsing them.

The spending bill may carry more force as a symbolic gesture than as a financial burden, however. The text of the bill does not specify just how much aid Cambodia could lose out on, and includes exceptions that would prevent much of it from being withdrawn.

Of the more than $1 billion in aid foreign donors shower on Cambodia each year, less than $80 million comes from the U.S., and most of that goes directly to nongovernment groups. The new spending bill targets only those funds that would go straight into government coffers for anything other than humanitarian aid. It also protects any funds for human rights training for the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, units of which have recently implicated in violently putting down a protest for higher garment factory wages.

Whatever modest aid is left, the bill would have it suspended until “a) such government is conducting and implementing, with the concurrence of the political opposition in Cambodia, an independent and credible investigation into irregularities associated with the July 28, 2013, parliamentary elections, and comprehensive reform of the National Election Committee [NEC] or b) all parties that won parliamentary seats in such elections have agreed to join the National Assembly, and the National Assembly is conducting business in accordance with the Cambodian Constitution.”

The opposition CNRP won nearly half the Assembly’s 123 seats in the July poll and claims it would have won a majority had the voting been free and fair. The party has refused to take its seats since the Assembly convened in September and is calling for an independent investigation and reforms to the NEC. Prime Minister Hun Sen’s government is refusing to do either.

Negotiations between the opposition and ruling CPP are still stalled, while mass protests against Mr. Hun Sen came to an abrupt end early this month after government thugs raided a camp of opposition supporters in central Phnom Penh.

CPP lawmaker and party spokesman Cheam Yeap said he was deeply disappointed by the bill’s passage and accused the U.S. of unfairly singling out Cambodia.

“I very much regret that America passed the law only on Cambodia; why doesn’t America implement this on other countries?” he asked. “I study the law a lot, I know about international law and common law. According to procedure, the Western countries should not do things like this.”

Mr. Yeap lamented what he felt was an American bias toward the opposition. “America cannot control Cambodia,” he added.

As for Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak neighborhood, from which the government has in recent years illegally evicted some 3,000 families to make way for a CPP senator’s real estate project, the spending bill calls for more accountability from the World Bank.

In early 2011, an independent investigation concluded that a World Bank project in Cambodia that was meant to furnish Cambodians with land titles had actually helped to strip the Boeng Kak families of their land rights. Later that year, the Bank confirmed that it was suspending all new lending to Cambodia until the government and families reached an agreement to compensate the evictees.

The spending bill would have the U.S. treasury secretary direct the World Bank’s American executive director to report regularly to the House Appropriations Committee on what the Bank was doing to “provide appropriate redress” to the Boeng Kak families harmed by the Bank’s land titling project. The Bank director would also have to tell the Appropriations Committee what he was doing to “postpone reengagement” with Cambodia until the election dispute was resolved.

Evictees and human rights groups have accused the World Bank of not doing enough to help the displaced families.

Tep Vanny, a Boeng Kak resident who has protested against the evictions for years and paid for it with jail time, welcomed the provision in the new bill by the House of Representatives.

“We are very glad for the solidarity of the American people and we hope that the World Bank will take notice. It is time to resolve our case once and for all because our people have suffered long enough,” she said in a statement circulated by rights groups.

The bill would also suspend any U.S. funds appropriated for the Khmer Rouge tribunal until the Cambodian government provides or secures funding for the national side of the hybrid, U.N.-backed court.

The government is obliged to support the chronically under-funded national side of the court under its agreement with the U.N. but has largely failed to do so.

The U.S. is the court’s third- largest donor, behind Japan and Australia. Of the $200 million provided by donors to the court as of September, the U.S. has given $16.1 million, or about 8 percent.

U.S. Embassy spokesman Sean McIntosh declined to comment on how much aid the bill could actually cost Cambodia.

“In general we do not comment on pending legislation,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Khy Sovuthy)

Cambodians Ranked Healthiest Eaters in World

By Emily Wilkins - January 16, 2014

Cambodia was ranked the best country in the world for healthy eating habits due to its low rates of diabetes and obesity, according to a report released Wednesday by Oxfam International.

However, the report, which ranks food health and availability across the world, emphasizes that Cambodia’s top ranking is nothing to celebrate, as its healthy diet is directly linked to food scarcity.

When Cambodia’s score on healthy eating was combined with its scores for adequacy of nutrition and percentage of underweight children, Cambodia dropped from first place to 74th in Oxfam’s ranking.

“What’s clear is that the amount of food available is far more of a priority concern for the country,” said Lucy Brinicombe, senior press officer for Oxfam.

About 15.4 percent of Cambodia’s population is undernourished and 29 percent of children are underweight, the Oxfam report says.

The report measured countries on two additional criteria: affordability and food quality. Based on all measures, Cambodia ranked 88th, on par with Cameroon and Guinea-Bissau.

While diabetes and obesity are still low in Cambodia, they might be set to rise, said Maurits van Pelt, director of MoPoTsyo Patient Information Center, a local NGO that screens for diabetes.

Mr. van Pelt said he has seen an increase in consumption of sugary drinks among Cambodia’s youth and a decrease in the amount of exercise Cambodians of all ages get, due to mechanization of farming and more sedentary jobs available.

“Cambodians are quickly becoming heavier and more and more obese,” he said. “But [diabetes] is still relatively small.”

10 Ways to Improve Your English Writing Skills Today

Source: http://www.grammarcheck.net/10-ways-to-improve-your-english-writing-skills-today/

Learning to write English can be a frustratingly slow process. Every time you think you have written a word-perfect piece, some wise guy comes along and points out a mistake that you just don’t see anything wrong with. But before you snap your pencil and throw your books out of the window, take a deep breath and consider this… 

Firstly, you are probably a lot better at writing than you think. If those reading your written English understand what you mean, even though the grammar and spelling isn’t perfect, you’re half way there. 

