United Nations U Seeks to Make Grade as Real College

If you’ve never heard of the United Nations University, don’t feel bad. The institution, or, really, network of institutions, is more of a think tank: Spread across 13 academies around the world, it researches matters important to the global village. Now, the institution's new rector Konrad Osterwalder seeks to develop the UNU even further—into a global, degree-awarding university, reports Der Spiegel

His plan is bold: He sees the current UNU network accepting students and providing them with the same quality degree whether they attend the UNU in Helsinki or Macau. Eventually, he hopes to challenge the knowledge gap between rich and poor countries by having each UNU branch create a “twin university” in a developing country. (More United Nations stories.)