Archive for the 'Education' Category

Curiouser and Curiouser: Kamran Daneshjoo's Revised Resume

Published on September 2, 2009 in Education and Politics. 6 Comments

AWT IMAGE Full Name: Prof. Daneshjo, KamranPosition: Professor

Phone: 98-21-77240540-50 Ex:2906

Fax: 98-21-77240488

Email: kdaneshjo@iust.ac.ir
Address: Iran University of Science & Technology, Tehran, IRAN

University Degrees

  • PHD, Imperial College of London , U.K. (The Viva examination hereby in Iran)
  • MSC, Imperial College of London , U.K.
  • BSC, Queen Mary College , U.K.

    • I concluded last blog by giving Kamran Daneshjoo the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps Ahmadinejad’s embattled nominee to head Iran’s Higher Education Ministry could, in time, explain the unexplainable inconsistencies in his academic record—the bachelor’s degree from a vaguely-defined but plausibly Anglican university, the advanced degrees, including a Ph.D. from Manchester Imperial Institute of Science and Technology, an institution that simply does not exist.

    But instead time has complicated his story and thus simplified any possible explanation: it’s a farce. Daneshjoo’s new resume, listed above, diverges so brazenly from his old one, listed below. Today, according to the details listed on the Iran University of Science and Technology website, Daneshjoo received his doctorate and MSC from the Imperial College of London, one of England’s finest tertiary institutions. Degrees from Imperial are certainly nothing to be ashamed of and not likely to be hidden in favor of a fabricated graduation from the fictitious Manchester Imperial. For the record, Manchester and London are difficult to confuse and are separated by a four-hour drive.

    Were Daneshjoo an avid reader of the “Iran in the Gulf” blog, he might have changed his BSc from “Queen Mary” to “Queen Mary, University of London” and not “Queen Mary College.” Queen Mary College, as I’d written in the last post, is a preparatory academy. It’s good if you want to explore some GCSEs or some A-Levels but no good for picking up a BSc.

    Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani has stuck up for Daneshjoo and offered a rather involved alibi: Daneshjoo was expelled from a London college for his participation in a rally against Salman Rushdie (the details of which college employs such a heavy-handed disciplinarian were left undefined).

    The fact that Daneshjoo, a former election committee chief who willfully repeated June’s questionable election results, is being defended after this backtracking is a very bad sign. In this morning’s NYT, reporter Michael Slackman doesn’t mention Daneshjoo by name but does hit on the very real possibility of an upcoming purge of the universities. Daneshjoo’s appointment could act to facilitate just that. And secondly, what kind of message over the value of credentials and academic honesty does this send to the nearly 3 million students currently in Iran’s universities? Iran is rightfully credited for its long history of knowledge production and strong network of tertiary institutions. So here’s to hoping that come Thursday’s parliamentary vote and the narrowing of Ahmadinejad’s inner circle, a newly-revised resume for Professor Kamran Danshejoo says nothing of Iran’s Higher Education Ministry. -SW

    UPDATE: The vote on Daneshjoo, 186 votes for, 75 against, 25 abstentions. Look for this to have a major impact on Iran’s universities and particularly the teaching of social sciences. For a good list of votes on all nominees, this works.

(Dr?) Kamran Daneshjo

Published on August 31, 2009 in Education and Politics. 0 Comments
AWT IMAGE Full Name: Prof. Daneshjo, KamranPosition: Professor

Phone: 98-21-77240540-50 Ex:2906

Fax: 98-21-77240488

Email: kdaneshjo@iust.ac.ir
Address: Iran University of Science & Technology, Tehran, IRAN

University Degrees

  • PHD, Manchester Imperial Institute of Science and Technology, U.K.
  • MSC, Manchester Imperial Institute of Science and Technology, U.K.
  • BSC, Queen Mary, U.K.

As Iran’s 290 member parliament continues three days of debate over the composition of the Ahmadinejad cabinet, objections to the president’s picks, mostly on grounds of inexperience, are many. As a measure of lost legitimacy, Ahmadinejad is reportedly facing unprecedented pushback from leading figures of the 220-member conservative bloc. Eleven of his 21 nominations represent new faces and 16 are being questioned.

