Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Kenneth Starr, Clinton Prosecutor, Is Picked to Lead Baylor

Ace! NewsFlash

Kenneth Starr, Clinton Prosecutor, Is Picked to Lead Baylor

Baylor University named Kenneth W. Starr its new president on Monday, saying his Christian ideals and experience heading a law school made him the ideal candidate.

Mr. Starr, whose investigation of the Whitewater land deal and theMonica Lewinsky scandal led to President Bill Clinton’s impeachment in 1998, has been dean of the law school at Pepperdine University in Malibu, Calif., since 2004. He will be the 14th president of Baylor, following John M. Lilley, who was fired in 2008.

Pepperdine officials said he would begin his new job in Texas on June 1.

Baylor issued a statement on the appointment, which was first reported by The Waco Tribune-Herald.

In it, R. Dary Stone, who leads the board of regents at Baylor, said, “His depth of experience and exceptional record as a university dean and legal scholar, his dedication to the highest ideals of the Christian faith, and his profound commitment to public service and visionary leadership make him the ideal person to lead Baylor at this remarkable time in the university’s history.”

Mr. Starr was born in Vernon, Tex., near the Oklahoma border, and grew up in San Antonio. He has taught at New York University School of Law, George Mason University School of Law in Fairfax, Va., and Chapman Law School in Orange, Calif. He served as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit for six years, was the solicitor general for four and conducted five investigations as independent counsel, according to Baylor.

His office spent millions of dollars in the 1990s investigating Mr. Clinton’s affair with Ms. Lewinsky, a White House intern, and efforts to cover it up. The House approved two articles of impeachment against Mr. Clinton, but the Senate did not convict him.

Mr. Lilley, the former Baylor president, was fired less than three years after he was hired. Regents said he failed to unite students, faculty members and alumni, but they declined to elaborate.

*** Ace! is a member of the EducationUSA global educational advising network affiliated with the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, U.S. Department of State. We provide free EducationUSA counseling services to students in the northern provinces of Thailand; our faculty of U.S.-trained Test Prep Experts can help you with cost-effective result-driven training programs for SAT-1, SAT-2, TOEFL, GRE, GMAT, GED, IELTS etc ***

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Expansion of A.P. Tests Also Brings More Failures

Ace! NewsFlash

The College Board’s Advanced Placement program is expanding in American high schools, but as it moves from being a program primarily for elite students, the number of test-takers who fail A.P. exams is growing — although not as much as the number of those who pass.

According to a College Board report, about 800,000 public high school seniors in last May’s graduating class, or 26.5 percent of the class, took an A.P. exam at some point in their high school career, almost twice as many as took A.P. exams in the class of 2001.

While the majority of students who take A.P. exams still earn a passing score of 3, 4 or 5, which is enough to earn college credit at many institutions, the share of failing scores has risen with the program’s rapid expansion. In 2009, about 43 percent of the 2.3 million A.P. exams taken earned a failing grade of 1 or 2, compared with 39 percent of the one million exams taken by the class of 2001.

“Are we getting more 1’s and 2’s? Absolutely,” said Trevor Packer, vice president of the Advanced Placement program. “But are we getting more 3’s, 4’s and 5’s? Even more so. So the question is whether that increase in the percentage of low scores is a reasonable tradeoff for the even larger growth in high scores. And I don’t know an educator who wouldn’t think it’s a good tradeoff to take the risk and give more courses that we know have been good for the few.”

The College Board report emphasized the rising proportion of seniors who had taken at least one A.P. exam, and received at least one passing grade. The share who took at least one A.P. exam last year was a third larger than it was for the class of 2004, while the share who got a grade of three or higher was about a quarter higher than in the class of 2004.

Whether there are benefits for students who take an A.P. exam, but do not pass, remains a matter for debate.

The College Board said that students who got a 2 or higher were more likely to earn a bachelor’s degree within four years than other students. Some educators say that being exposed to college-level work helps even those students who fail the exam.

“It doesn’t get you college credit if you get a 1 or a 2, but I think it does provide students with a sense of the kind of skills and critical thinking that college will require from them,” said Jean Robinson, associate dean for undergraduate education at Indiana University. “I think the focus shouldn’t be so much on students obtaining credit and taking care of some intro course while they’re in high school, as on getting the skills they’re going to need.”

Many high schools have adopted extensive Advanced Placement offerings as a goal, to increase the rigor of their curriculum, to give students a head start on college credit, and to help them impress college admissions offices. On average, the College Board reported, high schools now offer 10 A.P. courses, up from seven five years ago.

In April 2008, the College Board announced that, because of the costs, it was discontinuing four programs — French literature, computer science AB, Italian and Latin literature — each of which had less than 5,000 participants. Those exams were given for the last time in May.

But several other programs continue with low enrollment: Chinese, German, Japanese, Latin: Vergil, and Studio Art: 3-D Design. Each had less fewer than 5,000 exam-takers in May.

