Harvard Hyderabad and Oxford Kolkata? The future of US higher education could be in India

哈佛海德拉巴分校，牛津加尔各答分校?美国高等教育的未来或在印度

By Tyler Cowen

With much of U.S. higher education online only this semester, and its more long-term future deeply uncertain, now is a time to dream big. My own fantasy is based on the Indian government’s recent plan to encourage the top 100 universities in the world to operate in India.

美国高等教育本学期只在线上授课，而且未来还很不确定，现在是时候放飞想象了。我的幻想是基于印度政府最近鼓励世界前100名大学在印度办学的计划。

Consider how the next 30 years might look if India were to allow the creation of a “Princeton Mumbai,” a “Harvard Hyderabad” or an “Oxford Kolkata.”

试想一下，如果印度批准建立“普林斯顿孟买分校”、“哈佛海德拉巴分校”或“牛津加尔各答分校”，未来30年将会是什么样子？

At first, most top U.S. universities would be reluctant to proceed boldly. Branch campuses abroad exst, such as the Yale-NUS College in Singapore, but they are usually smaller and less important relative to the home university. Top universities jealousy guard their positions as exclusive institutions, and it would not be easy for Harvard (even pre-Covid-19) to hire faculty of comparable quality in India in most areas of academic study.

一开始，大多数美国顶尖大学都不愿大胆推进这一进程。虽然在国外也有分校，比如新加坡的耶鲁-新加坡国立大学学院，但它们的规模通常较小，地位也不如本国大学重要。顶尖大学守护着自己作为独家机构的地位，对哈佛大学来说(即使是在新冠疫情爆发之前)，要在印度聘请到在大多数学术研究领域具备同等素质的教师并不容易。

Still, some schools in the top 100 would start operations in India. Even if Harvard hesitated, schools such as University of Texas at Austin, Georgia Institute of Technology or perhaps one of the nearby Singaporean schools would not.

不过，一些排名前100的商学院将在印度设立分校。即使哈佛犹豫了，但德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校、乔治亚理工学院或离得较近的新加坡学校不会犹豫。

In my fantasy, the schools that are open to expanding their India operations will rise considerably in reputation. India, and South Asia more generally, is in the midst of a phenomenal explosion of talent in diverse fields. Sundar Pichai runs Alphabet and Google, and Satya Nadella runs Microsoft. Abhijit Banerjee recently won a Nobel Prize in economics. Vishy Anand is one of the world’s top chess players. Indian writers are famous around the world. And so on.

在我看来，那些对扩大印度业务持开放态度的商学院，其声誉将大幅提升。印度，更广泛地说，是南亚，正处于不同领域人才的惊人爆炸式增长之中。桑达尔·皮查伊执掌Alphabet和谷歌，萨蒂亚·纳德拉执掌微软。阿比吉特•班纳吉最近获得了诺贝尔经济学奖。维希·阿南德是世界顶级棋手之一。印度作家在全世界都很有名，等等。

The universities that open significant branches in India thus would become among the very best in the world — not the top 100, but the top 50. India could find itself in a situation much like that of the U.S. in 1900, when most American universities and scholars lagged behind those of Europe but were within decades of overtaking them. Competitive pressures would kick in, and the very top schools that initially were reluctant to enter India would find themselves drawn in.

因此，在印度开设重要分校的大学将跻身世界一流大学之列——不是前100名，而是前50名。印度可能会发现自己的处境很像1900年的美国，当时大多数美国大学和学者都落后于欧洲，但在几十年内就超过了他们。竞争压力会随之而来，那些最初不愿进入印度的顶级商学院会发现自己被吸引了进来。

You might wonder whether India actually needs all of these foreign branches, when it has some superb schools of its own, for instance the various Indian Institutes of Technology. In my fantasy, some Indian institutions of higher education will improve and force some competitors — shall we say UC Berkeley? — to leave the country. Yet many talented Indians will find attending a branch of Harvard or Yale to be an appealing option. Furthermore, the top foreign schools may form alliances with Indian institutions (as Yale has done in Singapore), giving students the best of both worlds.

