The rapid expansion of universities in the Arab region has brought challenges for higher education quality. Part of the challenge is down to the significant increase in the number of private institutions in the region. Concerns about quality focus a great deal on how to regulate private institutions and creating robust systems for ensuring quality and compliance with national frameworks.

PASCAL subscribers may be interested in a recent series on 'Overstretched Cities' published by the Guardian newspaper in the UK. The series looks at cities across every continent. One of the blogs includes a short profile on Kigali one of the case study cities within the GCRF Centre for Sustainable Healthy Learning Cities and Neighbourhoods of which I'm Senior Business Manager.