Study and Work in Europe: Key Websites

This article should be useful to anyone intending to study or work in Europe. The below websites and resources give essential information about study programs and scholar funding in Europe(1); EU affairs internships and entry-level jobs in the private sector(2); and vacant positions(3) at the EU level and in various European countries, across all sectors.

Jobs in Geneva & UN System

This article provides a selection of key websites useful to job seekers wanting to work in Geneva and/or the United Nations system.

Geneva is known not only for being home to many of the UN agencies but also to many other international and non-governmental organizations, professional associations and various consulting companies. Jobs in the private sector and websites with information on research funding and jobs in Switzerland have also been included in the list.

In addition to the official UN career page, there are currently several other websites where UN vacant positions are published. Note that UN internships are unpaid and entry-level positions are rarely announced. However, there are opportunities for young professionals through the Young Professional Programs based at various UN agencies, only nationals of countries sponsoring these programs are eligible but sometimes nationals of developing countries may also apply.

While it is true that foreign language fluency is a requirement, or at least an advantage, for a career in international organizations, many people believe that social science degrees are the only suitable qualification. In fact, international organizations are also looking for staff trained in the natural sciences and engineering, and IT skills are highly sought after, irrespective of the degree.

Development Opportunities: Jobs, Funding, Research

This post is a selection of online resources for finding a job or internship in development as well as funding and scholar opportunities for nationals of developing countries.

The first part(I) provides resources for people interested in working in development-related organizations. Note that despite the fact that many jobs in the field are either in NGOs or volunteer positions, development career opportunities may exist in government agencies and even in the private sector, e.g. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) functions.

The second part(II) is geared toward nationals of emerging and developing countries who are looking for scholarships and grants; and the third part(III) is a compilation of scholar resources - advise from volunteer mentors, free resources on academic writing, methods and research and accessible scientific literature, and research reports on development issues carried out by governments or various organizations.

Sites & Directories for Kids, K12 Students & Teachers | Research Keys, Part 4

Research Keys is a series of blog posts which will cover essential resources on search engines and information intelligence; directories and sites for kids, K-12 and university students; global search sites for jobs and travel; multimedia search engines; online library guides; content-rich subject guides by educators and professionals; resources by foundations, universities and governments; open access repositories; content curation sites; similar sites - their application in research; free Excel tutorials; global and European research scholarship websites. Although the focus is clearly on research, many of the resources are useful for business and individual targeted search (e.g. competitive intelligence sites; sites for jobs and travel; library guides and content-rich websites provide information in many areas and the websites are freely accessible; Excel resources)

Research Keys, Part 4 examines education-related search engines, directories and sites for kids and K-12 students, teachers and parents. Search engines for kids differ from other search engines because they are free of adult content, sites are almost always reviewed by professionals and focus on fun-education activities. The below sites are public and free, created and put together by educators, librarians, writers, foundations, government agencies and schools. Some of the sites target both kids and young students, and some directories for K-12 students provide materials useful to all audiences (e.g. guides for writing genres, foreign language tutorials, misc. links)

Open Access Education Resources | Research Keys, Part 3

Research Keys is a series of blog posts which will cover essential resources on search engines and information intelligence; directories and sites for kids, K-12 and university students; global search sites for jobs and travel; multimedia search engines; online library guides; content-rich subject guides by educators and professionals; resources by foundations, universities and governments; open access repositories; content curation sites; similar sites - their application in research; free Excel tutorials; global and European research scholarship websites. Although the focus is clearly on research, many of the resources are useful for business and individual targeted search (e.g. competitive intelligence sites; sites for jobs and travel; library guides and content-rich websites provide information in many areas and the websites are freely accessible; Excel resources)

Research Keys, Part 3 is a collection of important open access education resources useful to students, researchers and lifelong learners. Two subcategories have been outlined - initiatives funded by public institutions/foundations, and resources which are crowdsourced or maintained by private individuals/firms

