Tag: Tree

  • HEPI / Kaplan 2025 Soft-Power Index: Harvard and Oxford top the tree

    HEPI / Kaplan 2025 Soft-Power Index: Harvard and Oxford top the tree

    • The HEPI / Kaplan Soft-Power Index looks at the number of very senior world leaders (monarchs, presidents and prime ministers) who studied at a higher level in another country.
    • Countries that have educated a significant proportion of the world’s most senior leaders are thought to benefit from a boost to their ‘soft power’.
    • The results for the leading two countries, the US and the UK, are broadly comparable to those for recent years but other countries, like France and Germany, fare worse than in past years while Russia and India have improved their position.
    • For the first time, the results are being published according to the institution that world leaders studied at. Harvard University and the University of Oxford lead the pack, with Sandhurst, the University of Cambridge, the LSE and the University of Manchester making up the rest of the top 6.

    When launching the Soft Power Council in early 2025, the UK’s then Foreign Secretary, the Rt Hon. David Lammy MP, said, ‘Soft power is fundamental to the UK’s impact and reputation around the world. I am often struck by the enormous love and respect which our music, sport, education and institutions generate on every continent.’ The HEPI / Kaplan Soft-Power Index offers one way to measure the extent of this soft power.

    In 2025, the United States remains comfortably in first place, as their higher education institutions have educated 66 senior world leaders, which is only slightly lower than the US total for 2024 (68). The UK remains in a comfortable second place, having educated 59 world leaders. France performs less well than in the past but stays in third place, with 23 leaders.

    The Index is based on a snapshot of world leaders for early August 2025. Changes since then are not reflected in the data. The Index should not be regarded as the only way to measure soft power and should be used alongside other sources of information.

    Since the Soft-Power Index was launched in 2017, 81 (42%) of the countries in the world have had at least one very senior leader educated at a higher level in the UK. The Index is regularly quoted by UK Government Ministers – for example, last year’s results featured in this week’s Post-16 Education and Skills white paper.

    World leaders educated in countries other than their own

    For the first time this year, the results are also being published according to the institution that the leaders attended, with Harvard (15) and Oxford (12) topping the tree.

    Harvard alone has educated more senior world leaders than all higher education institutions in Russia (13). Harvard has also educated more senior world leaders than Italy (5), Spain (5) and Germany (4) combined.

    Key findings

    • The strong performance of the United States represents the country’s second best ever total (equal with 2022 but slightly down on 2024).
    • In terms of absolute score, the United Kingdom matches the best it has done since the Index began in 2017 (59), equalising the record that was also hit in 2019 and 2021.
    • France fares worse than in the past, with a big drop-off of 17 since 2019 from 40 to 23, but retains third place.
    • Russia posts its best performance, with 13 world leaders educated there, beating its previous high of 11 in 2022.
    • Australia (9, +2) remains in fifth place, while Switzerland is in sixth place (7, +1).
    • India scores its best ever performance. In 2022, only two serving very senior leaders had been educated to a higher level in India; in 2025, five had been – this is the same total as for Spain and also Italy.
    • Germany drops out of the top 10 for the first time, having educated just four serving world leaders, the same number as Canada, Germany, Morocco, the Netherlands and South Africa – and the same number as for the LSE alone.
    • The higher education institution that has educated the most current world leaders while they were international students is Harvard University (15), closely followed by the University of Oxford (13).
    • Five of the six best-performing institutions are situated in the UK, meaning world leaders educated in the UK tend to have been concentrated in a smaller number of institutions. While Harvard is the only US institution to have educated more than three serving world leaders, the UK has five institutions that have educated more than three: Oxford (13); Sandhurst (8); Manchester (6); Cambridge (5); and the LSE (4).

