Intl grad schools boast of strengths
Yoko Mizui Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer
In recent years, the number of students entering graduate schools has been increasing in Japan. According to the Education, Science and Technology Ministry, the number of graduate students, which was about 87,000 in 1988, increased to about 261,000 in 2006. As companies and schools are requiring more competent or specialized people, it is expected the tendency will continue. Not only Japanese but also foreign graduate schools are recruiting the best Japanese university graduates. The Daily Yomiuri interviewed the heads of two overseas graduate schools: Susan Fuhrman, president of Teachers College, Columbia University, from New York and Pierre Tapie, president and dean of ESSEC Business School, from Paris.
The Education, Science and Technology Ministry decided to certify new graduate (professional) schools in the field of education from next April. Nineteen universities have been officially recommended for the ministry approval to open such graduate schools next year.
The two aims of such graduate schools are to equip new students with practical teaching skills and also to train incumbent teachers so that they can become leaders of other teachers.
These are also the aims of Teachers College, Columbia University (TC). "I've noticed a new development--graduate schools for education-- in several parts of the world--in India, Middle Eastern countries, etc. I think it's very good," said TC President Susan Fuhrman, who visited Japan to attend the commencement ceremony of Teachers College, Columbia University Japan, held at International House of Japan in Tokyo on Oct. 28.
"For teachers, for continuing education throughout their careers, graduate schools of education offer good professional development," Fuhrman said. "Also very import!ant is the research on the system on what's working and what's not working. Graduate schools of education in the United States are the ones to do the most of that research.
"If there would be graduate schools of education here in [Japanese] universities, I think Teachers College, which is the No. 1 school in the world, would be very interested in helping and advising."
TC was named the top graduate school of education in annual rankings by U.S. News and World Report magazine in March.
The TC president is proud of the breadth of school's programs. She said TC is the only graduate school of education in the United States that has health, psychology and nutrition courses as well as those in education. "All of these things are interrelated when you talk about improving the life of children," she said.
An excellent faculty and students who have had diverse experiences before coming to TC are additional attractions, she said. "We have very interesting students."
About 20 percent of TC students are foreign, many from Asian countries, according to Fuhrman. "I would say a substantial number [are] from Japan," she said.
TC inaugurated an MA program in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) in Japan in 1987. The Japan Campus was officially designated by the education ministry as the Japan campus of a foreign graduate school on Sept. 20, 2006. This is TC's only officially accredited branch outside of its main campus in New York.
Fuhrman said the school did not have plans to expand to more foreign campuses in other countries. "We're very actively engaged in international work, but we don't think we're going to start more campuses," she said. "I think we'd like to have alliances with existing schools in other countries. For example, in Jordan, we're starting a major program for teacher training."
Last winter, she visited Jordan along with Columbia University President Lee Bolling and a group of TC faculty members to work with the Jordanian government to improve the country's English-language teacher training.
Fuhrman, who became the first female president of TC in August 2006, has long been actively engaged in U.S. education policymaking, after she received her MA in history from Northwestern University and a PhD in political science and education from Columbia University.
Closely watching the U.S. education system, Fuhrman said the current, heavily test-based school system is now under debate. "The United States has been for the last 15 or 20 years going through a period of standard-based reform. In the current period, there's a very big emphasis on testing students and holding schools responsible for students' test scores," she said. "I think many people think that's gone too far. There's a major piece of legislation that governs [the] education system from the federal level [that] is undergoing revision right now."
Fuhrman has conducted research on state education reform, state differential treatment of districts, federalism in education, incentives and systemic reform and education policy.
In her Tokyo commencement address, Fuhrman said TC was expanding its collaborative work through a partnership with New York City schools and would like to be an educational partner to the world by providing high-quality research and research-based curriculums and community programs to policymakers and practitioners.
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Theory and practice at ESSEC
"Asia is very import!ant in our policy and in our development," said Pierre Tapie, president and dean of ESSEC (Ecole Superieure des Sciences Economiques et Commerciales) Business School in Paris, who visited Japan for the school's centennial anniversary event held in Tokyo on Oct. 30.
ESSEC, billed as the top "grande ecole" in terms of its number of students and quality of education, now has about 3,700 full-time students and 6,000 executives enrolled in courses each year.
"We have in total about 1,000 international students, including about 600 Asian students," Tapie said, reflecting the priority the school places on Asia. The school has liaison offices in major cities in Asia, including Tokyo and Seoul, to recruit students.