Academic Search Engines & Directories | Research Keys, Part 2

Research Keys is a series of blog posts which will cover essential resources on search engines and information intelligence; directories and sites for kids, K-12 and university students; global search sites for jobs and travel; multimedia search engines; online library guides; content-rich subject guides by educators and professionals; resources by foundations, universities and governments; open access repositories; content curation sites; similar sites - their application in research; free Excel tutorials; global and European research scholarship websites. Although the focus is clearly on research, many of the resources are useful for business and individual targeted search (e.g. competitive intelligence sites; sites for jobs and travel; library guides and content-rich websites provide information in many areas and the websites are freely accessible; Excel resources)

Research Keys, Part 2 is a compilation of useful academic search engines and sites. You will access specialty sources and repositories, online journals, real-time news, images, references, tips on finding and narrowing a topic. Most of the articles were written by librarians working for online education blogs

Search Engines & Information Intelligence | Research Keys, Part 1

Research Keys is a series of blog posts which will cover essential resources on search engines and information intelligence; directories and sites for kids, K-12 and university students; global search sites for jobs and travel; multimedia search engines; online library guides; content-rich subject guides by educators and professionals; resources by foundations, universities and governments; open access repositories; content curation sites; similar sites - their application in research; free Excel tutorials; global and European research scholarship websites. Although the focus is clearly on research, many of the resources are useful for business and individual targeted search (e.g. competitive intelligence sites; sites for jobs and travel; library guides and content-rich websites provide information in many areas and the websites are freely accessible; Excel resources)

Research Keys, Part 1 starts with a comprehensive collection of key search engine resources and guides – how to search effectively the internet; where to find topical search engines, dictionaries, news and marketing columns. Semantic search engines, deep web tutorials, information and competitive intelligence, big data and knowledge maangement resources are also on the list.

Daily Tekk Resources

Launched by Chris McConnell, Daily Tekk is a relatively new website on tech-related content, and yet it is already used as a teaching resource. Apart from articles on entrepreneurship, innovation and social media, they have become popular for the Top 100 Tech series.

Expat Resources, Guides and Networks

If you are considering moving abroad and want to know where to find information about jobs, articles and tips for traveling, studying and living in a foreign country, country guides or simply advice by or network with other expats, then the following links might help you.

Useful Links for Tourists, Expats & Students in Latin America

Here is a list of useful links for future expats and travelers in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Latin America: 

Latin America:

• Finding Statistics in Latin America, an article (July 2012) by FreePint, the full version is available only to subscribers
• Intern in Latin America - all-inclusive programs for interns, volunteers, students enrolled in medicine/no Spanish is required/, Spanish courses; positions in Argentina & Colombia, soon the program will expand to Chile, Mexico and Brazil
• Internship programs in Latin America - links by Transitions Abroad
• South America Travel Guide - Chile-based website providing basic info for most countries in the region
• Nearshore Americas - Latin America business and outsourcing news and analysis
• Caribbean Search - local news, real estate and jobs 
• South America Expat Blogs - blogs by and for expatriates 
• More Expat Resources - expat websites, jobs & careers, immigration information, country guides, resources for healthcare and travel 

Latin America Attracts Foreign Professionals & Students

Skilled migrants consider economies already reputed for specific industries and skill pools – such as the USA, other English-speaking countries and countries in continental Europe. But given that visa procedures are complicated and since the American and European economies have been affected by the economic crisis, immigrants are increasingly interested in the emerging economies, especially if they are relatively stable and have a leading position in their region – i.e. countries in Asia and Latin America.

Emerging or catching-up economies are eager to fill their skill gaps. That is why they have been working on competitive migration policies which only complement developments such as attractive conditions for outsourcing; well developed higher education systems or ongoing efforts to improve them; growing industries; investments in IT and English language training.

Here is an overview of the latest economic advances, skills shortages and immigrant inflows in the most developed Latin American economies other than Brazil - Argentina, Chile and Mexico.

