Global Private and Total Higher Education Enrollment by Country, 2015

(This China Note was developed principally by Daniel Levy, Yitao Wang, and Ruirui Sun, with the assistance of Fengqiao Yan and, from the China office providing information to the UIS, Z. Zhang and JuXiang Liu) Vigorous growth is the most striking reality about Chinese PHE enrollment early in the new century. This vigorous private growth could be seen as a third stage of Chinese Communist higher education sectoral development. For its first three decades Communism banned PHE. For a second stage the regime then lifted the ban in the early 1980s as part of its massive marketization counter-revolution. Yet for its first two decades, PHE grew only modestly to still just 300,000 in 2000, before the  new  century’s  takeoff, marking the third stage. By 2005, PHE enrollment exceeded 2 million, its share leaping from 5.1% to 12.6% in the quinquennium, to be followed by more than a doubling of raw enrollment in the ensuing quinquennium (2005-2010).

Yet the growth picture changes after 2010. In a fourth stage, roughly tracking global tendencies, Chinese PHE has continued strong growth in raw enrollment yet a slowed pace and with relative stagnation in private share of total enrollment.

Nonetheless, our dataset exaggerates the peak private share and, consequently, any subsequent decline in private share. Fortunately, the distortion is limited in both degree and duration. But since (a) Chinese higher education is huge and (b) the data discontinuity inter-relates to PROPHE’s switch of principal data source between 2010 and 2015, it behooves us to understand the discrepancy as well as possible, and so doing illuminates linked aspects of private and public in Chinese higher education. 

The roots of the dataset discontinuity lie in the UIS’s failure to provide PHE data through 2010. Whether this failure traces to a Chinese government ambivalence about owning up to its large private sector, associated perhaps with avoiding the term “private” we cannot say. What is evident is that UIS’ China data were seriously distorted, 2000- 2010. Chinese total enrollment was understated grossly by the time PHE raced forward in the early 2000s and then again when the UIS’s belated addition of PHE made its presented total jump an implausible 8 million enrollments 2013-2014. 

Knowing that China in fact had significant PHE that should be included, PROPHE had turned directly to national data. The Ministry of Education (MOE) did show PHE (“non- government”). Oddly, however, it has provided no single total figure for the system (or either of the two sectors). Seeking figures best suited for “higher education,” PROPHE included MOE’s “undergraduates in regular higher education institutions” and “graduate students,” each listed separately for public and private, but PROPHE did not include “web-based undergraduates” or higher education students in “adult higher education institutions.” The not-included enrollment was only small in 2000 and modest by 2005 but as it became larger, PROPHE realized that the excluded categories were included in the UIS totals, and rightly so. As the huge majority of this enrollment was in fact public, PROPHE 2000-2010 data understate especially public enrollment, and therefore overstate the private share. By 2015 (the UIS finally including PHE), PROPHE could make a careful decision to switch to the UIS data though with attention to consequent dataset discontinuity. For 2010, the inclusion of 4,531,443 public “web-based undergraduates” and 5,360,388 public higher education  students in “adult higher education  institutions,” though also of 102,314 additional private enrollments  would  yield 4,766,845/33,850,490  =14.1% for 2010, as opposed to the dataset’s 19.6%. Peeking forward to 2020 reinforces the view that distortion centers on only 2010. From 2015-2020 (at least) there is marked stability in the Chinese private share: as shown in our dataset, the UIS 2015 Chinese data are 5,871,139/43,367,394 for 13.5% private and then, between 2017 and 2020, the private share ranged only between 14.4% and 14.9%, the 2020 figures 7,489,933/50,237,458 for 14.9% private. In sum, with the 2010 data corrected to include especially public enrollment in regular web-based and adult higher education institutions, we see a clear reality of private share takeoff at the century’s onset, followed by an extended period of stable private share amid major raw growth in each sector through 2015, followed (subsequent to our main dataset) by  slowed growth in both sectors. 

