ABSTRACT

Cross border education has been part and parcel of higher

education for quite some time now. It has undergone many
changes over a period of time. The manner as well as the objective
has witnessed a lot of changes. It presents lots of opportunities in
the sphere of higher education but at the same time poses risks
which are to be taken care of in the most astute manner. To
overcome the risks every country has to formulate a unique set of
regulation which could help in assuring the quality of cross border
education and at the same time resolve the problem of
accreditation.

Introduction

In common parlance cross border education can be described as

imparting of education to the non native students. To put it in the
formalized way ‘it refers to the movement of people, programs,
providers, Knowledge, ideas, projects and services across national
boundaries. This list continues, as whatever we take from a foreign
country in the field of education will be part of cross border
education. And when we go deep into this topic we find that it’s
been prevalent in the world since time immemorial. But, of course,
it has witnessed sea changes as the time progressed. The objective
as well as the way has undergone a tremendous change. Earlier
cross border education was imparted with the aim of augmenting
cooperation among the countries. That is it was under taken for
non profit purposes but as the world has evolved and
commercialization has come to the forefront, the cross border
education has also turned into profit activity. To corroborate we
can take up the example of United Kingdom. It is perceived that
when the United Kingdom has to play host to the Olympics in the
year 2012 they have opened their gates to the overseas students
just to mop up requisite funds to facilitate conduct of Olympic
Games.
The journey of cross border education can be divided into three
generations;
First generation –people mobility
This generation refers to the mobility of People across the
countries for education. Students and scholars have been moving
around the world since the time universities have been in
existence. In fact, the concept of universe in the term university is
the proof of global dimensions. This phenomenon started gaining
momentum in the 20th century. And in the 21st century by the year
2005 the number started to grow at an unprecedented rate. Till this
stage, students were moving to other countries for a full or short
term study, research, field work, internship and exchange
programmes. According to an estimate 7.8 million students will be
enrolled in the foreign countries by the year 2025.

The second generations- programme and provider mobility

In this period the tables turned as the commercial interest gained
supremacy. Pragrammes and the providers started moving to the
students instead of the students going to the latter. In the early
1990s the movement of programmes and providers across borders
began to increase substantially and impacted the number of
students who could access foreign tertiary education programmes
without leaving their home country. As we delve further into it we
find that it is to be looked through in two parts. One is programmes
mobility and the other one is provider mobility.
a) Cross border mobility of programmes can be described as the
movement of individual education/training courses and
programmes across jurisdictional boundaries through face to
 face, distance or combination of both these modes. Credits
towards qualification can be awarded by the sending foreign
country or by an affiliated domestic partner or jointly.
b) Cross border mobility of providers refers to the physical or
virtual movement of an education providers i.e. institutions,
organization, company etc across jurisdictional borders to
offer education/tanning programmes and services to the
students. The difference between programme provider
mobility is on of scope and scale in terms of
prorammes/sevices offered and the local presence by the
providers. Credits and qualification are awarded by the
foreign provider through foreign, local self accreditation
methods or by an affiliated domestic partner.

Third generation-Education hubs

Educations hubs are the latest feather in the cap of cross border
education and constitute the third phase of cross border education
initiatives. Education hubs necessarily encompass first and
second generation methods but in addition to that it comprises a
wider and more strategic configuration of action and activities. An
education hub is a and planned effort by a country(or zone, city) ,to
build a critical mass of education /knowledge action to strengthen
its efforts to exert more in the new market place of education. An
education hub is a well contemplated effort of a country to build a
critical mass of local and international actors strategically engaged
in cross border education, training knowledge production and
innovation initiative.

Emerging issues, challenges and unintended consequence

Student access: The demand for higher, quality education is ever

increasing. Does cross border education can provide a solution to this
problem?
The basic issue that we face when we contemplate cross border
education a solution to this problem is that, how many of the students
are in a position to access cross border education. There can be
numerous issues ranging from affordability to language barriers (as the
medium of instruction for cross border education is predominantly
English)
Quality assurance: as the growing demand for cross border education
has aroused the interest of commercial organization. It has become
increasingly challenging to keep a check on the rogue institutions
which have started mushrooming at an unprecedented rate. More
national quality assurance and accreditation agencies have been created
in the last decade in Asia. In addition regional quality network such as
Asia pacific quality network (APQN) have also been establish.
Recognition of qualifications: The credibility of higher education
programmes and qualifications is of paramount importance for
students, their employers, the public at large and for the academic
community itself. To establish accreditation review and assessment
agency is a challenge facing many countries of the world.
Capacity building: Does cross border education really help in
capacity building of a country?
One can question the relevance of imported foreign
programmes/providers in the local context and the need for it.
Critics of cross border education believe that relying on foreign
expertise to prepare and teach courses pops up the issue of
dependency, some time neo-colonization.
Opportunities:

Brain gain
This is a term coined in contrast to brain drain. Recent research
works show that student are increasingly interested in taking a
degree in country A, followed by a second degree or perhaps
internship in country B, leading to employment in country C or D,
finally returning to there home country after eight to twelve year of
international study and work experience. This will help the home
country immensely.
Economy booster: Cross border education gives push to the
economy of the provider country as the incoming students bring
along with them the valuable foreign currency. It also provides
cheep labor along with more consumption which in turn gives
boost to the production and helps in triggering the multiplier effect.

International regulatory frame work:

Since cross border education has evolved into a complex

commercial activity, the need was felt for a regulatory frame work
which gave birth to the general agreement in trade in services
(GATS). GATS has been a wake up call for higher education
leader around the world. Higher education has been considered as
a public good and social responsibility. But with the advent of new
international trade agreements, higher education has also become a
tradable community or precisely, in terms GATS, internationally
tradable services. GATS is often seen as the catalyst for the
increased growth in commercial higher education between the
member countries

Concluding remarks
The mobility of the students, professors, knowledge and values
have been part of higher education for centuries but it has only
been in the last two decades that there has been exponential
growth in the mobility of progammes and providers along with
establishment of education hubs. The new development presents
endless opportunities for increased access to higher education for
strategic alliances between countries and regions, for the
production and exchange of new knowledge through academic
partnerships and for increased mutual understanding. But as the
law of nature goes where there are roses there are bound to the
thorns as well. In the same way cross border education entails
 risks as well, there can be varied risks in the form of rouge
institutions, irrelevance to the local market, language barriers etc.
To sum up we can state that it is important to acknowledge the
huge potential of cross border education, but not at the cost of
academic quality and integrity.

Reference
J. Knight (2006), ‘The Internationalization of Higher Education

Knight, J. (2007a), ‘Cross border Tertiary Education: An

Introduction’, in Cross border Tertiary Education

Knight, J. (2007b), Implications of Cross border Education and

GATS for the Knowledge Enterprises, Commissioned Research
Paper for UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and
Knowledge, Paris: UNESCO