Trends in Academic Research Which Options for Universities in Vietnam

1
Trends in Academic Research -Which Options for
Universities in Vietnam?

• 10th Conference on Science Technology, Oct
  22-26, 2007
• University of Technology, Vietnam National
  University HCM City
• Prof. Duong Nguyên Vu
• Senior Scientific Advisor - Chairman of the
  Scientific Board, EUROCONTROL EEC
• Affiliate Professor of Computer Science
  Engineering, HCMUT
• Academic Advisor, Faculty of IT, UNS - VNU HCMC

2
The Changing World

• Drivers
• Knowledge-based Economy
• Know-how is a crucial element of competitiveness,
  
• Essential link between scientific discovery and
  capacity to imagine and to tune imagination into
  concrete applications establishes the driving
  forces for innovation.
• Scientific investigations are backbone of
  industrial innovations,
• Globalization and Society
• Globalization imposes regional niches, and
  drives for scientific progress,
• However, society is not ready to foster
  disaffectation of young people to science in
  Western Europe and North America,
• Balance of demand and provision is one major
  concern.
• Development of Scientific know-how and
  technologic capacity is basing more and more on
  international cooperation,
• Changes in the organizational landscape of
  research institutions.
• Financing demands impose professionalization of
  academic professions,
• Changes in the business landscape of higher
  education institutions.

3
Understanding the Changes?

• Key data
• What has changes in the past decades?
• What is changing?
• What might change in the coming ones?
• Casting lights
• What changes there might be for the research
  mission of universities?
• Which options for Universities in Vietnam to
  anticipate such changes?
• Most data used in this presentation comes from
  OCDE Database,
• Primary analysis are courtesy of Stephan
  Vincent-Lancrin (OCDE-CERI)
• OCDE - Organization for Economic Co-operation and
  Development has 30 member states Australia,
  Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic,
  Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece,
  Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea,
  Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand,
  Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovak Republic, Spain,
  Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom,
  United States of America.

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Research in OCDE

• All Sectors
• 80 of world RD,
• 1,9 GDP (1981) - 2,3 GDP (2003) 200
• Fact 1 Rise of RD in Business Sector
• 65,4 (1981) - 67,7 (2003) of total OCDE
• Performance 1,26 GDP (1981) - 1,53 GDP (2003)
  141
• Expenditure 1,00 GDP (1981) - 1,39 GDP (2003)
• Explaining why OECD economies are often described
  as increasingly Knowledge-based Economy (Foray,
  2004).
• Fact 2 Decline of RD in Government Sector
• Total of RD financed by government 40,3 (1981)
  - 30,4 (2003)
• Performance 17,9 (1981) - 12,3 (2003)
• Expenditure 0,85 GDP (1981) - 0,68 GDP
  (2003) 60
• Shares of military research 43 (81) - 28
  (2001) - 33 (2004).
• Source OECD Science, Technology and Industry
  Scoreboard, OECD Publishing 2005, Paris.
• Foray, D. (2004) The Economics of Knowledge. MIT
  Press, Cambridge, MA, USA.

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GERD as GDP and Civil GERD
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Research in OCDE

• Fact 3 Changing landscape of Academic Research
• Growth in funding and output,
• Rise of private funding of higher education,
• Rise of performance of basic research by
  non-academic sectors,
• Growth of internationalization of academic
  research
• While
• New attitude of civil society towards scientific
  research,
• New computing networking opportunities offered
  by ICT are emerging as new driving forces for the
  future of academic research.

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Trend 1 Growth of Academic Research
8
Industry GERD vs. Government as GDP
Source OECD, Main Science and Technology
Indicators, May 2007.
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Growth of Academic Research

• Some other facts
• Academic Research 0,28 GDP (1981) - 0,39 GDP
  (2003)
• University Researchers
• Number of university researchers increased by
  127 (7 annum) vs 118 in industry.
• Percentage of university researchers 24(1981) -
  26(2003) of total in OECD.
• USA 14,8
• EU-15 35
• Growth in Academic Research is faster than in
  Industry Sector despite role of industry in
  knowledge-economy. 3-fold increase vs. 2-fold in
  industry sector.
• Role of Academic Research in knowledge-economy
  has become more and more crucial.
• Source OECD Database 2006.