你可能会想，印度本土有一些一流学校，比如各种各样的印度理工学院，印度真的需要这些外国大学来印度设立分校吗?一些印度高等教育机构将会改进并迫使一些竞争对手离开这个国家，比如举个例子，加州大学伯克利分校?然而，许多有才华的印度人会发现，就读哈佛或耶鲁的分校是一个很有吸引力的选择。此外，顶尖的外国学校可能会与印度的大学结成联盟(就像耶鲁在新加坡所做的那样)，向学生教授两个国家最好的东西。

This future gets better yet. Over time, the population of Indian alumni of prestigious U.S. universities will increase, relative to those who studied and graduated in America. America’s top schools thus will become engines of opportunity. It might also become obvious that the students attending in the U.S. are underperforming their Indian counterparts. What better way to light a competitive fire under the current dominant institutions?

未来会变得更好。随着时间的推移，相对于在美国学习和毕业的印度学生来说，美国著名大学的印度毕业生人数将会增加。因此，美国的顶级学校将成为机会的引擎。在美国就读的学生表现不如在印度就读的学生，这一点也可能变得很明显。在当前占主导地位的机构之下，还有什么更好的方法来点燃竞争之火呢?

And maybe some of the keenest and most ambitious American students will prefer to study in India rather than in America. (Perhaps a “canceled” American student could be sent to Brown Uttar Pradesh?) Wouldn’t you want to study with the very best of your peers, knowing you might be sitting next to the next generation’s Einstein, von Neumann or, of course Ramanujan?

也许一些最热切、最有抱负的美国学生会更喜欢在印度学习，而不是美国。(或许“被取消成绩”的美国学生可以被送到北方邦?)你难道不想和最优秀的同龄人一起学习吗，你可能坐在下一代的爱因斯坦、冯·诺伊曼或者拉马努詹旁边?

Best of all, America’s top schools would learn they could open their doors to many more students, while boosting the reach and prestige of their institutions overall. The success of Princeton Mumbai would lead to a much larger Princeton in New Jersey. After all, if they can admit more qualified students from Kerala, doesn’t it follow that they can also accept more high-achieving kids from suburban Maryland? Or even, say, Detroit?

最重要的是，美国的顶级学校将认识到，他们可以向更多学生敞开大门，同时提升其机构的整体影响力和声望。普林斯顿孟买分校的成功可能会让位于新泽西的普林斯顿大学扩大规模。毕竟，如果他们能从喀拉拉邦录取更多合格的学生，也许他们也能从马里兰州郊区录取更多成绩优异的学生呢?或者甚至是底特律?

As I said, this is all a fantasy. Indian bureaucracy can be frustrating, Indian politics can be forbidding, and many talented faculty still seek to leave India rather than to move there, among other problems. Still, especially considering the implications of a rising India, this future no longer sounds crazy. An Indian expansion could be the best thing to happen to American and British higher education in this century.

正如我所说，这些都是幻想。印度的官僚作风可能令人沮丧，印度的政治可能令人生畏，许多有才华的教师仍然寻求离开印度，而不想去印度，而且还有其他问题。不过，尤其是考虑到印度崛起的影响，这种对未来的幻想听起来不再疯狂。在印度“扩张”可能是本世纪美国和英国高等教育最好的发展方向。。

印度经济时报读者的评论：

译文来源：三泰虎     http://www.santaihu.com/p/50572.html 译者：Jessica.Wu

Jaivardhan Sharma

HIgher education is not a challenge but good to talk as it attract attention easily. We need more of good ITI skilled labors MBA's,Engineers etc fancy stuff will not solve India mass population employement problem.Nor they will help industry to have right talent.

高等教育不是一个挑战，但很适合讨论，因为它很容易吸引注意力。我们需要更多优秀的IT熟练工。MBA、工程等花哨的专业无法解决印度大量人口的就业问题，也无法帮助企业找到合适的人才。

Kirin M

Foreign universities will grant Indians foreign degrees which are needed to open up jobs working for all the companies in the world. German and Japanese universities can also come to India.

外国大学将授予印度人外国文凭，这样可以为世界各地的公司输送人才。德国和日本的大学也可以来印度办分校。

Shri

BEST IS FULL COMPETITION. INVITE ALL GLOBAL UNIVERSITIES. WE WILL GET BEST EDUCATION IN ENTIRE WORLD.