Ahmadinejad may have to weather a new and particularly embarrassing storm over his nominee to head Iran’s higher education system. The L.A. Times blog has picked up on reports by the reformist website Mowjcamp.com suggesting the credentials of Kamran Daneshjo (alternately spelled Daneshjoo)– currently a professor of mechanical engineering at the Iran University of Science Technology– are dubious. In his official biography, Daneshjo holds a doctorate in aerospace engineering from a “College of London,” with apparently no further explanation needed. His website-listed resume, however, sites a MSc and Ph.D. from “Manchester Imperial Institute of Science and Technology.” There is no way to verify if Daneshjo did, in fact, attend Manchester Imperial because Manchester Imperial does not exist.

A BSc from “Queen Mary” could also use some clarification. It’s possible, perhaps even likely, that this refers to Queen Mary , University of London. There is also a Queen Mary’s College but it’s a preparatory academy, with most of its students between the ages of 16 and 19. QMC is located more than an hour outside of London and it certainly does not award doctorate degrees in aerospace engineering.

The LA Times incorrectly repeats a claim made by Mowjcamp.com– that Daneshjo’s inventory of academic publications cannot be found online, implying that its entirety is potentially bogus. Daneshjo is indeed a published academic. But for the prospective head of Iran’s nearly 3 million university students, such basic biographical misrepresentation could mean another political hurdle for Ahmadinejad. The case might become an unwelcome replay of the Oxford degree fabrication that forced Ali Kordan, the Minister of Interior, from power last year.

Yet perhaps there is a simple justification for all of this. When the majlis votes on individual nominees this Wednesday, we’ll surely know more. For now the inconsistencies in Daneshjo’s record are enough to raise some eyebrows and prompt some questions. After all, engineers tend to appreciate accuracy. And it’s not unfair to expect the author of “Classical coupled thermo elasticity in laminated composite plates based on third-order shear deformation theory,” to correctly recall the name of his own alma mater. -SW

Rezaee: Economic Federation Better Than Stagnation

Published on August 3, 2009 in Education, Free Trade Zones and Politics. 0 Comments

In a pre-election debate, Ahmedinejad paid challenger Mohsen Rezaee (An arch conservative and former head of the Revolutionary Guards, who also holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Tehran University) ta’arof as one of the few candidates with ‘new ideas’. He then mocked Rezaee’s proposal to divide Iran into nine economic regions or ‘focal points’ as wholly unworkable: “How can one have economic federalism without political and administrative components? “, he asked.

Rezaee replied that he actually did mean economic federalism, not full federalism, and that matters of international policy, defense, etc. remain with the center. Rezaee explained that while there might be 40-45 provinces or more, each with their own devolved political and security functions, economic blocs would be much larger: “There might be nine economic administrators with full visibility on the activities of their respective regions. These would be responsible for their regional economic blocs and (report to) the president.” Ahmedinejad responded by saying that that dividing the country into nine administrative units was in fact not a new concept, as it had been proposed at one time by the Sepah (Revolutionary Guards). Furthermore, Ahmediejad told Rezai, “economic administration without political or social direction is without meaning.”

The federal question has been one that has plagued Iran for centuries, with decentralisation (or, more precisely, lack of central control) being both a cause of Iran’s economic stagnation, as well as the hallmark of some of the more productive periods in Iran’s past. As Springborg and Clement put it, Iran’s modern dysfunction has been a failure to globalize. Rezaee’s conception of economic federalism relates somewhat to the policies of former president Hashemi Rafsanjani, whose attempts at privatisation and export-promotion through China-esque Free- and Special Economic Zones have met with limited success. While these ideas are only sketches of plans thus far, they do constitute thought, in contrast to Ahmedinejad’s vigorous defense of the status quo.

–EDC

NYUAD: Success in Numbers

Published on July 30, 2009 in Education, Politics and Trade. 0 Comments

In a little more than a year, a large pair of scissors will come across a large red ribbon and thus mark the inauguration of nothing short of the world’s biggest experiment in higher education. NYU Abu Dhabi will welcome its first students. As detailed in a recent two-part report by John Gravois in The National (Part I, Part II), NYU administrators have aggressively sought to preempt many of the challenges plaguing other Western degree programs in the Gulf, namely low student enrollment and an inability to recruit and then retain faculty.