10
HERD vs GOVERD (in GDP)
Source OECD, Main Science and Technology
Indicators, May 2007.
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Growth of Research Output

• Publications 466.000 articles (1981) - 650.000
  (2003) 39
• USA
• University researchers authored 74 of total US
  articles in 2004,
• Books published by university press increased 21
  (93-04),
• Books published increased 74 (93-04).
• Recent trends
• Flattening of scientific articles output of USA
  since 1992 of the Netherlands, Canada, UK since
  late 90s.
• Reasons are unknown are under investigation
• Age structure of workforce?
• Change in professional practice? (a researcher in
  clinical medicine publishes around 10 papers/year
  vs. 1 in engineering EC, 2003)
• Change of attitude towards the widespread
  practice of slicing research outputs?

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Why?

• Massification of higher education
• USA 8,5M students (1970) - 16M (2001), Japan
  85 France 100
• OECD 20M (1985) - 36M (2003) 80, average 4
  per year
• Explaining
• Increase in academic workforce, hence research
  workforce (FTE) and outputs
• Professionalization of academic profession
• Importance of quantitative research output in
  academic career paths, and
• Strong external incentives to publish, and
• Introduction of research assessment exercises.
• Publish or Perish rule,
• No information about the evolution of its quality
  over time.

13
FTE of Researchers per thousand of Total
Employments
Source OECD, Main Science and Technology
Indicators, May 2007.
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So, how about the future?

• Massification of higher education has reached its
  peak in many OECD countries
• 45 in 15 OECD countries (Universal Higher
  Education reached),
• 35 - 45 in 7 others, and lt35 in only 4
  countries.
• Enrollments have been flat for years in many OECD
  countries inclined in Korea and Japan.
• Internationalization or Brain Draining?
• EU objective to 3 GDP for RD requires 700000
  new researchers. Where do they come from?
• OECD encourages foreign students to integrate
  their education and research, and eases
  immigration of high-quality professional in
  science technology.
• Principal flows observed between Asia (China,
  India) and OCDE countries. 25 of Science
  technology PhDs are foreigners.
• Vietnam must create the possibility for training
  and employment on science and technology research
  to avoid life-time immigration, for the sake of
  competitiveness in a knowledge-economy,
• Shall even go beyond this by attracting returns
  (including overseas Vietnamese).

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Trend 2 Basic Research - Main Mission?
Basic Research 18 of Gross Domestic
Expenditure on RD (2003), up from 15 in 1991.
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Basic Research - a Mission?
2025 Government and Higher Education sectors gt
60 of Basic Research
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Basic Research - a Mission?

• Observations
• Korea is the sole country in OECD where the
  business sector consistently spends more on basic
  research than any other sectors (11 of budget on
  basic research, equivalent to 80 of university
  RD budget).
• Think about the position of Korea in the growing
  knowledge-economy in 2007!!
• Eastern European states (Czech republic, Hungary,
  Poland, Slovak Republic) prior to 1990s followed
  the Soviet tripartite model
• Universities focus on teaching,
• Academy of Science on basic research,
• Ministries (and Departments) on applied research.
• Structural changes have been difficult in some
  states and consequently on the pace of growth.
• Significant growth of basic research by academia
  in USA offsets the decline in smaller countries
  like Iceland and Australia.
• What does it means? Migration of basic
  researchers? Financial and funding issues?

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Basic Research - a Mission?

• Assessment
• Basic Research in higher education institutions
  declines.
• A possible respond could be for academic research
  to specialize even more in basic research to keep
  its specialty (or competitive advantage),
• Other forces might push academic research in
  other directions,
• Questions
• Adapting the traditional Soviets Tripartite
  model and Westerns All-in-One model to establish
  a hybrid model meeting the global societal needs?
  
