Contact:
Julia Kent
jkent@cgs.nche.edu
(202) 223-3791

 

Washington, DC — The Council of Graduate Schools today reported an 8 percent increase in the first-time enrollment of international students from 2011 to 2012, matching the 8 percent increase between 2010 and 2011, and representing the third straight year of growth in first-time enrollments. Total enrollment of international graduate students among responding institutions reached 197,000 in 2012.

Where are graduate students coming from?

Growth was found in a broad range of sending countries and regions, with significant variations:

• China logged its seventh consecutive year of double-digit growth in first-time enrollment, adding another 22 percent for the 2011-2012 period. Chinese students now constitute 37 percent of all international graduate students in the United States, according to survey respondents.
• First-time graduate enrollment of students from Brazil grew a substantial 14 percent.
• Taken regionally, the Middle East accelerated growth in first-time enrollment to 18 percent, compared with its 14 percent increase from a year ago.
• First-time graduate enrollment of students from India increased 1%, an increase from previous years in which this number dropped by as much as 16% (between 2008 and 2009).
• Although total enrollment of South Korean students dipped 3% between 2011 and 2012, this period also marks the third year in which such decreases have become smaller.
• Similarly, total enrollment of students from India decreased by 3%, but this is an improvement from the 6% decreases in each of the two previous years.

These results corroborate findings from another recent CGS report, Graduate Enrollment & Degrees: 2001-2011, showing that international students now account for 14.5 percent of the nation’s total graduate enrollment.

CGS President Debra Stewart noted that the international survey results underscore the importance of international students to U.S. graduate schools. “The data show us that international students represent a growing percentage of overall graduate enrollment in the United States—a sign that graduate students, and in many cases, the countries that fund their studies, recognize the quality and return-on-investment provided by U.S. graduate degrees.” Stewart added, “The stabilizing rates of growth in first-time enrollments for India and South Korea are also good news for U.S. graduate institutions.”

All of the broad fields of study reported in the survey experienced growth in first-time enrollment of international graduate students. The two most popular fields among internationals are business and engineering: together they comprised 47 percent of all international graduate student enrollment in 2012, according to survey respondents. Changes in first-time enrollment by field are shown in the table below.

* Includes Mathematics and Computer Sciences

Locations of Study by Region and Institution Type

International first-time graduate enrollment increased in all four major regions of the United States in 2012: the Northeast saw the largest increase (11%), followed by the Midwest (8%), West (7 %), and South (5%).

In terms of first-time enrollment, gains at private, not-for-profit institutions (9%) outpaced those at public institutions (8%) between 2011 and 2012. Doctoral institutions, both public and private, not-for-profit, grew at 9 percent. Master’s-focused institutions reported negative rates of change in first-time international graduate enrollment; public master’s-focused institutions saw a decrease of 9 percent, and private, not-for-profit master’s-focused institutions increased by 9 percent.

Findings from the 2012 CGS International Graduate Admissions Survey, Phase III: Final Offers of Admissions and Enrollment is based on the final phase of a three-part annual survey of international graduate student applications, admissions, and enrollment among CGS U.S. member institutions. The survey had a response rate of 52%, including 79 of the 100 institutions that grant the largest numbers of graduate degrees to international students. Overall, the 265 institutions responding to the Phase III survey conferred about 64% of the nearly 97,000 graduate degrees awarded to international students in the United States in 2011/12.

Contact:
Julia Kent
jkent@cgs.nche.edu
(202) 223-3791

Washington, DC – The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) today announced awards to seven universities to develop new approaches for enhancing graduate student skills and understanding in the assessment of undergraduate learning. Supported through grants to CGS from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and the Teagle Foundation, the awardees will integrate learning assessment into programs that prepare graduate students for faculty careers.

The project is designed to identify effective institutional models for improving the preparation of future faculty across all fields, while also examining issues specific to Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields, social sciences, and humanities. CGS will work with partnering institutions to develop their findings into best practice guidelines for integrating assessment into faculty professional development programs such as the Preparing Future Faculty (PFF) program launched in 1993. Project partners will contribute to a web‐based clearinghouse of resources on learning assessment.

The institutions selected to receive funding are:

• Cornell University
• Harvard University
• Indiana University
• Michigan State University
• North Carolina A&T State University
• University of California, Merced
• University of North Carolina at Greensboro

An additional 19 universities will participate in the project as affiliate partners.