Mr. Packer said there were no plans to eliminate any other Advanced Placement programs, and he added that the Chinese and Japanese exams, offered for the first time in 2007, were relatively inexpensive to offer because they were administered via computer.

Many states have been working to expand their Advanced Placement programs, in some cases paying for students to take the exams.

Jamie Oliver Wins TED Prize for Obesity Efforts

Ace! NewsFlash

Jamie Oliver Wins TED Prize for Obesity Efforts

Jamie Oliver wants to start a campaign to educate American children about eating healthier food.

Jamie Oliver, the chef who prodded the British government to overhaul the nation’s school lunch program, was awarded the $100,000 TED Prize on Wednesday at the annual TED conference, a series of lectures by experts from a wide range of fields including science, religion, and economics.

The award is intended to allow prominent people to articulate “one wish to change the world.”

“My wish is for everyone to help create a strong sustainable movement to educate every child about food,” he said, “to inspire families to cook again and to empower people everywhere to fight obesity.”

In front of more than 1,500 people in Long Beach, Calif.. and millions more who watched live over CNN.com, Mr. Oliver challenged his listeners to work with him.

The prize comes with organizational support, largely drawn from the resources of people who attend this week’s conference.

Among the things that Mr. Oliver’s campaign would need: office space, equipment to run community kitchens, media support, a Web site, and corporate partners who would help champion healthier food label. Following TED tradition, audience members stood up and offered their help and suggestions: headhunting for staff members, access to lawmakers in Washington, Web site design and marketing testing.

His mission dovetails with Michelle Obama’s new initiative to combat childhood obesity, a problem that now affects nearly one in three children in the country.

Pacing on the stage in a plaid shirt and his trademark spiky haircut, Mr. Oliver became emotional in explaining that this generation of children isprojected to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents, by as much as full decade — which he argued is almost all entirely diet-related.

Mr. Oliver had already established a beach head in the United States in Huntington, W. Va., statistically one of the most unhealthy communities in the country. His alternatingly humorous and emotional efforts to convert the community into eating better are documented in a series, “Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution,” which will be shown by ABC starting on March 26.

In one clip from the program, schoolchildren misidentified tomatoes for potatoes, an eggplant for a pear and a beet for an onion. Mr. Oliver said that they did not know the vegetables because they do not cook with them.

At the darkest moments during the campaign, Mr. Oliver said he thought to himself, “If I had a magic wand, What would I do? I’d just love to be put in front of the movers and shakers in America.”

A month later, TED, whose large annual conference in Long Beach attracts influential people across a range of industries, called and offered him the prize.

Winners of the four previous TED Prizes, which were introduced in 2005, have included Bill Clinton, Dave Eggers and Bono. In past years, there were three winners announced at each conference. But this year the organization decided to scale down to just one, as the number of wish campaigns was becoming unwieldy.

Friday, February 12, 2010

U.K. Cutting Down on Foreign Students

Ace! NewsFlash

Britain Plans to Cut Flow of Foreign Students

LONDON — In the face of mounting concern about abuse of student visa rules by migrant jobseekers and potential terrorists, Britainsaid Sunday that it was planning an immediate tightening of its border controls that could reduce the flow of people entering the country as students by tens of thousands a year.

The new rules will apply to all applicants from outside the European Union. British officials announcing the new controls noted that the policy review that prompted the new restrictions had been ordered in November, before the airliner bombing attempt on Christmas Day 2009. They said 240,000 student visas were issued in the 2008-9 statistical year, accounting for a third of all migrants reaching Britain. They said their main concern lay in stopping the abuse of student visas by people seeking to find jobs and settle in Britain.

Still, the Christmas Day attack appeared to have had an influence. Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said that Britain regarded the thwarted attack as “a wake-up call” requiring a review of airport security measures and border controls, among other things. Home Secretary Alan Johnson, responsible for overseeing domestic security, said in a BBC interview that care would be taken not to damage “a major part of the U.K. economy,” the $8 billion to $13 billion a year generated by the education of foreign students here. But in a formal statement, Mr. Johnson said that “those who are not seriously interested in coming here to study, but come primarily to work, should be in no doubt that we will come down hard on those that flout the rules.”

The restrictions will include a requirement that students speak English well enough to pass British high school exams, not just the “beginner’s English” required previously. Applicants for courses lasting less than six months will no longer be allowed to bring family members with them, and the dependents of students on courses not leading to degrees will be barred from working. Colleges will be more tightly monitored, to eliminate the kind of fake institutions that one critic described last year as “a couple of people above a chip shop.”

The restrictions come only nine months after a major overhaul aimed at weeding out false applicants. But the new system — requiring applicants to show they have offers from approved colleges and adequate finances — was quickly overwhelmed, particularly in the Indian subcontinent, where applications soared and British officials complained that they were approving applications on paperwork alone, with no interviews.

Last week, the government halted all student visa approvals from northern India, Nepal and Bangladesh while the system was under review.