• Shall we foster specialization in basic
  research so as to complement the distribution?
• Which specialization for CSE of HCMUT?
• ICT Infrastructure for Basic Research?
  Computational Mathematics?
• Advanced Computer Graphics (Virtual Reality,
  animation, special effects, etc)?

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Funding - A Debate

• Strong social demand for better public management
• The shift towards more autonomy
  entrepreneurship is a common trend in higher
  education management in most OECD countries.
  (Marginson Considine, 2000 Martin, 2002 OECD,
  2003)
• Accountability, transparency, efficiency and
  effectiveness, responsiveness and forward vision
  are now considered as the principal components of
  good public governance which universities are
  being increasingly be asked to implement. (Braun
  Merrien, 1999)
• Debates on National budget priority, efficiency
  of resource used, public policy objectives (eg,
  high quality education and research) leading to
  what government should provide and how costs
  should be shared among different groups in
  society (tax payers, students families,
  companies, etc.)
• Marginson, S., Considine, M. (2000) The
  Enterprise University Power, Governance and
  Reinvention in Australia. Cambridge University
  Press, Cambridge, UK
• Martin, B.R. (2002) The Changing Social Contract
  for Science and the Evolution of the University.
  In Geuna, Salter and Steinmueller (Eds) Science
  and Innovation Rethinking the Rationales for
  Funding and Governance. Edward Elgar, Aldershot.
• OECD (2003) Changing Patterns of Governance in
  Higher Education. Education Policy Analysis. OECD
  Publishing, Paris.
• Braun, D. and Merrien, F.-X. (1999) Towards a New
  Model of Governance for Universities? A
  Comparative View. Jessica Kingsley, London.

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Mode of Public Funding
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Effects of Changes in Public Funding

• Observations
• UK 9 universities representing 12 of all
  institutions, and 17 of post-grads receive 47
  of public funding in 2002 top 4 got 29.
• USA Top 200 universities among 3600 got 96 of
  all funding top 100 got 51 of public funding
  for academic research top 20 got 20.
• In practice, as research funding becomes more
  concentrated in a few institutions, the ability
  of some others to carry out academic research
  becomes limited. (Enders Musselin, 2006)
• Issues
• Academic research might just become concentrated
  in a relatively small share of the system while
  the largest number of institutions will carry out
  only little research, if any. (Vincent-Lancrin,
  2006)
• Creation of a more concentrated academic research
  (Research University)
• Possible future disconnection between academic
  research and teaching,
• Enders, J. Musselin, C. (2006) The academic
  Profession of the 21st Century. In OECD Meeting
  on Demography and the Future of Higher Education.
  December 5-6, Paris
• Vincent-Lancrin, S. (2006) What is Changing in
  Academic Research? European Journal of Education.
  Vol 41(2), June.

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Trend 3 Rise of Private Funding
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Rise of Private Funding

• Rise of own private funds of higher education
  institutions
• Expansion of private university sector,
• Increase in tuition fees,
• New entrepreneurship activities of universities,
  e.g.
• Commercial cross-border education,
• Commercial courses for adult learners or for
  industries,
• Commercial e-learning,
• Patenting licensing.
• Bayh-Dole act of 1980 (USA) giving incentive to
  universities to patent inventions,
• Revenues from IPR in USA 2003 870M (NSB, 2004).
• Gradual evolution of academic research and of
  university systems towards a more private system,
  most likely within a non-profit framework.
• Again public governance and management
  transparency is essential.
• Larsen, K. and Vincent-Lancrin, S. (2002)
  International Trade in Educational Services Good
  or Bad? Higher Educational Management and
  Policy, Vol 14(3).pp 9-45. OECD Publications,
  Paris.
• Observatory on Borderless Higher Education
  (2004), Mapping Borderless Higher Education
  Policy, Market and Competitions. OBHE, London.
• Newman, F., Couturier, L. and Scurrie, J. (2004)
  The Future of Higher Education, Rhetoric,
  Reality, and the Risks of the Market. Wiley
  Sons, San Francisco.
• OECD (2004) Internationalization and Trade in
  Higher Education. Opportunities and Challenges.
  OECD Publishing, Paris

