Search Page

Some 82 cases of professors listing their secondary school offspring as co-authors in academic papers have been unearthed by an investigation by South Korea’s ministry of education. According to a Korea Herald Editorial, “It is obvious why the professors included the names of their children in the papers. The merit of being co-authors of research papers gives them a good advantage in seeking to enter universities through special admissions programmes”. The discovery could lead to disciplinary action in some cases, under Korea’s strict research misconduct laws which cover author attribution of research papers.

The Minister of Primary and Secondary Education last week slammed the parents for paying Form One entrance examination fees saying they did that at their own peril as the Government has set an enrolment date for all the schools in the country. He said the entrance exams were banned long back by his ministry and have remained illegal and should not be left to continue. Enrolment of Form One students for next year started yesterday with parents expected to use their children's Grade Seven results.

The Bangladesh government has decided to warn students and their guardians of the fact that private universities' open outer campuses in the guise of regional resource centers, study centers, etc. The ministry has come to know that students who take admission in those unapproved local universities are frequently cheated. Actually, there are 51 private universities in Bangladesh which were run according to the Private University Act 1992, as amended in 1998.

Honduras invests large sums in education, but powerful teachers' unions and political appointments hinder reforms in a sector vulnerable to corruption and lacking of civil society monitoring. There are 50,000 teachers in the country; between 2,500 and 6,000 of them have pending issues about their posts (such as irregular paid leaves or unjustified absence while still on the payroll). For current decentralization plans to impact positively on education services, local auditing skills need to be improved, parents must be given a bigger role, and unions must adhere to codes of conduct.