The school has been building relationships with the best business schools worldwide to give its students opportunities to participate in exchange programs overseas. In Japan, Keio University and ESSEC have had exchange programs for more than 20 years.
The exchanges are not just for students. "We have exchanged more than 10 or 12 professors on each side," the president said. "The two universities are very similar. There's a value of humanism, service to society, which is shared by both universities."
Although Keio University is not included, ESSEC has concluded several double degree programs with foreign universities such as Peking University, Germany's Mannheim University and the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.
"We have in total 120 universities as partners of ESSEC," he said. But he added that his school would prefer "to go deeper in the relationships [rather] than to extend the number."
In addition to its connections with elite local universities, ESSEC established a new campus in Singapore in 2004, giving ESSEC MBA students a chance to study part of their curriculum in Singapore to deepen their understanding of business in Asia.
ESSEC, which in 1997 became the first institution outside of North America to receive accreditation from the AACSB (Association to Advanced Collegiate Schools of Business), enjoys a premier position in Europe.
ESSEC is ranked seventh among the top 25 international business schools in this year's Wall Street Journal survey of recruiters.
Tapie has no objection to the idea that U.S. business schools are excellent, as management education was invented in the United States as a consequence of that country's powerful economy. "Naturally, when you think about an MBA, you will think about the United States. Today, you will enrich your decision-making landscape," he said. "In Europe, we have schools which are much more international in diverse culture than American business schools that extremely focus on the American way of life and American management, I would say."
The French business educator, who speaks English fluently, said there are no business schools in the United States that require students to have learned at least three languages, which is mandatory for an MBA at ESSEC.
"The way we consider business and society are different. In the United States, business is money. In Europe, business is not money only but it is also social creation. Business is more complex than just money," he said. In this sense, he thinks European culture is more compatible for Japanese society than the American way of life.
ESSEC students are obliged to do an internship abroad. "Our students are doing part-time studies and part-time internships or professional experiences in the companies," he said. "For that reason, students mature very quickly because they are alternately at the school and in the real life."
Tapie is confident that ESSEC students achieve the right balance between theory and practice.
(Nov. 29, 2007)
Yoko Mizui Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer
In recent years, the number of students entering graduate schools has been increasing in Japan. According to the Education, Science and Technology Ministry, the number of graduate students, which was about 87,000 in 1988, increased to about 261,000 in 2006. As companies and schools are requiring more competent or specialized people, it is expected the tendency will continue. Not only Japanese but also foreign graduate schools are recruiting the best Japanese university graduates. The Daily Yomiuri interviewed the heads of two overseas graduate schools: Susan Fuhrman, president of Teachers College, Columbia University, from New York and Pierre Tapie, president and dean of ESSEC Business School, from Paris.
The Education, Science and Technology Ministry decided to certify new graduate (professional) schools in the field of education from next April. Nineteen universities have been officially recommended for the ministry approval to open such graduate schools next year.
The two aims of such graduate schools are to equip new students with practical teaching skills and also to train incumbent teachers so that they can become leaders of other teachers.
These are also the aims of Teachers College, Columbia University (TC). "I've noticed a new development--graduate schools for education-- in several parts of the world--in India, Middle Eastern countries, etc. I think it's very good," said TC President Susan Fuhrman, who visited Japan to attend the commencement ceremony of Teachers College, Columbia University Japan, held at International House of Japan in Tokyo on Oct. 28.
"For teachers, for continuing education throughout their careers, graduate schools of education offer good professional development," Fuhrman said. "Also very import!ant is the research on the system on what's working and what's not working. Graduate schools of education in the United States are the ones to do the most of that research.
"If there would be graduate schools of education here in [Japanese] universities, I think Teachers College, which is the No. 1 school in the world, would be very interested in helping and advising."
TC was named the top graduate school of education in annual rankings by U.S. News and World Report magazine in March.
The TC president is proud of the breadth of school's programs. She said TC is the only graduate school of education in the United States that has health, psychology and nutrition courses as well as those in education. "All of these things are interrelated when you talk about improving the life of children," she said.
An excellent faculty and students who have had diverse experiences before coming to TC are additional attractions, she said. "We have very interesting students."
About 20 percent of TC students are foreign, many from Asian countries, according to Fuhrman. "I would say a substantial number [are] from Japan," she said.