NYUAD’s team on the ground has been given a sizable time window (at least in relative terms) through which to problem solve. The ambitious project was first announced in October 2007. By way of contrast, Michigan State University was asked to set up shop in neighboring Dubai inside of a year. Despite offering coursework with obvious links to the local economy (including degree programs in Business Administration and Construction Project Management), MSU-Dubai has experienced early troubles with enrollment, attracting just 40 students in 2008-2009.

For the fall of 2010 NYUAD will take in no more than 100 students but then projects to grow– and grow quickly– to 2,000 undergraduates and 800 graduates. To arrive at these numbers NYUAD is employing a strategy that is surprising as it represents a marked break from regional precedent.

The case of Qatar Foundation and its Academic Bridge Program serve as perhaps the most prominent divergence. Qatar Foundation sets enrollment targets for Qatari nationals and each of the six American universities located in Doha’s Education City. Even as the targets are non-binding, the Bridge Program gives an additional year to two years of preparatory schooling for Qataris transitioning to university. In so doing, the available pool of qualified local students is increased and low numbers across the Education City campuses are given a boost.

NYUAD has taken an entirely separate approach. The enrollment of a desired number of Emiratis is neither explicit nor implicit. University President John Sexton believes that UAE nationals are likely to be only a tiny percentage of the student population and he is unabashed in saying so. There is no preparatory, foundation year program. Instead, Sexton and NYUAD have ramped up admissions requirements and dubbed the Abu Dhabi venture NYU’s “honors college.” The “global education” offered at NYUAD will attractively combine with unparalleled financial aid packages– international students who would otherwise attend the Ivies (or else NYU’s Washington Square campus) will opt for freshman orientation Gulf-style. An estimated 40 to 50% of the student body will be made up of Americans.

By all accounts, NYUAD will open its doors with an impressive faculty. Whether the university can reach a total of 2,800 enrolled students, however, remains to be seen. Some observations about their efforts to date:

1) There will assuredly be dynamic tension between the appeal of an exciting, newly-established institution– indeed, perhaps the beginnings of the future of higher education itself– and a half-formed university experience. With less than 100 first-year students, the extracurricular opportunities on offer are sure to be limited. Abu Dhabi is likely to be a jarring introduction to the American freshman who traditionally stays in-country for his or her undergraduate experience (and all the more so given the UAE’s average highs of 102 degrees Fahrenheit in September). Whether NYUAD will be able to retain students from one year to the next is a question that needs considering.

2) There will assuredly be tension, no less dynamic, inspired by the availability of world-class education– expensively funded by the Emirate– and its inaccessibility to the local population. Relative to Dubai, Abu Dhabi has long-demonstrated a consistent uneasiness with the course and speed of societal change, the size and composition of its expatriate population and the loss of local heritage and culture. The issue of NYUAD’s labor policy has already cropped up and could become particularly thorny. In the absence of a large Emirati student contingent, NYUAD’s ability to meaningfully link up with the community and its existing universities becomes all the more vital.

3) Lastly, NYU is wisely utilizing the Institute of International Education toward identifying potential applicants. The IIE (the American non-profit responsible for administering the Fulbright) does not have a relationship with neighboring Iran. Before its Revolution, Iran had the single highest population of international students in American universities. NYUAD’s success in enrolling even a handful of students from Iran would do more than add to student numbers. It would also bolster Sexton’s case for the emergence of the Global Network University and its potential implications for the 21st century.