    Institutions attended by very senior world leaders

    Ranking Higher education institution Number of world leaders
    1 Harvard 15
    2 Oxford 12
    3 Sandhurst 8
    4 Manchester 6
    5 Cambridge 5
    6 LSE 4
    7= Boston 3
    7= Bristol 3
    7= George Washington 3
    7= New York 3
    7= Pennsylvania 3
    7= UCL 3
    7= US Army Command and Staff College 3

    The 15 world leaders educated at Harvard are: i) the Prime Minister of Bhutan (Tshering Tobgay); ii) the President of Botswana (Duma Boko); iii) the Prime Minister of Canada (Mark Carney); iv) the King of Denmark (Frederik X); v) the President of Ecuador (Daniel Noboa); vi) the Prime Minister of Greece (Kyriakos Mitsotakis); vii) the Prime Minister of Israel (Benjamin Netanyahu); viii) the Prime Minister of Jordan (Jafar Hassan); ix) the Prime Minister of Lebanon (Nawaf Salam); x) the Prime Minister of Luxembourg (Luc Frieden); xi) the President of Moldova (Maia Sandu); xii) the Chief Minister of Sierra Leone (David Moinina Sengeh); xiii) the President of Singapore (Tharman Shanmugaratnam); xiv) the Prime Minister of Singapore (Lawrence Wong); and xv) the Prime Minister of South Korea (Kim Min-seok).

    The 12 world leaders educated at the University of Oxford are: i) the King of Belgium (Philippe); ii) the King of Bhutan (Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck); iii) the Prime Minister of Canada (Mark Carney); iv) the President of East Timor (José Ramos-Horta); v) the Prime Minister of Hungary (Viktor Orbán); vi) the Emperor of Japan (Naruhito); vii) the King of Jordan (Abdullah II); viii) the President of Montenegro (Jakov Milatović); ix) the King of Norway (Harald V); x) the Sultan and Prime Minister of Oman (Haitham bin Tariq); xi) the President of the Philippines (Bongbong Marcos); and xii) the Prime Minister of the Solomon Islands (Jeremiah Manele). 

    Nick Hillman OBE, the Director of HEPI, said:

    International students bring enormous benefits to the UK. They all spend money while they are here and some then contribute to the UK labour market after studying. The diplomatic benefits are less well understood even though they can be equally important. In 2025, over a quarter of the countries around the world have a very senior leader educated in the UK, which amounts to tremendous soft power.

    The current UK Government have established a Soft Power Council and promised a new education exports strategy. These are welcome, but they are counterbalanced by the incoming levy on international students, huge dollops of negative rhetoric and excessive visa costs.

    Recent new obstacles standing in the way of people wanting to study in Australia, Canada and the United States provide an opportunity for the UK to steal a march on our main competitors. We are at risk of squandering this opportunity.

    Linda Cowan, Managing Director of Kaplan International Pathways, said:

    It is fantastic to see how many of our best known universities are educating foreign leaders. This year’s list also highlights the growing diversity and range of institutions contributing to the UK’s soft power, including Cranfield, Leicester, Liverpool and Westminster.

    Another trend to watch is the expansion of transnational campuses of British universities abroad, such as in India and the UAE. These initiatives have the potential to further enhance the UK’s soft power by extending the reach of our higher education sector beyond students coming to the UK – a development to watch going forward.

    Professor Irene Tracey, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, said:

    That so many world leaders have studied at Oxford speaks to the transformative power of education — to shape ideas, deepen understanding, and inspire service on the global stage.

    Professor Duncan Ivison, the President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Manchester, said:

    If soft power is fundamental to the UK’s impact and reputation around the world, then so too are the UK’s outstanding universities.

    The HEPI / Kaplan Soft-Power Index makes clear just how important international students are to the UK’s global influence – both now and into the future. Extraordinary future leaders get their start at many of our universities and retain a deep affection for our country long after. And yet the Government is, at the same time, putting up obstacles to welcoming future international students to the UK with a proposed international levy, higher visa costs and reducing the graduate visa route.

    We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to make the UK the global destination for the best and the brightest in the world given what is happening elsewhere – and especially in the US and Canada. Let’s not blow it.

