I found this article written by a woman who successfully applied to Harvard seven years ago. I post it here for a few reasons: first of all, I think it is an interesting window into the mind of American high school students applying to college. Secondly, it has an interesting (and humorous) perspective on the admissions process. Here’s a taste:

The perfect Harvard applicant must possess myriad traits that would, to the untrained eye, appear to be polar opposites. They must be at once intellectual and down-to-earth, confident and humble, outgoing and reclusive, athletic and artistic, literary and scientific.

They must be, simultaneously, a bold leader and an easygoing follower. They must consume gossip mags and classic novels with equal ferocity. They must enjoy spending countless hours holed up in the library–if and only if they spend the same number of hours at a sweaty dorm party afterward in order to forget what they studied.

They must be equally comfortable dining in evening wear at a Michelin three-star French restaurant and wolfing down Oreos and peanut butter as they sit, pajama-clad, on a lumpy and off-kilter futon mattress.

In other words, they must be superhuman.

My roommates and I teased each other mercilessly every time (and there were many, many times) that we failed to live up to this paradigm of utter perfection. It was a running joke to label yourself “the admissions mistake” if you fell short in any area, whether it was the classroom, on the intramural playing field, in the newsroom of the college newspaper or in a romantic relationship.

Discussions of why U.S. universities are so keenly interested in foreign students tend to focus on the educational benefits of creating an “international” campus. In some disciplines and at some levels, however, the interest is much simpler to express: foreign students are the ones going to school.

“. . . [a]ccording to a report from the Engineering Workforce Commission of the American Association of Engineering Societies . . . 51 percent of the students in masters programs in [electrical engineering] in U.S. universities were foreign nationals last year. Only 49 percent come from the states.”

I imagine other disciplines are experiencing the same drop in U.S. students. It’s hard to tell whether this is the result of U.S. students losing interest in particular fields, or the higher quality of international students making it harder for U.S. students to get into E.E. programs. Either way, it’s another reason why U.S. universities are increasingly interested in international students . . . and that’s good news.

Many individuals interested in pursuing higher education quickly run into a number of difficulties. It’s sometimes difficult to get into the university you want to attend. You may have other responsibilities that complicate your educational plans. And then, of course, there’s the issue of cost – university education is expensive to begin with, and seems to be getting more expensive all the time (especially in the U.S.).

So it’s a natural question – is a higher education worth it? Or would we be better off shelving our hopes for higher degrees and go on with our lives?

Answering that question obviously depends on your individual values and how you understand the word, “worth.” But to take a brutally simplistic criteria – salary – there is strong evidence from a number of sources that higher education is indeed worth all the fuss. As an example, here are some of the conclusions of one particular study that considered the value of higher education in the state of Arizona:

• “Individual earnings are strongly related to educational attainment.”
• “Average annual earnings of individuals with a bachelor’s degree are more than 75 percent higher than the earnings of individuals whose maximum educational attainment is a high school diploma.”
• “The benefits to an individual from a university education vary with the quality of the institution attended.”
• “. . . [T]he benefits of a college education are seen to be more than three times as large as the costs.“
• “If the value of a college education is expressed on the same basis as the return on a financial investment, the net return is on the order of 12 percent per year, over and above inflation. This compares favorably with annual returns on stocks that historically have averaged 7 percent.”

Obviously this report and its conclusions focused on one U.S. state, and the differences between Kosovo and Arizona are various. Still, reports like this – or this, or this – suggest that a higher education, at least from a financial perspective, really is worth the significant investment of time and money that it demands.

We have received several variants of the following question in the past few weeks:

The government recently decided that from all the private colleges, only AUK will be accredited and licensed. The University of Prishtina did not go through the process; however, it would be right to say that in Kosova we know have only two licensed universities, UP and AUK.

We don’t know yet what’s going to happen with the other private colleges at this point. Will KAEF accept diplomas from these institutions?

The blog seems like a very good place to post an answer, albeit a partial one. Before I do, it’s worth repeating the standard disclaimer that the following represents only my own personal opinion about how we will treat this issue, and that the official KAEF position may change based upon a number of evolving factors. Having said all of that, let me give you my understanding:

KAEF will provisionally accept all diplomas from all universities. There is no legal relationship between the accrediting body in Kosovo and U.S. accreditation bodies or individual institutions. Just because an accreditation body in Kosovo says a university is or is not accredited, it doesn’t make it so in the eyes of our partner universities. There are “accredited” institutions in some countries, for example, the diplomas of which are viewed as illegitimate here, and vice versa.

Having said that, the question of whether a diploma is valid is ultimately up to our partner institutions. They will ultimately make such decisions after a thorough review of the circumstances. So while we will accept an application and put a candidate through the application process regardless of where they got their diploma, we may not be able to place them at a U.S. university. Additionally, the U.S. Consulate may issue rules restricting J-1 visas to individuals holding an accredited diploma. Both of these factors – university acceptance of Kosovar diplomas, and Consular granting of J-1 visas – are beyond our control.

So when someone calls and asks, “I have a degree from a private university that has not received accreditation – can I apply?” the answer is “Yes, but we need to warn you that we don’t know for sure whether our partners will accept your diploma, because this is the first year we’ve worked under this new system. However, we expect we WILL be able to work with your diploma.”

I would encourage all of you in this situation to apply with cautious optimism.

A new report from the World Bank, entitled “Doing Business in South East Europe 2008,” has some interesting an encouraging data. The report

covers 22 cities from South East Europe which can be compared against each other, and with 178 economies around the world.

The two cities within Kosovo covered by the report are Prishtina and Prizren. In response to the question, “Where is it easiest to do business?” the report replies that Prizren is in 8th place, and Prishtina in 12th. It’s worth reading the report to understand how the authors came to this conclusion. The report includes other indicators, such as ease of starting a business, and ease of obtaining a construction license. It’s available in many different languages and shows that, while Kosovo does of course have a lot of work to do, it has already managed to make remarkable progress in encouraging a business-friendly environment.