Time for Brodhead officials to fess facts about international efforts

In response to a Chronicle rah-rah article about Duke's internationalization:

✔Fact Checker here. On duty all summer.

With respect to our #2 international program -- after the Singapore Medical School which is by far #1 -- I think it is about time for Dean Sheppard to tell us how many students are going to enroll this August in the Cross Continent MBA. We also need to know the quality of those students.

Given his record of over-reaching, all of us should be holding our collective breath.

Loyal Readers will recall that last year this MBA program drew only 120 students -- far short of the 180 inaugural goal even after we bent standards and admitted more students from the USA robbing the program of its international flavor.

Sheppard said he was "confident" of 280 this August. And I will judge against that goal.

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It's also time for the good Reverend / Vice President Jones to stop pretending as if everything were OK in Kunshan.

Tell us, please, if major construction has finally started. Explain for us, please, why we are almost a year off the originally announced timetable, and why occupancy has slipped from 2011 to 2012.

Fact Checker also challenges this statement in the Chronicle article, presented with no attribution whatsoever:

"And as Duke establishes more programs abroad, more international students are coming to study at the University."

Just today I read an interview in the India Times with Dean Shepherd talking about our plans in Delhi -- or nearby since we may end up in another outpost like Kunshan. The idea that Durham will be flooded is directly challenged by this paragraph:

"On why an Indian student would opt for a campus in Delhi instead of Durham, Jaivir Singh, Indian adviser to the dean, says 'We will offer students an international experience at their doorstep, and at a lower cost.' "

It seems to me that we may be going into competition with ourselves, with the USA and India efforts nipping at each other rather than enhancing each other.

Moreover, we are setting up two tier education. Delhi for the poor. Durham for those who can patch together the dollars.

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Loyal Readers, I want to you know the evidence about Kunshan is mounting its success in manufacturing computers has driven wages up and corporate sharks are already out-sourcing to new, lower priced locations. This city is going to wind up like Youngstown Ohio and Detroit. More on this in the weeks ahead.

For now, back to the pool!!!!