The Mission
This ARC8 Expert Group discusses risks and opportunities in widening access and success in higher education. Members are jointly working on the equity chapter of the ARC8 Outlook Report 2030: Inclusive and Diverse Higher Education in Asia and Europe to be presented in the summer of 2021. Experts will make recommendations for the ASEM Senior Officials and university leaders in Asia and Europe on advancing equity policies.
Topics discussed: equity vs equality in higher education, monetary and non-monetary access instruments, underrepresented groups, gender gap, digital divide, disadvantaged, vulnerable and excluded populations.
Expert Group Members
Session Summaries
The first session of the experts was dedicated to gather inputs to the Outlook Report 2030: Inclusion and Diversity in Higher Education in Asia and Europe. Two experts shared their views on the status quo of equity in higher education, and proposed risks and opportunities to be discussed by group members. Below is a short summary of their presentations and the ideas they sparked in the group discussion.
Mary TUPAN-WENNO, Executive Director of ECHO, Centre for Diversity Policy, The Netherlands
Mary started her presentation by explaining her definition of access and success in higher education. She demonstrated with a nice visual that inclusion policies can only be successful if certain themes are covered such as ensuring different pathways to entry, inclusive learning environment, sense of belonging, social safety, etc. Mary proposed 5 discussion points on potential risks and challenges, that could jeopardize inclusion efforts in the next 10 years. These included the matter of context, too much focus on access and less on inclusion, and the “Color-blind instead of a Color-brave approach”.
In terms of opportunities and leverage points that could take inclusion to the next level in the upcoming decade, Mary shared the following points:
- Co-creation and collaboration with students
- Outreach and collaboration with informal and non-formal education providers
- More focus on benefits of diversity and inclusion to the quality, productivity and innovation in science
- Public– Private collaboration
⇒ View the summary of Mary’s presentation with visuals
Dr Graeme ATHERTON, Director, National Education Opportunities Network (NEON)
Graeme’s presentation was focused on some of the major issues in terms of access and success to higher education and the challenges faced in terms of developing support both from policymakers and institutions. He started by introducing the World Access to Higher Education Day (WAHED) initiative, and related research materials, such as the “All Around the World: Higher Education Equity Policies Across the Globe” authored by Lumina Foundation in 2017.
In terms of the risks that could jeopardize inclusion efforts in the upcoming years, Graeme has identified two major points: (1) Financial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic (2) Digital divide.
In terms of opportunities or leverage points, Graeme has pointed out putting equity in higher education into the big inequality agenda as the main opportunity.
Dr Dina AFRIANTY, Founder, Australia-Indonesia Disability Research and Advocacy Network (AIDRAN); Research fellow, La Trobe Law School, Australia
Dr Dina went straight to the point, stating that people with disabilities in Indonesia are faced by a myriad of challenges. One major challenge was the fact that persons with disabilities could not rely on the government. Data on number of people with disabilities in Indonesia vary depending on the different ministries. According to some ministries, the number sits between 15% to 20% of Indonesian population, which means it would be about 27 million to 35 million people with different types of disabilities, out of the total of 260 million population of the country. Based on the 2019 report of the SMRU Research Institute, the data on the prevalence of disability in Indonesia stands between 17-45%.
Despite varying statistics from different ministries of the government, according to Dina, in terms of policies, the Indonesian government had made significant progress by adopting international principles of disabilities and by ratifying the 2011 Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Additionally, the Indonesian government introduced the national disability law in 2016.
What our experts said...