Skilled Migrants in Brazil

Latin America’s biggest economy is now the world’s sixth. With a population of over 190 million people and an annual growth of 4 %, Brazil is expected to become the fifth oil exporter by 2020. Despite recent warnings that its economy is not sustainable and that inequality is still prevailing across the country, significant socioeconomic changes have occurred including the 28 million people having moved out of poverty, improved education outcomes - Brazil’s 2009 PISA results placed it ahead of Argentina and Colombia, birth rates lower than the ones of the US (1.9 children/woman vs. 2, down from 6 children/woman in the 1960s) and a closing gender gap in education - women account for 60 % of the country’s graduates.

In addition to these changes which are likely to increase consumption, new employment opportunities will be created thanks to the 2014 FIFA World Cup and the 2016 Summer Olympics. At the same time, Brazil needs more professionals than it produces and is fortunate that the world crisis is bringing the latter its way. In order to facilitate procedures, Brazil is about to revise its immigration policy and create a path for skilled workers.

Asia’s Prospects: Regional Hubs and Skilled Mobility

This post covers the latest developments in human mobility in Asia, mainly with regard to skilled migrants and international students. While China, Korea and Japan are trying to attract skilled immigrants as well as to ease policies toward immigrants already arrived, they might have to compete with Southeast Asian countries.

The University World News article Worldwide Student Numbers Forecast to Double by 2025 revealed some highlights of the Bob Goddard chapter for the book Making a Difference: Australian International Education. According to the author, by 2025 there will be 262 million post-secondary students worldwide (up from 150 million currently, or an increase of 75 %), much of that growth coming from India and China; and almost 8 million students studying outside the country in which they were born (up from 3-3.5 million currently).

Goddard points to Singapore and Malaysia as emerging education hubs: the former hopes to attract 150,000 foreign students by 2015 while the latter has a target of 100,000 by 2020. However, both countries are currently experiencing some problems.

Turkey’s Target: 100,000 International Students by 2020

In order to attract tourists from all horizons, Turkey and Istanbul have been promoted as a country/city between two continents – where East meets West. Now Turkey's officials are looking forward to another campaign – how to optimize the benefits of  international students mobility, and maybe take their exports and marketing to another level.

According to the Turkish Student Selection and Placement Center (OSYM) latest statistics, there is a 59 % increase in the number of foreign full-degree students over a 5-year period – from 16,000 in 2006/07 to over 25,500 in 2011/12 (Today’s Zaman 2011). The overall growth is largely due to a 65 % increase in the number of students from Muslim countries – from 11,000 in 2000/01 to 18,000 in 2010/11(Uzum 2012). In times of rising Islamophobia, Turkey was perceived as a politically safe and economically stable country in the Muslim world. However, academics and students cited other reasons for the increase, among which positive experiences of former international students, Turkey's cultural and historical heritage, reputation for  good educational facilities and programs and increased promotion of universities at education fairs.  

Forthcoming Posts on Skilled Migration

My next posts will cover skilled migration news from Latin America, Northern Europe and the English-speaking world (the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) -- all policies gravitate around the models of Canada and Australia while these countries have problems of their own...

Open J-Gate: Search Tips and Comparison with DOAJ

You have probably used Informatics India directory Open J-Gate (the website is not working at the moment) to find open access articles and journals.

However, in case you didn't know it (b/se DOAJ search options are not that many), search tips (e.g. operators, truncation) about using the database can optimize your results. You can learn how by reading some of J-Gate Newsletter search tip monthly articles from June 2011 onwards - just browse the J-Gate Newsletter archive. 

Innovation Union: EU R&D Updates and Competitiveness

Innovation Union  was created under the Europe 2020 Strategy and functions as a part of the Communication Unit of the EU Commission's Research & Innovation DG.

Free Language Learning Resources

Here is a comprehensive list of language resources containing useful links to free language lessons, tutorials, podcasts and videos. Many of the websites are academic language directories while others are hosted by other directories or are maintained by people passionate about learning languages.