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Trend 4 Internationalization of Academic Research

• Globalization of economies and societies, leading
  to
• Internationalization of higher education,
• Internationalization of academic research
• Observations of growth
• International mobility
• International collaboration
• International influence of science
• Funding from abroad.
• Consequences
• New poles of research are gradually emerging in
  the world.

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Growth of Mobility

• Academics
• USA inflows increased by 49 (94-05) 90.000
  persons in 2005 (IIE, 2005)
• EU intra-European mobility under Socrates grew
  by 71 (97-00) 12.000 persons in 2000 (OECD,
  2004)
• Japan increased by 66 (93-03)
• Korea increased by 300 (90-03)
• Doctoral and Postdoctoral Students
• USA 41 of all post-docs holding a US PhD are
  foreign-born share of foreign academic
  increased 12 - 24 (94-05).
• Growing cross-border mobility of academic
  researchers shows the internationalization of the
  academic workforce and research, partly driven by
  an increasing competition between countries to
  attract foreign talents in their country. (OECD,
  2005, OECD 2006)
• Food for thought Malaysia is trying to build
  capacity in universities by attracting foreign
  research institutions and by moving away from the
  import of foreign educational programs through
  financing. (Tremblay, 2005)
• Institute for International Education (IIE)
  (2005) Open Doors 2005 - Report on International
  Educational Exchange. Sewickley, PA, USA.
• OECD (2005), Trends in International Migration -
  2004 Edition. OECD Publishing, Paris
• OECD (2006), The Internationalization of Higher
  Education Towards an Explicit Policy. Education
  Policy Analysis 2005. Paris.
• Tremblay, K. (2005). Academic Mobility and
  Immigration. Journal of Studies in International
  Education, Vol 2(2), pp 245-263.

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Growth of International Collaboration

• Scientific articles co-authored by at least 1
  international institutional affiliation increased
  from 8 (1988) to 18 (2001).
• USA 23,2 (2001) x2 from 1988,
• EU-15 17 (1988) - 33 (2001) nearly x2.
• Asia 11 (1988) - 21 (2001).
• Average number of countries collaborating in
  scientific activities increased from 89 (1994) to
  102 (2001). Foreign articles in scientific
  publication in US 55 (1992) - 62 (2001)

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World Order New Poles of Research?

• Internationalization of academic research does
  indeed correspond to the emergences of new poles
  of science in the world.
• China represents half of RD expenditures of
  non-OECD countries (OECD, 2005)
• Between 1988 and 2001, scientific article output
  has risen by
• North America 13
• Western Europe 59
• Asia 119
• South and Central America 177
• Near East North Africa 49
• Pacific 47
• Eastern Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa -20.
• Share of funding from abroad for the performance
  of academic research x3 2 (1981) - 6 (2003)
• Open to emergence and developing countries
• EU funded FPs
• US NSF, DoE, NIH
• Inclusion of RD in the General Agreement on
  Trade in Services (GATS) of WTO.
• Future privatization of Academic and Higher
  Education Institutions?

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New World Order in 2025?
Vicent-Lancrin scenarios (2006) Vincent-Lancrin,
S. (2006) What is Changing in Academic Research?
European Journal of Education. Vol 41(2), June.
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Scenario 1 Open Collaboration

• Mainly public funded,
• Very internationalized,
• Driven by Technology,
• Free and Open Knowledge.
• Global networking is important goes beyond
  universities, involving industries as well as
  individuals and concerned groups,
• Governments across the world can easily share
  their large research investments (remote
  operations, distributed research team).
• Technology driven networking induces much quicker
  spillover in the lower ends of higher education
  systems (and in developing countries).
• Hierarchy between universities is more relevant
  for the recruitment of academic researchers.
• Access to research tools recent knowledge, new
  data sets, computing visualization tools,
  virtual co-laboratories open to everyone.
• Cutting edge research crosses borders.