-SW

Tyranny of Numbers

Published on April 20, 2009 in Education, Natural Resources, Politics and Trade. 0 Comments

I wanted to highlight a blog I’ve just discovered written by Djavad Salehi-Isfahani at Brookings. Tyranny of Numbers looks to set the record straight on Iran’s employment, education, poverty, and income distribution and other macroeconomic issues that are often bandied about by journalists and pundits writing on Iran’s economy. In a particularly important post, Salehi-Isfahani corrects many of the stereotypes of Iran as a desperately poor country with out of control inflation that we often see in the media:

Every time a reporter mentions Iran’s inflation or unemployment data, they feel obliged to assert, sometimes quoting unnamed experts, that actual numbers are probably twice the official rates. But most people who work with numbers know well that officials can manipulate one year’s inflation rate or two, but if the rates are misreported for a number of years, the mere effect of compounding will soon reveal their hand. If you take an inflation rate twice the reported rate for the last 15 years, the price level in 2008 would be about 130 times higher than it was in 1993, nearly ten times higher than the official rates indicate. It is easy to show that under reporting inflation by 50% each year for 15 years produces some very absurd results. For example, think of what such under reporting would do to the purchasing power of unskilled construction workers. Their wages increased by a factor of 20 during the fifteen year period 1993-2008 (you can easily verify this number can by asking people in the construction business in Iran, if you do not trust the Central Bank index). The official data that show a 14-fold increase in prices during the 15-year period suggest that unskilled construction workers experienced a 42% increase in real wage over 15 years, or 2.4% per year, which is rather low because it puts the increase in their real wage just below that of per capita GDP. If one believes that actual inflation was higher than has been reported, one is saying that construction workers did even worse. How much worse? Let us assume that the so-called experts are correct and inflation is in fact twice the official rate. In that case the real construction wage in 2008 should be only 15% of its value in 1993 (then about 6000 rials per day). Clearly, even a superficial knowledge of the change in the living standards of unskilled workers in Iran would confirm that the 42% increase is much closer to the truth than an 85% decline.

The overblown accounts of Iran’s economic problems that Salehi-Isfahani looks to correct are often used to further a political agenda of portraying Iran on the verge of collapse or to fuel wishful thinking that Ahmadinejad stands no chance of re-election due to economic mismanagement. The more sober picture we see from Tyranny of Numbers, is of an Iran that lags a bit behind Turkey and its Gulf neighbors, but that is certainly nowhere near an economic meltdown linked to hyperinflation or plunging living standards.

Will Anyone Speak Farsi at NYUAD?

Published on April 14, 2009 in Education. 0 Comments

Within the next few years, New York University (NYU) will have implanted a full-service campus on Saadiat “Happiness” Island, the future cultural and educational center of Abu Dhabi. New York University-Abu Dhabi (NYUAD)’s stated mission is to become a regional hub for quality liberal arts education for more than 2000 undergraduates and less than half as many graduate students. This undertaking is important, as it has the potential to generate positive linakges into the Emirati educational system, and to help train a new generation of regional leaders.

NYUAD’s success in realizing these goals will likely be a direct result of three factors: First, an over-riding focus on the quality of undergraduate education it provides; second, making sure that the offerings are relevant to the regional market (concentrations in schools administration, Islamic finance, and the like would be a good start) and third, stressing active linkages both to the country and the region. It is worth noting that most of the problems with existing (and defunct) Gulf-US exchange programs are on both the demand (an inability to generate adequate interest by qualified student), and supply side (attracting qualified teachers).

While the word “Iran” doesn’t figure in any of NYUAD’s communications—and for cause at this stage, this is NYU Abu Dhabi–, it is apparent Iran may indirectly and directly play a big part in its success, as well as provide for a “public diplomacy” coup, if not for the U.S., then for NYU and its hosts. There are currently more than 500,000 Iranian nationals living in UAE; with well over a million in the Arab Gulf States. This is a population that is for the most part pro-Americanand for whom education is a high priority. A good number are very affluent; more are unable to access an American education directly.

Recognizing UAE sensitivities (and ambivalence) towards its Iranian neighbors, the sensitivities of NYU trustees, and the current state of US-Iranian relations and parallel legal issues, would it not be to both UAE, the US and Gulf interests to spend some effort planting the seed of an NYUAD education with UAE-resident Iranian nationals? Thus far, NYU administrators have been quiet on the subject, noting only that the institution will cater to a wide range of students. We hope someone’s giving this issue some thought.

ED Note: This post originally ran in March 2009.