Art Resources on the Web

Here is a short list of useful art resources which can be freely accessed:

• Arts Section of the Virtual Library: extensive list of resources on art history 

• The search engine Art Cyclopedia indexes online museums and image archives including works of over 9,000 fine artists. Art news, museums and other useful links can be found on the left-hand side of the page. The resource was shared by Project Gutenberg.

Dolphin Language & the Holographic Theory Applied to Sound

Researchers investigating the dolphin language have come to the conclusion that dolphins see "sono-pictures", i.e. they see with sound. There is hope that one day humans will be able to communicate with dolphins.

Highlights from the 2012 FutureMed Conference

The 2012 FutureMed Conference was organized by the Singularity University.

Some of the ideas shared were covered by MedGadget articles Surgical Robotics Pioneer Discusses Holomers and Palsma Medicine and IBM Doctors Advocate New Approaches to Medicine. More articles will appear under Press Coverage - News & Videos Section. 

Insights from the Physician Social Network Doximity

Doximity, the US physician network linking medical minds, was launched last year. Articles published on the website cover issues such as med tech, networking and demography.

Study Abroad Intentions Tweets: US & UK Top Choices; Wealthy Chinese to Go Abroad Earlier

Genius Recruiter has created a map of students' preferred study destinations based on January 2012 tweets. The US and the UK stood out as top destinations, especially for students from Europe, East Asia and South America; Australia was attractive for Southeast Asians, and Canada saw a growing interest in India.

Since Twitter is blocked in China, there was no data for Chinese student preferences. However, another post (published in July 2012) examines why Chinese students are going abroad and where they are going. Again, the US (27%) and the UK (22%), followed by Canada (15%) and Australia (7%) were the most preferred countries, although this study focuses on the children of the rich Chinese. While it is not surprising that Chinese parents are (or want to) sending their children to the US to get a quality education and all-round development, Genius Recruiter reports that 35% of the surveyed wealthy parents, or HNWI (high net worth individuals), were planning to send their children to high school education, followed by 30% to college education, 21% to junior high school and only 4% at the level of postgraduate education - here is the original infographic. While 85% of HNWI were thinking of sending their children abroad, this was the case for 9 out of 10 UHNWI (the ultra rich). The survey was carried out by the Chinese magazine Hurun Report and the Industrial Bank.

Having accessed the Chinese Luxury Consumer White Paper, one can read that children's education was the 3rd consumption hot spot of the HNWI, just behind luxury travel and healthcare, and that more and more parents are planning to send their children abroad earlier. Actually, while more HNWI parents planned to send their children abroad to junior and senior high school in 2011 than in 2010 (21% vs. 17%; and 35% vs. 32%, respectively), the UHNWI were clearly showing more interest in senior high school (40% in 2011 vs. 23% in 2010) and were less interested in college-level education (18% in 2011 vs. 27% in 2010 – this compares to 30% in 2011 vs. 29 % in 2010 for the HNWI, see p.40 of the white paper). At the same time, the study states that wealthy Chinese care not only about their children's education but also about their own - 30% of HNWI were taking further education courses in order to increase their professional knowledge and expand their social networks.

Chinese parents' plans on their children's earlier education abroad may aim at a more effective learning of the host country language and culture as well as at building a social network as early as possible, but they may also reflect the idea that their children should return home once they graduate from the program. International Business Times (quoted by Genius Recruiter) reminded of last year's estimates of Fujian's Overseas Chinese University: only around 500,000, or less than 1/3 of the 1.62 million students who arrived in the US in the period 1978-2009 returned to China.

While it is not unlikely to see more Chinese and other foreign students going to Canada, Australia and New Zealand, rather than to the UK and the US, as a result of aggressive recruitment, targets set by the former countries and two-step migration policies making it easier for students to stay, it is also possible to expect changes in admission policies and screening procedures in order to prevent frauds (e.g. New Zealand declined 3453 applications from India and 1027 Chinese applications in the past 12 months because of fake documents).