The Sloan Foundation has invested in the enhancement of introductory and gateway courses in STEM fields, which are vital to U.S. student persistence in science majors and the cultivation of domestic STEM talent. Elizabeth S. Boylan, Program Director of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, commented, "Sloan is committed to assisting future STEM faculty to attain the tools and skills they will need to become highly effective faculty—attuned to how their students are learning and what they, as faculty, can do to maximize the learning potential of all their students. I expect that the institutional participants will greatly enrich the graduate community’s understanding of best practices in this area."

Projects to prepare future faculty in the humanities and social sciences are supported by funding from the Teagle Foundation. "We are excited about this project because it reaches graduate students at a formative moment in their teaching careers, an approach that will potentially result in life‐long commitments to the assessment and improvement of undergraduate learning," said Richard Morrill, Teagle Foundation President. "The Teagle Foundation looks forward to learning what these forward‐thinking institutions will discover and achieve as they work collaboratively across the arts and sciences."

The project builds upon the results of a prior partnership with the Teagle Foundation to explore needs and opportunities for the integration of undergraduate learning assessment into PFF programs. "Assessment of student learning is an essential skill for effective teaching, and yet many new faculty are not exposed to useful methods and tools until they are managing the responsibilities of a first job," noted CGS President Debra W. Stewart. "The awardees and affiliates have shown extraordinary leadership in recognizing this important link between graduate training and successful teaching."

For more about the role of graduate schools in preparing students for faculty careers, please visit the PFF project page.

International Guidelines Created for Supporting Global Skills and Careers

Contacts:
Julia Kent, CGS: (202) 223-3791 / jkent@cgs.nche.edu
Undine Ziller, TUM:  +49 8161 71-5403 / ziller@zv.tum.de

Seeon, Germany (September 6, 2012) — Higher education leaders from 15 countries agreed today on a set of principles to guide the preparation of graduate students for the demands of the global workforce and economy.

The statement was released following the Sixth Annual Strategic Leaders Global Summit, “From Brain Drain to Brain Circulation: Graduate Education for Global Career Pathways,” jointly hosted by the U.S.-based Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) and the Technische Universität München. The Global Summit is an annual event designed to promote international best practices on current issues in master’s and doctoral education.

This 2012 summit re-examined the concept of “brain drain” in light of several global trends:

• Global R&D networks, along with new technologies for collaboration, are stimulating research that benefits multiple countries and regions.
• Many countries are making new investments in graduate education in order to maintain a strong domestic talent pool and recruit international students.
• Evidence suggests that researchers and highly educated professionals may work in multiple countries over the course of their careers.

Session topics addressed new patterns of talent mobility by country and region, new opportunities for students to develop global skills, and collaborations between international universities that prepare students for the global workforce.

Professor Ernst Rank, Director of the TUM Graduate School and the International Graduate School of Science and Engineering, explained: "In the past and to a large extent still today, many countries have seen themselves either on the side of brain gain or brain drain. The global summit clearly showed that these categories can no longer simply be associated with 'winning' or 'losing' talents. On the contrary, the globalized scientific and economic community demands circulation of brains — that is, mobility in networks, openness for exchange, and flow of minds and ideas."

In the final session, participants discussed key issues that emerged in the forum and developed a consensus statement to guide future action. The “Principles for Supporting Global Careers in Graduate Education” include integrating international experience into graduate degree programs, defining high-level global skills, and collaborating with external partners to stimulate multi-directional flows of knowledge workers.

CGS President Debra Stewart noted, “The principles will help advance the global conversation about a key priority for graduate schools—helping students and new researchers make the transition to successful careers. But they also take us into important new territory, providing guidelines that will help universities prepare future researchers to understand the global possibilities and impacts of their professional lives.”

The 34 participants included deans and other leaders of graduate schools and representatives of national and international associations devoted to graduate education. Along with Germany and the United States, the countries represented were: Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China (PRC and Hong Kong), Denmark, Hungary, Luxembourg, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Singapore, South Africa, and South Korea.

The consensus statement is attached. A proceedings volume will be published in 2013.