Before deciding whether it was feasible and prudent to switch to UIS over direct MOE data, PROPHE scrutinized the enrollment categories that might be encompassed by MOE data and how their aggregate might or might not approximate UIS higher education figures. Again, a major challenges is that the MOE categories do not specify whether they are counted as higher education nor, we will shortly see, with what weight they are counted. Another challenge emerged from the un-labeled fact that, from the inception of its inclusion of MOE PHE data, the UIS has included it with a one-year lag. In other words, the MOE 2014 PHE data appear as part of the UIS 2015 data. 

With all indicated adjustments made, PROPHE remained unable to get exact correspondence between a set of MOE categories and the private and total enrollment obtainable directly from the UIS but could confirm that the figures became close. The consensus of Chinese higher education scholars consulted, as well as functionaries of the Chinese office providing data to UIS, was  that PROPHE should indeed switch to the UIS data starting 2015, with little concern for relatively minor data discrepancies. Further questioning aimed at understanding the extant discrepancies were then fruitless. Has private graduate enrollment been  incorporated in every year? Can we be sure that all sub- categories (e.g., “short-cycle courses”) that MOE lists under “Regular HEIs” are counted fully as higher education enrollments? Why do UIS totals  for  2014 (when it first incorporates PHE) through 2017 exceed what we calculate from MOE categories and then for 2018-2020 fall short of them? 

(a) 2000-2010. Our 2000-2010 data draws from a 3-way partnership report (http://ficci.in/sedocument/20244/recommendations-2012.pdf.), itself drawing from the country’s University Grant Committee (UGC). Because the Partnership’s data are for 2001, 2007, and 2012, we employ our usual calculation methods to estimate for the three PROPHE dataset years. These data exclude distance education (DE); with DE, the private share would fall from our 58.3% to 53.5%.

(b) 2015 and Forward: Shifting to UIS Data. By 2013 the All India Survey of Higher Education (AISHE) becomes easily the best source for enrollment data and replaces the UGC as PROPHE’s  main  source  for  academic  year  2011). However, AISHE provision of data to the UIS finally enables the UIS to report PHE data, enabling PROPHE to shift to UIS data, though with a discontinuity between its data for 2000-2010 and 2015-forward. The discontinuity springs mostly from the Partnership’s apparent inclusion (2000-2010) of non-degree students as well as its exclusion of DE (distance) students whereas the UIS excludes non-degree students while including DE students. However, our analysis of AISHE’s own data would leave us close to what UIS provides and PROPHE uses, the former 58.5%, the latter 57.9% (18,583,774/ 32,107,419).

(c) Private Inclusiveness with High Privateness. Indian PHE has two private components-private unaided and private, government-aided. Generally self- financed in independent India’s early years, private colleges became mostly government-funded in the 1960s, with accompanying government control and thus fitting our government-dependent category, most common in Europe, and similarly leads to blurring and sometimes confusion over sectoral status. Counting them as private is consistent with the UIS’ and PROPHE’s general policy of counting as private anything defined nationally as legally private. But although our dataset requires no internal breakdown of the two private subsectors, we nonetheless have interest in such a breakdown for how it enlightens us about the degree of privateness within Indian PHE.

The most important discovered fact is the decisive shift from government-aided to unaided PHE. For colleges, by 2007 or so (Agarwal 2008), the unaided share had nearly caught the aided share (34% vs 37%), each surpassing the public share (29%). By 2018, the unaided share more than doubles the government-aided share, 47% to 21%. Private advocates credit their privateness in governance while critics denounce shoddy offerings.

Moreover, by various calculations we can go beyond colleges alone to total enrolment. A key is that private university enrollment has been unaided, almost exclusively until very recently. Thus, as of 2018, some 38% of total Indian higher education is private unaided compared to 15% private government-aided, the unaided share of PHE having leapt from 54% in 2007 to 72% in 2018. Shortly thereafter the Indian government announced a huge reform to terminate affiliated colleges, reflecting deep displeasure with decades of rampant private institutional proliferation. However far the reform might go, the world’s largest private sector has been overwhelmingly marked by its privateness.

