Presentation on how how impacts on global higher education: financial impact, staff, student enrollment, international students, etc.

1. THE IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON
GLOBAL HIGHER EDUCATION
Dirk Van Damme
OECD/EDU

2. SOME BASICS ON THE GLOBAL
COVID-19 PANDEMIC
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3. • Timing, spread, intensity, etc. of the pandemic vary a lot
among countries
– Impact very uneven
– Post-pandemic recovery will also be very uneven
– Precise impact of confinement policies still unclear, but
early adopters (Australia, Austria, Norway, Denmark) seem
to enjoy some benefit
– Some late adopters (US, UK, etc.) seem to be suffering,
others (Sweden, Netherlands) are still to be seen
– Statistics only partially reliable and not very comparable
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The COVID-19 pandemic: what to expect?

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The COVID-19 pandemic: what to expect?

5. • Timing, spread, intensity, etc. of the pandemic vary a lot
among countries
• Some worrisome signs add to uncertainties
– A second and third wave of infections to be expected
– New mutations might increase the infectiousness and
mortality of the virus
– Immunity after infection seems to be limited (people
reported with second infection)
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The COVID-19 pandemic: what to expect?

6. • Timing, spread, intensity, etc. of the pandemic vary a lot
among countries
• Some worrisome signs ad to uncertainties
• Some positive views in need of confirmation
– Very rapid progress on development of drugs and vaccine
– Because of underreporting of cases, ‘infection fatality ratio’
could actually be much lower than the assumed 1 to 2%;
according to recent study even as low as 1 in 270
– Calculating surplus deaths leads to different evaluation
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The COVID-19 pandemic: what to expect?

7. • After initial confusion and contrasting policy options
(isolation, testing, confinement, ‘herd immunity’) now
emerging consensus on best policy mix
• Diverging policy options in early stages now determine rate
of infection, hospitalization and death toll
• Large-scale testing seems to be hardest bottleneck, but will
be solved soon with new, quicker, cheaper, reliable tests
• Policy coordination both within and between countries is
very weak
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Health policy responses

8. • Many countries are working on various exit scenarios, but
these prove to be more difficult than introducing measures
• Capacity of the health care system to absorb and treat
patients with severe symptoms is critical factor
• Difficult political discussion on the economic cost of surplus
deaths as part of balancing economy and health
• Exit will be stepwise, extending over a long time span,
following an ‘accordion-type’ pattern
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Exit strategies

9. • Impact of COVID-19 and containment measures on
economic output will be enormous, bigger than the 2008
financial crisis
• Estimates of GDP loss around 2% per month of
containment
• Real risk of global recession
• Service sector heavily hit
• Unemployment impact still difficult to assess
• How fast will economy catch up?
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Economic impact is enormous

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Economic impact is enormous

11. • Severe blow to globalisation: production, supply chains, trade,
multilateralism, travel, tourism,…
– International student mobility and mobility of research staff shrinking
dramatically
• Nationalist/protectionist tendencies very powerful, with probably
long-lasting effects, even after the crisis
– Seemingly strong multilateral frameworks and organisations (EU,
Euro-zone) are put to a very severe stress-test
• The rise of China in the global arena gets a serious setback
– Attempts to cover up, suspicion of failing laboratory security,
suspicion of serious underreporting, silencing researchers and
doctors, etc. leads to dramatic decrease in international trust 11
Global impact will be severe and long-lasting

12. • Huge negative impact on equity: both crisis, policy
measures and consequences amplify inequalities
• Confinement very hard for families living in poverty, poor
housing conditions, bad health and other vulnerabilities
• Psychological impact on individuals still unknown, but
probably severe mental health impact, stress in
households, increase in child abuse and intra-family
violence
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Social, personal, well-being

13. IMPACT ON UNIVERSITIES
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14. • Estimate that 20,000 HEIs closed down, affecting learning
opportunities of 200,000+ students worldwide
• Impressive switch to distance education, online learning, e-
learning, and mixed-modes educational delivery.
• Very negative impact on equity: disadvantaged students
particularly hit
• Disruption in assessments and end-of-year examinations
disrupts study progression, graduation, learning trajectories, etc.
• Increased flexibility as part of institutional responses
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Immediate disruption in education

15. • As stream of international students is drying up, institutions
dependent on fee-paying students will suffer very much
– Mainly UK (£6.9bn), Australia, NZ
– But also impact on European countries: NL, Sweden,
Switzerland, Germany, France
• Indirect impact because of fiscal crisis
– US public universities immediately
– Many other countries when recession will unfold
• Compensation by stimulus packages still unclear
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Financial impact

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17. • Immediate measures taken by universities: laying-off
staff on temporary contracts
– Often young, promising research staff
– Disinvesting in young researchers will have severe impact
on longer-term research potential by cutting off their talent
pipeline
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Staff

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19. • Overall student enrolment will increase
– Like in any crisis, students are postponing graduation to avoid
entering a labour market in crisis
– Many students will not be able to finalize important parts of the
curriculum (field research, internships, etc.) needed for graduation
– Enrolment in universities is a better option than being unemployed
• Higher education students are perceived to be high-risk
contaminators
• In many European countries, looming prospects of stagnating
or declining public funding with increased student enrolment
and teaching work load
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Students

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21. • Huge drop in Chinese student enrolment
• Asian students look to regional opportunities (Korea,
Malaysia, Singapore) instead of US, UK or Europe
• Restrictions on travel, immigration, visa etc. will remain
in place for a long time, cutting off student mobility
• Admission procedures seriously disrupted
• Also intra-European mobility will be affected
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International students

22. • Capacity of many institutions to replace face-to-face
delivery by various models of distance education should
be praised
• Yet, many mistakes are made. Need for comprehensive
evaluation of real-world experiments.
• Need to consider long-term integration of e-learning in
multimodal delivery; the ‘old normal’ will not come back
• Still, lot of work to be done in assessment, evaluation,
study career guidance, etc.
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Teaching and learning

23. • The COVID-19 pandemic will reinforce hierarchies in the
global higher education landscape…
– Institutions with large endowments or other financial
buffers will be more resilient than vulnerable ones
• …but will also shake up the familiar landscape
– Losers: US, UK, Australia
– Winners: Europe (Germany, France, Sweden,
Netherlands, Switzerland)
– Uncertain: Asian universities
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Impact on global landscape

24. • UK: after Brexit, uncertainty about access to EU research
funding, COVID-19 is another heavy blow
– Huge losses because of departure of fee-paying international st
– Beyond the Russell Group, many universities will suffer, not only
financially, but also in quality
• US: economic recession, political instability
– With many states in dire budgetary conditions, many public
universities will suffer
– Top private research universities will cope, but lower-ranked for-
profits will also suffer
– Top research labs dependant on Asian PhD and post-docs
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Impact on global landscape: outlooks

25. • Germany & Nordic countries (incl NL?):
– Effective containment and mitigation strategies, reopening
of schools and universities pretty soon
– Stable public funding, excellent research policies, well-
functioning labour markets, minimal impact of economic
recession
– Continuous rise of universities in global rankings will be
confirmed and reinforced
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Impact on global landscape: outlooks

26. Thank you!
dirk.vandamme@oecd.org
www.oecd.org/edu
www.oecd.org/coronavirus
twitter @VanDammeEDU
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