    The 59 leaders educated in the UK lead 55 countries (as a small number of places – Bahrain, Luxembourg, Namibia and the United Arab Emirates have two very senior leaders educated in the UK). Changes affecting the UK list for 2025 are outlined in the table below. They include:

    • The Rt Hon. Mark Carney, the Prime Minister of Canada since early 2025, studied Economics at the University of Oxford.
    • Taye Atske Selassie, the President of Ethiopia since late 2024, studied International Relations and Strategic Studies at Lancaster University.
    • The President, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, and Prime Minister, Elijah Ngurare, of Namibia, who have both been in post since early 2025, studied in the UK – the Namibian President studied at Glasgow Caledonian University as well as Keele University and the Prime Minister studied at University of Dundee.
    • The Prime Minister of Rwanda since July 2025, Justin Nsengiyumva, studied Economics at the University of Leicester. 
    • The Prime Minister of Sri Lanka since autumn 2024, Harini Amarasuriya, studied Social Anthropology at the University of Edinburgh.

    Click here to download a table showing all the countries with at least one senior leader educated in the UK for the whole period from 2017 to 2025.

    The 66 world leaders from 58 countries educated in the United States head the following countries:

    Bahrain (2); Bangladesh; Belgium; Belize; Bhutan (2); Botswana; Bulgaria; Cambodia; Canada; Costa Rica; Denmark; Dominica; Dominican Republic; East Timor; Ecuador; Egypt; Finland; Greece; Guinea-Bissau; Guyana; Haiti (2); Iceland (2); Ireland; Israel (2); Ivory Coast; Jordan (2); Kuwait; Latvia; Lebanon; Liberia; Luxembourg; Malawi; Malaysia; Marshall Islands; Micronesia; Moldova; Monaco; Montenegro; Namibia; Nigeria; Palau; Palestine; Panama; Paraguay; Philippines; Rwanda; Saint Kitts and Nevis; Sierra Leone (2); Singapore (2); Slovenia; Somalia; South Korea; Spain; Sudan; Switzerland; Togo; Tonga; and Vatican City.

    Notes for Editors

    1. Leaders are defined as heads of state and heads of government (monarchs, presidents and prime ministers). Countries often have more than one (such as a president or monarch and a prime minister).

    2. Countries are included if they are members of, or observers at, the United Nations, currently numbering 195 places. Palestine is therefore included but Northern Cyprus, for example, is not.

    3. The HEPI / Kaplan Soft-Power Index is a measure of tertiary education. This is defined broadly but distance learning and transnational education are excluded for the soft-power benefits are thought to be less.

    4. Leaders change throughout the year, so we provide a snapshot for August 2025. For example, the fieldwork was undertaken prior to the recent change of leadership in Thailand.

    5. Each country is treated equally and we do not claim each individual result provides good evidence of positive soft power. No one is excluded on moral grounds. 

    6. Some people are educated in more than one other country and they can therefore count towards the totals for more than one country.

    7. While we use multiple sources to obtain information, the educational background of some national leaders is opaque. HEPI welcomes feedback that would enable us to build up a more complete picture.

    8. When new information comes to light, we update the figures. So there are some slight differences in the figures provided here for earlier years compared with what we have published in the past. For example, in the preparation of the 2025 numbers, we found new information that reduced the recent past total for the US (as we discovered two leaders were distance learners rather than in-person learners).

    9. King Charles III’s higher education was delivered in the UK (at the University of Cambridge), the country where he was born and lives, and he is head of state of other countries in part by virtue of his position in the UK. So we have opted to exclude this information. This matches how we treat the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, who is one of the heads of state (Co-Prince) of Andorra.

    10. The University of the West Indies (UWI) serves 18 countries and territories in the Caribbean. Attempting to unpick the place of study for those world leaders who studied at the UWI is beyond the scope of this study. Therefore, we have assumed that each one studied in their home nation. This is the same practice as followed in earlier years.