References (posts & reports mentioned):

International Students Future Forecasts, (15 June 2012), blog post by Genius Recruiter, http://geniusrecruiter.com/2012/06/15/international-student-future-forecasts/ 

International Student World Map Based on Tweets, (15 February 2012), blog post by Genius Recruiter, http://geniusrecruiter.com/2012/02/15/international-student-world-map-based-on-tweets/

Tan, Lincoln, (19 July 2012), Thousands from India Failing Student Visa Bids, an article by NZ Herald accessed on 20/07/2012, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/students-study/news/article.cfm?c_id=329&objectid=10820611

The Chinese Luxury Consumer White Paper, (March 2012), prepared by the Hurun Report and the Industrial Bank, accessed via Hurun Report website on 20/07/2012,
http://img.hurun.net/hmec/2012-03-27/201203271608211665.pdf

Why Chinese Students are Going Abroad, (6 July 2012), blog post by Genius Recruiter, http://geniusrecruiter.com/2012/07/06/why-chinese-students-are-going-abroad/

Zhang, Yifei, (7 April 2012), 90% Of China’s Super-Rich Want To Send Children Abroad, an article by International Business Times accessed on 20/07/ 2012, http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/325189/20120407/chinese-super-rich-children-abroad.htm?page=all

The post was updated on 20/07/2012

Why Multiculturalism Works in Australia

Several months ago, I read the report Selection, Migration and Integration: Why Multiculturalism Works in Australia (and fails in Europe) written by Marc Hartwich and published on the Australian Policy Online website. He compares Australia with the UK and Germany and claims that it is not any other policy towards migrants - such as education or integration - but the very policy of selection that makes AU newcomers so successful.

Research Posters & Presentations

Unfortunately, very few university programs worldwide (esp. outside US and in the social sciences) offer meaningful courses in academic writing & presentation relevant not only to theses writing but also to attending conferences and journal publishing.

Free Resources for All Writing Genres

This compilation of useful writing resources targets all writing genres and audiences - children, students, beginning, freelance and online writers.

Citizen Science Projects & Resources

Citizen science, also known as crowdsourced science, refers to the participation of non-scientists on a volunteer basis in projects led by academic scientists. Normally such projects have a wide community (and sometimes world) impact but they can concern only a particular geographical area. Citizen participation is especially helpful when a lot of data should be sorted and analysed. This is the case of projects in astronomy and biology. Aside from the technical help provided, citizen science has an educational aspect - citizens accumulate knowledge through the process of participation and by reading the available learning materials. Here below are some of the major citizen science platforms:

Student Journals & Conferences

This post provides some resources for student journals and conferences: 

• The Undergraduate Journals & Conferences Directory (UJCD) is a frequently updated resource encouraging undergraduate scholarship in the US. Journals and conferences are grouped into subject categories. Several articles in favor and against the use of undergraduate journals are published on the website.

Open (text) Books: Online, Free and Serious

Here below is a list of the most important open textbook providers and some other repositories of open access educational content as well as content-rich websites curated by librarians and former educators. Although most of the resources target university students, some are geared toward K-12 students while others may benefit all lifelong learners.

• The Open Course Library (OCL) is a Washington-based initiative that has made available courses for free as an alternative to the costly traditional textbooks in the US. They have published on the website links to open access resources  - open textbooks, courses and other learning materials created and peer-reviewed by academics, and sponsored by foundations. 

ADBI Roundtable on Labour Migration in Asia

Here are some of the presentations, papers and videos from the 2nd ADBI-OECD Roundtable on Labour Migration in Asia held in January 2012 in Tokyo.

No surprising data have been presented. My favourite presentation, both in terms of content and design, is Labour Migration: Malaysia as a Receiving Country by L. Ahmad.

Some presentations highlights:

• Most immigrants in Malaysia come from neighbouring countries (52 % from Indonesia); security with regard to illegal migrants a major concern; 1/3 of the country's 1M emigrants are highly skilled (2010 data); more than 50 % of Malaysia's skilled labour is concentrated in Singapore (Ahmad);