竞争激烈是做好的。邀请全球所有大学到印度办学。我们将获得全世界最优质的教育。

SM

brand names and quality of education do not always go together. Folks go to US , only because of the potential high salaries which when converted to Indian salaries is high. Outsourcing happens due to the cost of labour involved not due to lack of quality candidates back in US

学校品牌和教育质量并不总是相匹配的。人们去美国，只是因为美国工资高。聘用外国人是考虑到劳动力成本，而不是因为美国缺乏优质人才

Chandresh

I would Say In India places like kutch ,Rajasthan,Etc must be made education zones where all foreign universities must be opened and let students from abroad to come there

把印度的库奇、拉贾斯坦等地建设为教育区，吸引所有外国大学开分校，让外国学生来印度学习

Ramana Gove

Needless to say the two major economies US and are virtually enjoying a global monopoly because of their indelible foot prints in science and technology.The fact that majority of Nobel Prize winners in various fields are from US, speaks of the way the nation has shaped it self and reaped from thrust on research.It is only through development in science and technology the nation can hope to aim high !

无需多言，美国和这两个主要经济体实际上正享有全球垄断，因为它们在科技领域留下了不可磨灭的足迹。各个领域的大多数诺贝尔奖得主都来自美国，这一事实说明了美国是如何塑造自己的，以及如何从不断推进的研究中获益的。只有通过发展科学技术，国家才有希望志存高远!

Indian

Can Karachi become California? And Lahore become London? Few days back one American citizen was shot dead in court for blasphemy by his accusers and the Judge said good. Every year hundreds of Hindus and Christians are imprisoned for blasphemy in Pakistan. Many are killed without trial.

卡拉奇能成为加州吗?

拉合尔能变成伦敦吗?

几天前，一名美国公民在法庭上因亵渎神明被指控者开枪打死，法官还叫好的。

在巴基斯坦，每年都有数百名印度教徒和基督徒因亵渎神明而被监禁，许多人未经审判就被杀害。

Raj Tillan

if they have to work under ABVP and NSUI god alone knows how long they will last

如果这些学生必须接受右翼组织“全印学生委员会”(ABVP)和“印度全国学生联合会”(NSUI)的领导，天知道他们能坚持多久。

Sasi Kumar

Perhaps you might not know; what is a student's life under SFI (Students Federation of India) and SIO (students Islamic Organization) who even possess torture rooms in Kerala colleges!

也许你不知道，在SFI(印度学生联合会)和SIO的领导下，学生的生活是怎样的?在喀拉拉邦的大学里他们甚至设有刑讯室!

mickky

India has to work on so many fronts, it is dire need of the time,but first and foremost we have to raise the bar in all the aspect, rather it is education or discipline, or cleanliness or law and order, list goes on......

印度需要在很多方面努力，这是当务之急，但首先我们必须提高各方面的标准，教育、纪律、清洁、法秩，等等

anu

Nonsense article.

胡说八道的文章。

Raj Tillan

Ahmedabad will have campus of MIT I hope

我希望麻省理工学院在艾哈迈达巴德设立分校

Praker

As long as Indian currency get devalued, people will go out.. and Indian will remain slave to foreign countries.. end up working for other countries for money... it is happening since 1947... ultra rich, politicians and business class will keep money abroad to prevent devaluation and they use it for education of children...

只要印度卢比贬值，人们就会去国外。印度人将继续充当外国人的奴隶，在其他国家打工挣钱，这从1947年就开始了…超级富豪、政客和商界人士将把钱留在国外以防止货币贬值，他们将这些钱用于子女教育……

Gaurashtra Official

Nice to hear!

喜闻乐见！

Harshavardhan Donthi

Author's fantasy.

这是作者的幻想。

Niket Jakhotiya

Success of institution argely depends on what it can offer post completion of program. In major cases - jobs. The article completely ignore this aspect and projects a Utopian world. No point of these fantasies until the job market is improved in India.

一个学校的成功在很大程度上取决于课程结束后它能为学生提供什么-主要是工作。这篇文章完全忽略了这一方面，而想象了一个乌托邦世界。在印度就业市场改善之前，这些幻想都没有意义。