UIS provides no data on Kosovo, as a divided UN does not officially recognize it, though many countries do. We use raw enrollment data (provided by A. Papadimitriou)   from   the   NORGLOBAL   project.  But   these   come   from institutional responses at only two universities, and how many higher education institutions should be included is unclear. However, the NORGLOBAL share (41.2%) approximates Zgaga et al.’s (2013), which reports its sources as national statistics offices. Zgaga does not give raw enrollment but  its  national  shares match or are within 2% of the UIS shares on 5 other West Balkan countries, differing by more only on Montenegro. We use our 2010 PHE share estimate of 41.2% for both 2000 and 2005.

Myanmar (formerly Burma) shows 0 PHE enrolment in UIS data through 2015, after which the UIS provides no higher education data. But, with heavy international orientation, nonprofit PHE has been functioning. Offering only UK degrees, Myanmar Imperial University claims its private existence since 2004. Its ties with private enterprise, including the jewelry business, and its rhetoric and photo images, suggest semi-elite aspirations. Parami University has its license from a US agency and will seek US accreditation. Its Board of Trustees composition and promotional statements also suggest semi-elite aspirations. Likewise upscale in appearance is Strategy First University, which boasts its international partnerships and variety of offerings. It is not clear, however, whether it is authorized to offer any level 6 degrees, while level 5 degrees are foreign ones. Joseph Education University, founded by a religiously committed businessman, apparently under national business law, was canonically approved by the local archbishop in 2020 and commits itself to Catholic values, as well as to liberal arts; though it seems substantially business-oriented in practice, it has faculty in fields such as missiology. Established in 2015, the small University of Medicine claims state recognition.

By the early 2020s, PHE enrollment was significantly increasing, in part from failures at public institutions, exacerbated by repression after the 2021 military coup, ending the period of public higher education reform. PHE now even includes alternative platforms like Spring University Myanmar (SUM), primarily funded by USAID and other aid agencies, and linked to the country’s shadow government democratic government. To be sure, a basic driving force for Spring and other PHE institutions is job-seeking. Like others, Spring offers short tertiary education courses imparting job skills. Much of Myanmar’s PHE is online. Research must determine which private institutions grant state-authorized and recognized degrees (and thus count as having domestic PHE enrollment) as well as whether the many foreign students have their degrees recognized back home

UIS totals for each year in the Netherlands are unproblematic, while private shares are  very problematic and would be so regardless of what figures are chosen. The UIS provides the private share for only 2012,  13.4%, without explaining the sudden inclusion or the basis for the 13.4% figure. We use that percentage along with the UIS total to calculate the private enrollment for 2010. OECD provides the figures for 2000, showing a 69.0% private share,  which appears consistent with scholarship on the country highlighting similarities to the Belgian case (Geiger 1986). We then estimate the 2005 private share simply (too simply) by taking the mid-point between the 2000 and 2010 private shares, and again we use the UIS total enrollment. Of course the  decade  did  not  see  the private share decline drastically and steadily in the sense of enrollment shifts between private and public institutions. The numbers’ apparent decline comes instead from volatile treatment of whether the bulk (or even entirety) of the institutions are private or public. European datasets do not indicate why their majority private enrollment in 2000 changed in 2003 (OECD and 2004 EUROSTAT) to 100% private or why this flipped to 100% public  in  2008 (OECD and 2010 EUROSTAT). The European organizations in question normally follow the breakdown provided by the country, according  to the organization’s written criteria. But the domestic perspective is complex and ambiguous. Dutch law appears to consider all institutions private, according to expert Gerrit de Jager (personal communication, October 17,  2012)  who ultimately concludes that whether now to categorize Dutch higher education as private or public is “a matter of taste.” Clearer is that if the institutions are private, they were at least historically government-dependent. Karl Dittrich (2009) of the Dutch accreditation agency reports around 10% as the current private independent figure; this includes the 70 “registered universities” (essentially professional  schools), privately funded, while excluding theological ones and universities of applied sciences. This percentage approximates our UIS-based estimate for 2010. Perhaps our 2010 figure represents “independent private” while our 2000 figure represents “government-dependent private.” We use UIS 2012 for 2010; OECD 2000 for 2000, and estimate 2005 based on 2010 & 2000 figures.

