September 26th, 2013 Like most of you, I’ve been watching the events in Greece unfolding from the sidelines. We have all been following the economic breakdown of the country and threats by the EU to rescind Greece’s EU member status. As Greece’s economy continues to spin out of control, giving rise to right wing fascist […]
politics
Iran: Elections and Academic Credentials Under Scrutiny
June 20, 2013 As you must have heard by now, Iranians had an election last week and cast their votes in favor of Hassan Rouhani (or Rowhani), ending the eight- year term of his predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. What has caught my attention is not the President-elect’s victory but the news surrounding his academic qualifications, which […]
20 Facts About Turkey
June 07, 2013 In light of the protests that have erupted in Turkey against the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, we wanted to share a few facts about this country situated at the northeast end of the Mediterranean Sea in southeast Europe and southwest Asia. North of Turkey is the Black Sea and […]
America’s Jazz Ambassadors
May 16, 2013 During the cold war in the 1950s and 60s, when America was worried about Sputnik, ICBMs, and building bomb shelters, there was a quiet but determined cultural diplomacy going on behind the Iron Curtain. The U.S. State Department around the mid-1950s started sending American jazz musicians into Russia, newly-independent African nations (whom […]
International Student Visas in the News, Again
May 09, 2013 The recent tragic bombings at the Boston Marathon, signifying yet another senseless act of violence and loss of innocent lives has spawned a wave of anti-immigration sentiments, in particular concerning student “visas.” According to the online blog Politico: last Wednesday on Fox News, Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio said “student visas are […]
China: Taking steps to ensure academic document legitimacy
Cooperative Agreement between CDGDC and ACEI April 18, 2013 According to a recent IIE Open Door report “International Student enrollment increased by 5% in 2010/11, led by strong increase in students from China.” The report cites a 23% increase in the number of Chinese students of which 43% are studying at the undergraduate level. According […]
Understanding the Institutes of Chartered Accountants in India and Pakistan
April 11, 2013 For institutions in the United States, accounting credentials from India and Pakistan can be especially difficult to interpret. Typically, comparative education researchers and credential evaluators in the U.S. seek to determine the comparability of foreign studies to domestic equivalents based on several criteria including: • admission requirements for the academic program in […]
Dispatches from the 2013 AIEA Conference in New Orleans
February 21, 2013 It’s been almost a decade since I last visited New Orleans. I have to thank the AIEA (Association of International Education Administrators) http://www.aieaworld.org/ for hosting its annual national conference in the Big Easy this year. No visit to New Orleans is complete without a stop at the world famous Café du Monde […]
Sounds Like…Geisha!
January 31, 2013 I grew up in Los Angeles, where the oldest standing building, the Sanchez Adobe, reportedly dates back to the early 1790’s. Therefore I am astonished on a daily basis, by the structures I see here in Bremen, Germany. Some of the oldest date back to the 11th century—really. Their Gothic and Renaissance […]
Heroes, Activists, and Martyrs: Lending their names to the streets of Tehran
January 24, 2013 When I heard the story of Granada, Spain planning to approve a measure to name a square in honor of the British punk band The Clash’s Joe Strummer http://www.theworld.org/2013/01/spanish-square-to-be-named-in-honor-of-the-clashs-joe-strummer/ I was reminded of the battery of street name changes that Iranian cities underwent immediately after the Islamic Revolution of 1979. The changing […]