TC inaugurated an MA program in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) in Japan in 1987. The Japan Campus was officially designated by the education ministry as the Japan campus of a foreign graduate school on Sept. 20, 2006. This is TC's only officially accredited branch outside of its main campus in New York.
Fuhrman said the school did not have plans to expand to more foreign campuses in other countries. "We're very actively engaged in international work, but we don't think we're going to start more campuses," she said. "I think we'd like to have alliances with existing schools in other countries. For example, in Jordan, we're starting a major program for teacher training."
Last winter, she visited Jordan along with Columbia University President Lee Bolling and a group of TC faculty members to work with the Jordanian government to improve the country's English-language teacher training.
Fuhrman, who became the first female president of TC in August 2006, has long been actively engaged in U.S. education policymaking, after she received her MA in history from Northwestern University and a PhD in political science and education from Columbia University.
Closely watching the U.S. education system, Fuhrman said the current, heavily test-based school system is now under debate. "The United States has been for the last 15 or 20 years going through a period of standard-based reform. In the current period, there's a very big emphasis on testing students and holding schools responsible for students' test scores," she said. "I think many people think that's gone too far. There's a major piece of legislation that governs [the] education system from the federal level [that] is undergoing revision right now."
Fuhrman has conducted research on state education reform, state differential treatment of districts, federalism in education, incentives and systemic reform and education policy.
In her Tokyo commencement address, Fuhrman said TC was expanding its collaborative work through a partnership with New York City schools and would like to be an educational partner to the world by providing high-quality research and research-based curriculums and community programs to policymakers and practitioners.
===
Theory and practice at ESSEC
"Asia is very import!ant in our policy and in our development," said Pierre Tapie, president and dean of ESSEC (Ecole Superieure des Sciences Economiques et Commerciales) Business School in Paris, who visited Japan for the school's centennial anniversary event held in Tokyo on Oct. 30.
ESSEC, billed as the top "grande ecole" in terms of its number of students and quality of education, now has about 3,700 full-time students and 6,000 executives enrolled in courses each year.
"We have in total about 1,000 international students, including about 600 Asian students," Tapie said, reflecting the priority the school places on Asia. The school has liaison offices in major cities in Asia, including Tokyo and Seoul, to recruit students.
The school has been building relationships with the best business schools worldwide to give its students opportunities to participate in exchange programs overseas. In Japan, Keio University and ESSEC have had exchange programs for more than 20 years.
The exchanges are not just for students. "We have exchanged more than 10 or 12 professors on each side," the president said. "The two universities are very similar. There's a value of humanism, service to society, which is shared by both universities."
Although Keio University is not included, ESSEC has concluded several double degree programs with foreign universities such as Peking University, Germany's Mannheim University and the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.
"We have in total 120 universities as partners of ESSEC," he said. But he added that his school would prefer "to go deeper in the relationships [rather] than to extend the number."
In addition to its connections with elite local universities, ESSEC established a new campus in Singapore in 2004, giving ESSEC MBA students a chance to study part of their curriculum in Singapore to deepen their understanding of business in Asia.
ESSEC, which in 1997 became the first institution outside of North America to receive accreditation from the AACSB (Association to Advanced Collegiate Schools of Business), enjoys a premier position in Europe.
ESSEC is ranked seventh among the top 25 international business schools in this year's Wall Street Journal survey of recruiters.
Tapie has no objection to the idea that U.S. business schools are excellent, as management education was invented in the United States as a consequence of that country's powerful economy. "Naturally, when you think about an MBA, you will think about the United States. Today, you will enrich your decision-making landscape," he said. "In Europe, we have schools which are much more international in diverse culture than American business schools that extremely focus on the American way of life and American management, I would say."
The French business educator, who speaks English fluently, said there are no business schools in the United States that require students to have learned at least three languages, which is mandatory for an MBA at ESSEC.
"The way we consider business and society are different. In the United States, business is money. In Europe, business is not money only but it is also social creation. Business is more complex than just money," he said. In this sense, he thinks European culture is more compatible for Japanese society than the American way of life.
ESSEC students are obliged to do an internship abroad. "Our students are doing part-time studies and part-time internships or professional experiences in the companies," he said. "For that reason, students mature very quickly because they are alternately at the school and in the real life."
Tapie is confident that ESSEC students achieve the right balance between theory and practice.
(Nov. 29, 2007)