UIS shows that Tajikistan has recently established PHE, though we maintain the UIS’ zero for 2000, 2005, and 2010. PHE is very limited, tottering on a political-legal edge (Hasanova, 2010). As with Turkmenistan, the near absence of PHE owes to the lack of greater break from the Soviet Communist legacy.

For the UK, UIS shows no private-public breakdown  and, worse, counts the total enrollment as private. It is one thing to count the UIS’ “government-dependent private” enrollment as private in countries like Belgium, where the private reality is long recognized in law and usage. In contrast, in the UK the law is not explicit on the point while both popular discourse and scholarly treatments have routinely counted virtually all higher education enrolment as public, often noting the exception of one small private university, the University of Buckingham (Geiger, 1986). Neave (1985) declares it erroneous to call U.K. higher education private. Only in 2011 did the UK officially open higher education to additional private providers, however much some had been de facto precursors (Fielden & Middlehurst, 2017; Middlehurst & Fielden, 2011). Allowing both for-profit and nonprofit, even including universities, the policy change created a dual-sector system. To count UK enrolment as 100% private (which the UIS does at least through 2015) because its public universities have charters, governing boards,  ample  private finance, or other such autonomy- related characteristics would require that we take U.S., Developed British Commonwealth, Israeli, and probably some other countries’ public university enrolment as private.

Accordingly, we need to count the UIS as public instead of private for 2000-2010 and then estimate the private enrollment for 2015 (and add that estimate appropriately to the total). For the 2015 estimate, we additionally consult work by Hunt and Boliver (2019), along with Hunt’s generous 2019 email commentary. Government data gathering includes only the institutions it funds, which omits especially the relatively smaller private providers (and recent improvements will likely reduce incompleteness only modestly). Meanwhile, eliminating from lists of “alternative providers” those that are public, not operational, or lie outside “higher education,” yields 813 for 2017. As only 115 of those receive government funds and thus figure into government counts, their enrollment (58,735) is just  part of the real private total. Analysts have then surveyed the other providers to estimate total private enrollment (Shury, Adams, Barnes, Hewitt, & Oozeerally, 2016) – a prominent estimate being 245,000 to 295,000 for 2014, which  might  be  compared  to  roughly  160,000  for  2011 (Hughes, Porter, Jones, & Sheen, 2013). One might therefore estimate 300,000 for 2015 based on a mid-range 270,000 for 2014 and a simple 2011-2014 growth- line. We opt for a lower estimate. Just as the 115 funded institutions  are  likely larger on average than the 698 non-funded ones, so those responding to surveys are likely larger than non-responders, and many private institutions include part time and lower than higher education students, as well as courses delivered intermittently and even by distance overseas. (Some such considerations probably apply to many “private providers” in several other countries.) For the UK, Hunt concurs with this reasoning and its consequent private estimate of 250,000 for 2015. We add a mighty asterisk. While we therefore put 250,000 for the private enrollment, we do not add that full number to the U.K.’s total enrollment. That is because the government does count enrollment at private institutions it funds. As that enrollment was 58,735 for 2017, from which we could roughly estimate 45,000 for 2015, we add 205,000 (rather than 250,000) to the 2015 total. Our 2015 private share of the total is 250,000/2,535,334 (9.9%)