    Source link

  • Black Student Found Hanging From Tree at Delta State

    Black Student Found Hanging From Tree at Delta State

    Demartravion “Trey” Reed was a 21-year-old student at the Mississippi institution.

    Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images

    Delta State University has been rocked by the discovery of a Black student’s body hanging from a tree in the middle of campus on Monday.

    Demartravion “Trey” Reed was a 21-year-old student at the Mississippi institution. Recalling a long, painful history of lynchings, his death has spurred an outpouring of grief and anger across the country.

    The Bolivar County Coroner’s Office said on Monday that a preliminary examination of Reed’s body showed no evidence of foul play, including “any lacerations, contusions, compound fractures, broken bones or injuries consistent with an assault.”

    But Reed’s family members are calling for their own investigation, including an independent autopsy, and have demanded access to video footage that might reveal more details of his death.

    “From the beginning, the family has been seeking transparency in this investigation,” Vanessa J. Jones, an attorney representing the family, told Inside Higher Ed. “Especially after a tragic incident like this occurs, and you’re dealing with a state that has a past history which includes a painful history of racial violence … transparency is paramount.”

    The Reed family’s distrust in the handling of the student’s death was deepened when officials allowed his mother to view her son’s body from the neck up only, Jones said.

    Officers also shared conflicting details of Reed’s death when they first spoke to his family, Jones said. According to Jones, the Grenada County Sheriff’s Department went to Reed’s grandfather’s home on Monday and said Reed was found dead in his dorm room “from an apparent suicide.”

    Prominent civil rights attorney Ben Crump has taken on the family’s case and said in a post on X that he will lead a team of civil rights leaders and organizers in “pursuing transparency for Trey’s family.”

    “We cannot accept vague conclusions when so many questions remain,” he wrote. Crump described Reed as a “young man full of promise and warmth, deeply loved and respected by all who knew him.”

    Lawmakers are also demanding more information.

    “We’ll never have true justice for Trey, because that would mean he would still be with us—but there must be answers,” Massachusetts representative Ayanna Pressley wrote on X.

    Mississippi representative Bennie G. Thompson called for a federal investigation into Reed’s death.

    “It is always a tragedy when a young life is cut short,” Thompson said in a statement. “We must leave no stone unturned in the search for answers. While the details of this case are still emerging, we cannot ignore Mississippi’s painful history of lynching and racial violence against African Americans.”

    Updates From the University

    At a press conference Wednesday, Delta State University president Daniel J. Ennis said Reed’s loss was “devastating” and “the manner of how Trey was discovered has stirred many emotions in this community and many emotions around the state and the nation.”

    Ennis reiterated the coroner’s early conclusions but said he recognized the psychological impact of Reed’s death. “This is not only about facts,” Ennis said. “It’s about emotions and it’s about feelings and the way this loss and how it was discovered affects people’s lives.”

    Ennis, who is white, said he acknowledged his weakness in not being “adequate to speak to the imagery that this incident raises.”

    Delta State serves roughly 2,800 students, about 40 percent of whom are Black. Ennis said the campus has been receiving threatening phone calls and messages since Reed’s death.

    “I can say that my heartbreak is comprehensive, not just for Trey—although it is primarily for Trey—but for the fact that the rest of the world has an impression of Delta State that is so at odds with what I know to be this institution,” which is “the joy and the grace of people living and working together and respecting each other,” he said.

    Mike Peeler, Delta State University chief of police, told the press that Reed’s body was transported to the Mississippi State Medical Examiner’s Office for a full autopsy on Wednesday morning. Authorities expect preliminary autopsy results within 24 to 48 hours. He said DSU Police, the Cleveland Police Department, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation and the Bolivar County Sheriff’s Office planned to update the public on the findings after first meeting with Reed’s next of kin.

    He told reporters law enforcement officials were reviewing relevant video, but he couldn’t offer any more details. Peeler also said he had no information about Reed’s family being told his death took place in his dorm room.