Secondly, you’d be surprised at just how many native English speakers struggle with writing, and just how many mistakes native speakers make in their written communications. 

And lastly, writing skills are a combination of personal negligence, poor teaching, lack of proper feedback and few opportunities to put skills into practice. Which is why today we’re going to solve these issues by giving you 10 ways to start improving your English writing skills immediately.

1. Read as much as you can

In today’s world, an increasing number of people are reading solely from online sources. The bulk of this reading is done on blogs, which aren’t always very well written. To ensure you are digesting a wide spectrum of written English, you need to employ a diverse set of reading tools. Read newspapers, magazines, brochures, reports and any other materials you can find in niches of interest. This will give you a broader understanding of grammar, sentence structure and technical jargon across a wide range of literature. When you come across words or expressions you don’t understand, underline them and look them up once you have finished your reading session.

2. Engage in chat room and forum discussions

The key to perfecting your English skills is to learn to think in English. This skill will help you write better and faster. Chat rooms and forums force you to think in English because contributors are writing in English and usually responding quickly. This dynamic environment brings English speakers of varying proficiencies together in one place, providing the perfect platform for you to improve your writing and conversational skills.

3. Mind Your Slang

It ‘s fun to learn English slang words so that you can understand the “cool” words young people use, and of course understand colloquialisms in countries like America, the UK, and Australia. But be careful not to allow slang to creep into your written work. Words such as ‘innit’ and ‘dunno’ are not considered proper English grammar, and should not find their way into formal written communications.

4. Read This Punctuation Book

No person can become a great writer of English without exemplary punctuation skills, and no writer’s bookshelf – no matter how skilled he or she might be – is complete without a copy of Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss. Using examples from literature, history, neighborhood signage and other sources, the book demonstrates how commas, apostrophes and conjunctions shape the meaning of sentences. Eats, Shoots & Leaves is not your typical “learn punctuation” book, either. It’s written in a witty, almost story-like way that makes it wholly enjoyable. You can grab a copy here on Amazon.com.

5. Start a Personal Blog

I know, every man and his dog are blogging for world domination these days, but this tip isn’t suggesting you embark on a mission to become the next blogosphere superstar, this endeavour is about challenging yourself to put fingers to keyboard and have the confidence to put your English writing skills on the line for all to see. A personal blog will give you a platform to use newly discovered words and expressions, and to express your thoughts and opinions on subjects you’re interested in. Don’t worry, no one’s going to judge your grammatical flaws on a personal blog; if anything, people will be impressed by your efforts.

6. Build a personalized dictionary

Easy to do and very helpful, building a personalized dictionary will improve your English writing skills overnight. Writing down irregular verbs, idiomatic expressions, technical jargon and any new words you come across will prove a far more effective learning aid than a printed or online dictionary you consult passively on an irregular basis. No matter how efficient the digital world, when it comes to learning, there is nothing quite like writing something down to get it to stick in your brain.

7. Find a personal tutor

There is no better way to advance your English writing skills that by having your work reviewed by a native English speaker. Perhaps you know a teacher or other professional whose job requires high level English skills. Ask this person if, once a week, they can help you correct grammar, spelling, tone and style in a piece of written work. Taking action on this point alone will greatly advance your English writing skills.

8. Stay humble

Even native English speakers struggle to write perfect English, and very few ever reach the standard required for professional journalism or award-winning book writing, but this doesn’t mean you won’t get there. What it does mean, however, is that no matter how good you become, you must remain open to constructive criticism. The learning never stops, and an integral part of the learning process is discussing your work with those more advanced than you and taking their comments on board. Don’t miss vital opportunities to advance your writing skills by being too proud to listen.

9. Buy a personal dictionary & thesaurus

Once you begin editing and rewriting your own work you should invest in a dictionary and thesaurus. It’s true that you can use an online dictionary and thesaurus to save money, but there’s nothing like having your own hard copy at home. One reason for this is that it is best to turn off the Internet when you edit your work so that distractions such as Facebook and Twitter don’t disturb your concentration. Your personal dictionary and thesaurus will also come in handy when you go to do some work in a library, or when you are staying away from home in a place where the Internet isn’t readily available.

10. Take advantage of free online resources

While it’s definitely worth investing in the aforementioned print books, and striking a balance between learning on and offline, there are a number of efficient online resources you can use to improve your English writing skills on a daily basis. Start with these three popular websites:

MALAYSIA: Experts worry over quality of young doctors

The Straits Times-ANN29 November 2013 Issue No:298

Concerns are being raised about the quality of young doctors in Malaysia, with the country's biggest doctors' association raising the red flag on foreign medical colleges and experts also warning of sub-standard local training, writes Yong Yen Nie for The Straits Times-ANN.

The Malaysian Medical Association, the main representative body for all doctors, has called on the government to review its list of recognised foreign medical colleges. Those that have failed to meet the government's mandatory standards, it said, should have their accreditation withdrawn. The problem is not only with foreign medical colleges, experts say. Over the years, the government has allowed a mushrooming of private medical colleges in the country, as it strives for developed nation status.

Entry into one of the nine publicly funded medical schools is difficult as the number of places offered is limited. These public schools, viewed as prestigious institutions, are known to accept mainly those who score four As in the Malaysian equivalent of A levels. But the 30 or so private medical colleges have much lower minimum requirements.