*** Ace! is a member of the EducationUSA global educational advising network affiliated with the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, U.S. Department of State. We provide free EducationUSA counseling services to students in the northern provinces of Thailand; our faculty of U.S.-trained Test Prep Experts can help you with cost-effective result-driven training programs for SAT-1, SAT-2, TOEFL, GRE, GMAT, GED, IELTS etc ***

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Study in Australia? Better Think Again...!

Ace! NewsFlash

Collapsed college owes students $10m

The Australian: Feb 2, 2010

The collapsed GEOS English language college network was permanently shut yesterday after administrators discovered the Japanese owners had left it with no money to keep going.

Students and staff are owed more than $10 million in pre-paid fees and entitlements.

Worst-hit are about 1000 students who had paid GEOS for homestay accommodation and who could now face eviction.

GEOS student Joachim Adam from Germany has already been told by his landlady in Melbourne to immediately pay his weekly rent of $220 dollars or leave, even though he has already paid all his rent to GEOS.

"I must pay by this evening or I must go," he said.

Administrator Justin Walsh of Ernst and Young said remaining funds "are vastly insufficient to continue trading". GEOS was put into administration by its Japanese parent on Friday.

The Australian understands students, landlords and agents could be owed about $10 million, while the entitlements of the nearly 400 staff also run into the millions

Student fees are protected under an assurance scheme run by peak body English Australia in which students are entitled to be placed with other colleges.

English Australia said it was confident of being able to place all students, but some are already regretting they chose to study in Australia.

Mario Galindo, a 39-year-old university tutor from Colombia, paid almost $7000 for a ten-month course to improve his English. He has been left stranded with two months tuition owed.

"I thought this was a serious country . . . but now I think it was a mistake," Mr Galindo said.

Pina Vigo of West Preston in Melbourne was yesterday showing her newly arrived nephew, Filippo Zilio, from Italy, where his GEOS college was, only to find it closed. Mr Zilio, 19 had paid for a month's study.

"It stinks," Ms Vigo said. "How can they do this to the students? How can the government not know?"

GEOS has schools in NSW, Queensland, South Australia, Victoria and Western Australia.

Students fed up as more international schools close

ABC News Post: Feb 2, 2010

More than 2,000 international students face an uncertain future, after the collapse of another major international college. Nine companies associated with GEOS, which operates the schools in Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Perth, and Brisbane, went into voluntary receivership late last week.

The Federal Government says the students will be placed in similar courses in other institutions.

The President of the National Union of Students, Carla Drakeford, says some of the students were affected by the collapse of another international college less that three months ago.

"Under the current framework another private college needs to be found for them to go to," she said.

"But as a lot of them came from the Meridian college collapse last year. A lot of these students are very sick and tired of being shafted from one private college provider to the next."

She said private colleges have been riddled with problems for a long time and she believes there will be more collapses in the next year.

"International students are not getting the support they need. They often don't know what they're getting into when they arrive at private colleges."

*** Ace! is a member of the EducationUSA global educational advising network affiliated with the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, U.S. Department of State. We provide free EducationUSA counseling services to students in the northern provinces of Thailand; our faculty of U.S.-trained Test Prep Experts can help you with cost-effective result-driven training programs for SAT-1, SAT-2, TOEFL, GRE, GMAT, GED, IELTS etc ***

Shocking SAT News from Korea

Ace! NewsFlash

A Korean cram school instructor has been caught stealing test sheets of the SAT, a test that is taken by more than one million students around the world. This ironically shows Korea’s blind obsession with academic records, private tutoring, globalization, and cutting-edge ability to collect information. The case is the first theft and leak of the SAT in the 110-year history of the test. It is unpleasantly surprising to discover that the instructor stole SAT sheets in Thailand, where test supervision is less strict than in Korea, where monitoring has grown much tighter.

Like the Korean college entrance exam, the SAT also takes test sheets back. In Korea, however, students in the past stole SAT sheets several times, making the College Board, which is in charge of the test, put Korea on its blacklist. Educational Testing Service, which supervises the SAT in Korea, conducted an investigation after some 900 students who took the test in Korea in 2007 received extremely high scores. The scores were canceled after the service discovered that the students had received questions in advance.

The cheating scandal was a combination of students seeking good scores in a short period of time and greedy overseas study agencies that profit by sending students abroad. Korea experienced a similar cheating case on the Test of English as a Foreign Language, leading to the use of the Internet-based TOEFL Test or iBT. The College Board has no choice but to take action to prevent cheating. It could make students in Asia take the test at the same time the exam in the U.S. is administered, or give it online like TOEFL. Asian students then might have to take the SAT after midnight or in the wee hours of the morning given the time difference with North America.

Another fear is that Korean students who did not cheat might still be at a disadvantage if college admissions officers believe they got good SAT scores after cheating. The perception is widening that Korean students show relatively low academic achievement compared to their SAT scores. A survey shows that 44 percent of Korean students who get accepted into a top 14 American university drop out.

Ace! The Academy for EducationUSA-Chiang Mai

Wednesday, February 17, 2010