    He emphasized during the press conference that “this is an isolated incident” and “there are currently no active threats to the campus,” which “remains a safe environment for students, faculty and staff.”

    ‘Heartbroken’ Students

    Nonetheless, the grisly incident has frightened Black students on campus.

    “Hearing that happened to another Black student, it really makes me feel unsafe,” a Delta State student, Stacie Hoskins, told WAPT16.

    The nature of Reed’s death has had an emotional impact on Black students on other campuses as well; some treated it as a foregone conclusion that Reed was killed and issued statements of support to fellow students.

    The Black Student Union at Illinois State University directed students to campus counseling resources, and its executive board said it was “heartbroken by the tragic loss of Trey Reed, whose life was cut short by a horrific act of violence.”

    North Carolina A&T University’s NAACP chapter posted on Instagram that Reed “could have been any of us. Any Black student. Any campus.”

    “Our education is under attack. Our sanity is under attack. Our very existence is under attack,” the chapter said. “We refuse to stay silent. Black lives matter. Black students matter. Always.”



    Source link

  • Dollar Tree and the Rising Cost of Survival

    Dollar Tree and the Rising Cost of Survival

    While Wall Street celebrates record highs, Main Street grapples with rising costs that strain household budgets. Dollar Tree, once synonymous with affordability, has seen its pricing structure evolve significantly. In 2021, the company increased its baseline price from $1 to $1.25, and by 2025, introduced items priced up to $10 in select stores.

    For residents in food deserts—areas with limited access to affordable and nutritious food—stores like Dollar Tree serve as essential sources for groceries. However, these stores often stock predominantly ultra-processed foods, contributing to dietary challenges. A study by Tufts, Harvard, and the USDA found that while dollar store food purchases scored low on the Healthy Eating Index, households shopping there didn’t significantly differ in overall diet quality from those shopping primarily at grocery stores.

    The expansion of dollar stores in low-income communities has been linked to exacerbating food insecurity. These stores often lack fresh produce and healthy staples, leading to diets high in processed foods. Research indicates that small food retailers are less likely than supermarkets to sell healthy staple foods, further entrenching food insecurity in these areas.

    Despite the financial gains reflected in the stock market, the affordability gap widens for working-class families. Economic gains at the top do not trickle down to the communities that need them most. As investment portfolios swell, the affordability gap grows, and the promise of basic necessities remains increasingly out of reach. For working-class families and those living in under-resourced neighborhoods, the soaring market feels less like a sign of prosperity and more like a reminder of growing inequality.

    In addition to rising costs, recent changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) are further impacting low-income households. A new law backed by the Trump administration and signed in July 2025 is set to reduce SNAP benefits for 2.4 million Americans by expanding work requirements to additional groups, including parents of children aged 14 and up, adults aged 55–64, veterans, former foster youth, and homeless individuals. The legislation requires these groups to work, volunteer, or participate in job training for at least 80 hours per month to qualify. This expansion is expected to shift more costs to states and redistribute resources, increasing income for middle- and high-income households while reducing benefits for low-income households.

    The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) notes that people in food-insecure households spend roughly 45% more on medical care annually than those in food-secure households. SNAP participation has been linked to improved health outcomes and reduced healthcare costs. For instance, early access to SNAP among pregnant mothers and in early childhood improved birth outcomes and long-term health as adults. Elderly SNAP participants are less likely than similar non-participants to forgo their full prescribed dosage of medicine due to cost.

    The reduction or loss of SNAP benefits can lead to increased food insecurity and poorer health outcomes. A study published in Health Affairs found that the loss of SNAP benefits was associated with food insecurity and poor health in working families with young children. The study indicated that reduced benefits were associated with greater odds of fair or poor caregiver and child health.

    As the affordability gap widens and access to essential resources becomes more challenging, the combination of rising costs and reduced support systems underscores the growing inequality faced by working-class families and communities in need.

    Sources:

    Source link