Headlines in recent weeks have highlighted the stumbles, and sometimes outright spills, by American colleges seeking to set up degree programs with foreign partners.
State University of New York Empire State College has allowed a university in Albania to deliver diplomas in its name. But the public college, the subject of a New York Times investigation, has had seemingly little say-so in the curriculum or hiring at the University of New York Tirana.
In North Dakota, state auditors issued a scathing review of dual-degree programs at Dickinson State University, reporting that they had admitted hundreds of unqualified students, mainly from China, and awarded them degrees even when they failed to meet graduation requirements. Ignoring its own standards, the public university had acted as a diploma mill, the audit concluded.
Then there’s Houston Community College, which has been in the midst of its own desert storm. Students at the Community College of Qatar, in the tiny Persian Gulf emirate, protested after learning that they would not earn degrees from the Texas college, as they had expected to. Those degrees would allow them to transfer to four-year universities. Houston officials maintain that they were working with Qatar’s first community college only in an advisory role, but that students could earn Houston diplomas by submitting their transcripts for review.
Taken together, these incidents have renewed concerns about whether, in embarking on ambitious international ventures, American colleges are putting themselves at risk, legally, financially, and reputationally. In their quest for global prestige and, often, dollars, are they rushing abroad without doing their homework? After all, experts note, even internationally savvy institutions, like George Mason University and Michigan State University, have occasionally misstepped in their efforts overseas.
“There are lots of good reasons to go and serve students where the education is weak,” says Alan Ruby, a senior fellow at the Graduate School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania. “But that doesn’t mean going unwittingly and unthinkingly.”
Looking Before Leaping
The North Dakota University System audit is damning. Dickinson State, it charges, enrolled international students with subpar grades, shaky English, and fraudulent transcripts, awarding them bachelor’s degrees for spending just one of their four college years on that campus. A number of the students transferred in from a remedial-education institute associated with Taiyuan University of Technology, in China, and not from a college-level program.
What’s more, Dickinson State disregarded its own rules regarding course and degree changes, allowing students to switch to majors for which they had no preparation. Department chairs apparently felt pressure to do so because recruiting agents in China, purporting to work for Dickinson, had promised students they would be able to swap majors once in the United States. Just 10 of the 410 students enrolled in these dual-degree programs since 2003 actually completed the necessary requirements, the audit report concludes.
It’s not entirely clear what led Dickinson State to begin the controversial programs, and the president in charge when the worst offenses occurred has been fired for other enrollment irregularities. But the news has many international educators scratching their heads: Why, they ask, did a small, little-known state university in North Dakota have dual-degree agreements with dozens of institutions abroad?
Too often, these experts say, colleges’ international relationships are partnerships of convenience. Kevin Kinser studies branch campuses at the State University of New York at Albany—he doesn’t start them. (He’s also a Chronicle blogger.) Yet he has been approached countless times after speaking at conferences by foreign institutions that want to work with Albany.
Philip G. Altbach, director of the Center for International Higher Education at Boston College, says colleges need to scrutinize their motivations and those of their potential partners before entering into any agreement. Sometimes he wonders why foreign universities or governments approach certain American institutions: “I don’t know if they just go through the phone book.”
Nor are many colleges sophisticated in their methods of assessing possible global ventures. Colleges should have centralized committees that vet any agreements, and those panels should draw on a range of expertise, including faculty members, human-resources administrators, and university lawyers, says Bob Lammey, a senior director at High Street Partners, a company that advises colleges on overseas risk management. Institutions need to ask the right questions, from what’s the rule of law in a potential destination country to who in the partnership will do the hiring and firing to how much such an arrangement will cost in staff time and money.
Few colleges have formal processes to assess international activities, Mr. Lammey says, and that’s a problem. Mr. Kinser agrees: “Approving a program in another country is not the same as approving a new program in sociology.”
Keeping Control
In Qatar, much of the disagreement seems to center around academic control. In internal e-mail messages obtained by the Houston Chronicle, officials of Houston Community College expressed concern about decisions made by the top administrator at the new Community College of Qatar, who was hired by the Qatari government, not the Texas college. They were also apparently surprised by a Qatari decision to educate male and female students separately. And although initial announcements by both partners said students at the Qatari institution would have “dual enrollment” in Houston Community College, Houston officials recently said that only those who go through an individual review process would be eligible for American credit for classes taken in Qatar.
Houston Community College is not the first institution to run into disputes over decision-making. George Mason shuttered its campus in Ras al Khaymah, another Persian Gulf emirate, after its partner sought to make midstream changes in their agreement, demanded to hire a chief academic dean, and reduced its financial commitment. Peter N. Stearns, George Mason’s provost, says the university hasn’t given up on overseas work but will focus on creating dual-degree programs, not overseas campuses. Degree programs, he says, give the university a greater amount of control.
Daniel Kratochvil, of the University of Wollongong in Dubai, studies the Emirati education market. There’s no such thing as a “free ticket” when it comes to international joint ventures, he says. “You’re overseas as a guest, and that’s a risk. Misunderstandings can arise, partnerships can change, governments can make unilateral changes to the terms of a contract.”
Webster University, based in St. Louis, has campuses throughout Europe and Asia, but it operates under a “one-university” policy, says Grant Chapman, associate vice president for academic affairs and director of international programs. All course changes are reviewed by a centralized curriculum committee. Every diploma says “Webster University.” While staff and faculty members may be hired locally, there’s always an administrator answerable to the home campus. And any variation from admissions standards must be approved back in St. Louis. “We’re not in the business of franchising our name,” Mr. Chapman says.
Relationship Maintenance
Some observers question if that’s what Empire State College did in striking a deal in Albania. Although an initial agreement between the SUNY college and University of New York Tirana sets out high academic standards, Empire State’s director of international programs told the Times that instructors in Albania were not subject to its review and approval. Teams of faculty members from New York are able to make the trip to Eastern Europe only a couple of times a year because of budget constraints. (College officials have since said they have a more substantial review system in place.)
By contrast, officials from the Rochester Institute of Technology regularly visit its branches in Croatia, the Dominican Republic, and Dubai. Rochester faculty routinely take temporary teaching appointments abroad, and the university uses its overseas sites as destinations for its students to study abroad. All those people going back and forth help act as a quality-control mechanism—one of many, says James H. Watters, senior vice president for finance and administration. “It’s easy to say, ‘Out of sight, out of mind,’” he notes.
Mr. Lammey, of High Street Partners, says many colleges assume that their foreign partners are taking care of everything on the ground. That’s not always the case, he warns, mentioning one client whose longstanding partner failed to pay employees of the joint venture according to local regulations. The American college could face a hefty settlement with the foreign government.
International agreements, Mr. Lammey says, “always start out on good footing.” But when problems arise, colleges need to have an “easy-out clause” to end floundering relationships.
Still, he cautions that educators should not assume the worst of all international ventures just because a few problems have grabbed headlines. Many are well-run, he says.
Jason Lane, who is co-director, with Mr. Kinser, of the Cross-Border Education Research Team at Albany, worries that failures of institutional management could lead to “overly aggressive external oversight” by outside groups, like accreditors or state legislatures. They could put severe limits, or even prohibitions, on overseas partnerships.
But John K. Hudzik, a former vice president for global and strategic projects at Michigan State, finds that good can come from scrutiny. “It’s hard, but we can learn from failures,” he says. “It’s a good thing if people can learn to be more systematic about this work.”
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