Principles for Supporting Global Careers
in Graduate* Education

Today’s doctoral and master’s students will enter and lead a rapidly globalizing economy and research enterprise.  In a world where technology and research offer new opportunities for global collaboration, all early-stage researchers must be prepared for the challenges and opportunities of a globalizing workforce.  The participants of the 2012 Global Summit on Graduate Education encourage ‘brain circulation,’ or the multi-directional flow of talents, education and research that benefit multiple countries and regions and the advancement of global knowledge. It is the responsibility of graduate schools to match expectations for doctoral and master’s students and faculty training with opportunities and incentives.

At the same time, a productive discussion of “brain drain” and “brain circulation” requires careful examination of terms, assumptions, and values. Graduate leaders recognized the need to distinguish between a short-term and a long-term perspective on the global mobility of talent. While it is useful to track short-term patterns of student mobility, it is also important to understand long-term impacts of mobility on individuals, national and global economies, and global research and development.

In this context, it is important for universities and graduate schools to:

1. Communicate the value and relevance of the broader concept of ‘brain circulation.’ Graduate leaders have an important role to play in communicating the importance of global training opportunities for students, early-stage researchers and faculty on their campuses.
2. Integrate international experiences and training into graduate degree programs. These experiences can take place both at home and abroad. Not only should universities promote joint and dual degree programs, academic research exchanges, and internships, they should also use the international diversity of their campuses as a basis for training in cross­-cultural skills.
3. Provide robust support systems, programs and services for international students and early-stage researchers on their campuses.
4. Respect reciprocity in international collaborations and recognize both material and non-material contributions.
5. Engage the intellectual leadership of faculty and students in developing innovative and interdisciplinary global research practices and related experiences appropriate to the field. 

6. Identify specific global competencies within and across degree programs. As they prepare future knowledge leaders, faculty and researchers have an important role to play in identifying these competencies by degree type and across fields of study, and across sectors.

7. Prepare students and faculty to use emerging technologies to advance and share knowledge globally.  New technologies are essential to research collaboration and management, communication, and networking.

8. Prepare graduate students for ethical issues that emerge in a globalizing workforce. At stake in this preparation is human health and safety, the protection of the environment, and the quality of research.

9. Assess and share the outcomes of global experiences and partnerships. Assessments of institutional benefits, research outcomes, and learning are essential and will be most meaningful if designed to improve the quality of programs. It is critical to differentiate desired outcomes for different career pathways, e.g. in academia, industry, government and non-profit sectors.

10. Collaborate with external partners in government, industry, professional societies, and non-governmental (NGO) sectors to facilitate multi-directional talent flows. In particular, universities have an important role to play in communicating the impact of policies regarding, for example, immigration and professional credentials, on research productivity, national and regional economies, and on individual career trajectories.

11. Encourage funding agencies to allocate funding for international research experience and global competency training for PhD candidates.

* The definition of the term “graduate” varies by country and region. In the context of this statement, it designates master’s and doctoral education.

The Fifth Annual Strategic Leaders Global Summit on Graduate Education brought together graduate leaders from 16 countries to address professional skills and career outcomes for graduate students. These proceedings provide brief essays on emerging best practices for improving the professionalization and employability of students. Readers will find summaries of rich discussions of topics such as integrating workforce demands into degree design and evaluation, developing professional development programs, and defining specific and transferable skills.

This best practice guide documents the results of the Project for Scholarly Integrity, a multiyear, multi-institutional CGS initiative to identify promising practices in embedding research and scholarly integrity into graduate education. Discusses a wide range of innovative strategies including the use of assessment to enhance and build support for high quality, relevant research integrity programs. Includes participant case studies, useful tools, and analysis of baseline survey results on activities, resources, and institutional climate for research integrity. Accompanied by interactive, online data "Dashboard."

From Admission to Completion

This program recognizes promising efforts in initiating or scaling up innovations in graduate education that occur from admission through successful completion of a degree program. It is designed to link innovative admissions practices with other institutional practices including, but not limited to, mentoring, support programs, intellectual enrichment, and social support, that will improve student success once students are enrolled in their graduate programs.

This award program particularly encourages innovations that promise to improve the success of a diverse and inclusive student population. The deadline for proposals is September 9th for the 2022 ETS/CGS Award.  

2022 Request for Proposal

Synopses of Winning Proposals

Webinar:  Winning Strategies for Diversity and Inclusion

FAQs

For a list of past awardees, please visit the ETS website.