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Scenario 2 National Interest Promotion

• Mainly public funded,
• Academics keeping control over research,
• Governments put strong emphasis on the national
  missions of universities,
• Universities more embedded in local communities
  and regional economy.
• Small number of elite universities research
  institutions continue to be very
  internationalized, and
• To keep their top rank nationally, the average
  university has research interests that are more
  related to their immediate neighboring cities
  regions.
• Academics continue to teach and to research, but
  teaching has become more clearly their 1st
  objectives and research is an arrangement that
  was found to match students and policy-makers
  expectation. (Vincent-Lancrin, 2006)

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Scenario 3 International Research Marketplace

• For-profit institutions,
• Academic research becomes close to business
  sector
• Good share of basic research,
• Increased revenues from IPR,
• Growing involvement in business,
• Funded by public and private.
• Research and teaching as distinct services,
• Universities orient towards core business -
  Research Universities.
• Fierce competition to attract research
  super-stars
• Basic research funded through tenders.
• Outsourcing research for cost effectiveness,
• More internationalization of research teams.

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Scenario 4 New Public Management

• Mainly Public,
• Public management makes intensive use of
  quasi-market forces,
• Higher Education institutions are autonomous
• Still dependent on public financing but
• Manage to diversify funding sources
• Foreign education market,
• Deregulation of tuition fees,
• Patenting of research,
• Financial links with business sector.
• Higher education ? private non-profit.
• Division of labor between institutions become
  stronger, most specializing into different
  missions regarding teaching (with research)
  research (with teaching).
• Funding budgeted research project through
  peer-reviewed selections.

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• More competition nationally between universities
  research money goes to some top.
• Institutions are much more accountable to states
  other financing sources (governance changed).
• Best universities get best students with high
  tuition fees,
• Advances made by research institutions are
  democratized by teaching institutions.

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Humble thoughts on an option for us

• Assumptions
• EU area goes to scenario 2 (some go to 4 in
  lesser extend) and US to 3,
• We goes to 4 (most likely to be).
• Adapting a modern governance,
• Be commercial and professional,
• Proactive relationships with industries through
  incubating approach.
• Proposal
• Be specialized into some research specialties as
  soon as possible to be ready to provide
  services to scenario 2 and 3.
• Services include
• Technology driven infrastructure serving highly
  collaborative research,
• Technology driven infrastructure and know-how
  ready for outsourced research,

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Some Random Thoughts

• Specific proposal
• Given the decline of basic research in
  Universities worldwide,
• Given the growth of basic research in Government
  sector,
• Given the strong demand for research and
  innovation in industry sector,
• Given the continuous demand of researchers
  worldwide,
• What if
• Universities in Vietnam to focus more on
  applications domains to bridge the gap between
  basic and applied research for industrial
  innovations?
• Example for CSE could be for specific domains
  where we have strong potentials
• Petroleum exploration and production. Basic
  components Modeling Simulations, 4D
  Visualization, Complex information and signal
  processing, etc..
• Game and movie industries. Basic components
  advanced computer graphics, physically based
  modeling, computer animation, etc.
• Air Transportation, Operational research,
  modeling and simulation, automatic control
• ICT Sourcing ?

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How to Make it Happened?

• Strong and modern governance, a business-like
  approach?
• Invite personalities not necessarily academics to
  help transferring knowledge about specific
  domains of applications to the faculty,
• Research topics must be relevant and concentrated
  to specific problems with target output to
  innovative studies in industries,
• Funding research must be seen as investments,
  while teaching constitutes the assets.
• Creation of a task-force to examine potential
  practical directions to anticipate changes to
  make the maximum benefits out of them.

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Thank You for Your Attention