Contact:

Anna M. Naranjo

Award support provided by:

This publication identifies good practices in graduate admissions and graduate enrollment management. Topics addressed include organizational structures and university-wide policies and procedures, departmental guidelines, and legal and financial issues. This 2012 revision includes new discussion of: "enrollment management" as opposed to a narrow "admissions" approach, international student recruiting, and recent changes affecting affirmative action/diversity efforts.

Joint degrees, dual degrees, and international research collaborations hold out exciting opportunities for North American universities, but they also present many challenges and questions. This publication reviews what is currently known about graduate international collaborations, what the current gaps in our understanding are, and what areas call for greater clarification. Includes findings from a CGS NSF-funded project, problem-solving scenarios, information about print and online resources, and a checklist for Memoranda of Understanding.

Member Discount Pricing
Starting from: 10 pieces $22.95
Starting from: 25 pieces $20.25
Starting from: 50 pieces $16.20
Starting from: 100 pieces $13.50
Starting from: 200 pieces $10.80

The 2010 Strategic Leaders Global Summit was held in Brisbane, Australia, and addressed the challenging topic of measuring quality in graduate education. Representing the contributions of graduate education leaders in 17 countries, these proceedings highlight a variety of emerging best practices for program and institutional assessment. Special attention is given to communicating with campus stakeholders and planning assessment-based interventions in the areas of mentoring, research training, and professional development for graduate students.

Member Discount Pricing
Starting from: 10 pieces $29.70
Starting from: 25 pieces $26.24
Starting from: 50 pieces $21.00
Starting from: 100 pieces $17.50
Starting from: 200 pieces $14.00

The Council of Graduate Schools Strategic Consultations are led by recognized graduate leaders selected from CGS member institutions and informed by an on-campus or a virtual site-visit. Aligned with CGS research, benchmarking, and policy documents, consultations guide universities toward best practices for administering graduate education. Standard consultations include a two-consultant/two-day model and a three-consultant/three-day model. For institutions requiring immediate assistance, an emergency one-consultant/one-day model is available. Consultations are available to CGS member institutions, international affiliates, and non-members institutions. 

Initiating a Strategic Consultation:

A consultation is initiated by contacting Robert M. Augustine, CGS Senior Vice President Emeritus at raugustine@cgs.nche.edu or 217-549-5246 who will arrange an online discussion with the university leadership to create a consultation Assessment Profile. The profile details the areas of graduate study that the institution seeks to advance and prepares the consultants for the on-campus or virtual site-visit.

On Campus Site Visit

On campus site visit planning begins with confirmation of the consultants. The consultation team studies the Assessment Profile and university support materials. In collaboration with the university, the consultation team develops the site-visit agenda. Based on the model selected by the university, the consultants travel to campus and meet with institutional representatives who inform assessment of the areas outlined in the profile. 

Virtual Site Visit

Virtual site visits also begin with confirmation of the consultants. The consultation team studies the Assessment Profile and university support materials. In collaboration with the university, the consultation team develops a virtual site-visit agenda. Based on the model selected by the university and using virtual technologies, the consultants hold discussions with institutional representatives who inform assessment of the areas outlined in the profile. 

Strategic Consultations Report

Integrating information obtained from the on-campus or virtual site visit, university documents, and CGS research, the consultants deliver a detailed report to the university. The report’s recommendations will align the university with best practices for administering its graduate mission with emphasis on the areas outlined in the Assessment Profile.  

Frequently Requested Areas of Consultation:

• Organization & Administration of Graduate Education
• Enrollment Management
• Program Review, Assessment, Signature Programs
• Professional Development and Related Student Services
• Financial Assessment and Student Funding
• Marketing, Recruitment, & Demand Analysis
• Graduate Admissions Structures and Processes
• Preparing for and Responding to Accreditation
• Completion and Attrition

CGS provides on-site consultations and custom data reports to member and non-member institutions. Depending upon your strategic consultation topic, you may choose to combine services.

Custom Data Reports

The Council of Graduate Schools also offers custom data reports inform strategic decision-making. The reports provide leaders with comparison data tailored to institutional Carnegie classification and mission based on benchmarking data, national surveys, and comprehensive data sets. 

Strategic Consultations Fee Structure:

For more information on strategic consultations, please contact Robert Augustine, senior vice president, emeritus.