Times Higher Education (THE) has just announced the latest edition of its Asian rankings. Since the indicators are the same as the world rankings with adjusted weightings there was absolutely no suspense about who would be top. In case anybody still doesn't know it was the National University of Singapore.
The really interesting part of the rankings is the citations indicator, field- and year-normalised, based on Scopus, with fractional counting only for papers with more than 1,000 authors.
Here are some of the superstars of Asian research. On the left is the citations rank and the score for citations. On the right in brackets is the score for Research comprising research reputation, publications per faculty, and research income. To achieve a score in the seventies, eighties or nineties for citations with minimal research reputation, very few publications and limited funding is remarkable.
1st. 99.1. Babol Noshirvani University of Technology (15.3)
2nd. 92.0 King Abdulaziz University (92.3)
3rd. 93.1. Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (37.8)
7th. 81.2. Quaid-i-Azam University (1.3)
13th. 74.5. Fujita Health University (9.4)
16th.72.5. Central China Normal University (11.3)
Tuesday, February 06, 2018
Free speech rankings from Spiked
The magazine Spiked is descended from Living Marxism although some think it is now more libertarian than socialist. It has just published the latest edition of its free speech university rankings.
These are not actually rankings but a classification or a rating, since they just divide UK universities into three groups. They have been subjected to mockery from sections of the academic blogosphere, including WONKHE, that might be justified on technical grounds. This is, however, such an important topic that any sort of publicity has to be welcomed.
Universities are divided into three categories:
RED; "A students’ union, university or institution that is hostile to free speech and free expression, mandating explicit restrictions on speech, including, but not limited to, bans on specific ideologies, political affiliations, beliefs, books, speakers or words."
AMBER; "A students’ union, university or institution that chills free speech and free expression through restricting vague and subjective types of speech, such as ‘offensive’ or ‘insulting’ speech, or requiring burdensome vetting procedures for events, speakers, posters or publications. Many policies in this category might not explicitly limit speech, but have the potential to be used to that end, due to purposefully vague or careless wording."
GREEN; "A students’ union, university or institution that, as far as we are aware, places no significant restrictions on free speech and expression – other than where such speech or expression is unlawful."
The roll of honour in the green category includes exactly seven universities, none of them in the Russell Group: Anglia Ruskin, Buckingham, Hertfordshire, Robert Gordon, Trinity St David, West of Scotland, and Winchester.
These are not actually rankings but a classification or a rating, since they just divide UK universities into three groups. They have been subjected to mockery from sections of the academic blogosphere, including WONKHE, that might be justified on technical grounds. This is, however, such an important topic that any sort of publicity has to be welcomed.
Universities are divided into three categories:
RED; "A students’ union, university or institution that is hostile to free speech and free expression, mandating explicit restrictions on speech, including, but not limited to, bans on specific ideologies, political affiliations, beliefs, books, speakers or words."
AMBER; "A students’ union, university or institution that chills free speech and free expression through restricting vague and subjective types of speech, such as ‘offensive’ or ‘insulting’ speech, or requiring burdensome vetting procedures for events, speakers, posters or publications. Many policies in this category might not explicitly limit speech, but have the potential to be used to that end, due to purposefully vague or careless wording."
GREEN; "A students’ union, university or institution that, as far as we are aware, places no significant restrictions on free speech and expression – other than where such speech or expression is unlawful."
The roll of honour in the green category includes exactly seven universities, none of them in the Russell Group: Anglia Ruskin, Buckingham, Hertfordshire, Robert Gordon, Trinity St David, West of Scotland, and Winchester.
Interesting data from Webometrics
The Webometrics rankings perform the invaluable function of ranking 27,000 plus universities or entities claiming to be universities around the world. Also, their Excellence indicator identifies those institutions, 5,776 this year, with any claim to involvement in research.
Consequently, it has often been used in unofficial national rankings in countries, especially in Africa, where very few places can make it into the top 500 or 1,000 universities included in the better known international rankings.
However, there seems to be a universal law that when a ranking becomes significant it will have unintended and perverse consequences. In the UK we have seen massive inflation in the number of first and upper second class degrees partly because this is a n element in popular national rankings. Sophisticated campaigns can also produce significant gains in the QS academic opinion survey which has a 40% weighting and a few hundred strategic citations can boost the most unlikely universities in the research impact indicator of THE world and regional rankings.
Webometrics also has indicator that seems to be susceptible to bad practices. This is "Presence", the number of pages in the main webdomain including subdomains and file types such as rich files, with a 5% weighting. Apparently this can be easily manipulated. Unlike other rankings, Webometrics does not attempt to ignore this but has highlighted it in several recent tweets, which is helpful since it indicates who might be manipulating the variable. It is possible that there might have been a misunderstanding of the Webometrics guidelines, an error somewhere, or perhaps some totally valid and innocent explanation. If the latter is the case iIwill be happy to publish a statement.
Here is a selection of universities with their world rank in the Webometrics Presence indicator. The overall rank is in brackets.
4. University of Nairobi, Kenya (874)
5. Masaryk University in Brno, Czechia (433)
9. Federal university of Santa Catarina, Brazil (439)
15. Charles University in Prague (203)
17. University of Costa Rica (885)
20. University of the West Indies St Augustine (1792)
32. National University of Honduras (3777)
40. Mahidol University, Thailand (548)
55. Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Indonesia (6394)
Consequently, it has often been used in unofficial national rankings in countries, especially in Africa, where very few places can make it into the top 500 or 1,000 universities included in the better known international rankings.
However, there seems to be a universal law that when a ranking becomes significant it will have unintended and perverse consequences. In the UK we have seen massive inflation in the number of first and upper second class degrees partly because this is a n element in popular national rankings. Sophisticated campaigns can also produce significant gains in the QS academic opinion survey which has a 40% weighting and a few hundred strategic citations can boost the most unlikely universities in the research impact indicator of THE world and regional rankings.
Webometrics also has indicator that seems to be susceptible to bad practices. This is "Presence", the number of pages in the main webdomain including subdomains and file types such as rich files, with a 5% weighting. Apparently this can be easily manipulated. Unlike other rankings, Webometrics does not attempt to ignore this but has highlighted it in several recent tweets, which is helpful since it indicates who might be manipulating the variable. It is possible that there might have been a misunderstanding of the Webometrics guidelines, an error somewhere, or perhaps some totally valid and innocent explanation. If the latter is the case iIwill be happy to publish a statement.
Here is a selection of universities with their world rank in the Webometrics Presence indicator. The overall rank is in brackets.
4. University of Nairobi, Kenya (874)
5. Masaryk University in Brno, Czechia (433)
9. Federal university of Santa Catarina, Brazil (439)
15. Charles University in Prague (203)
17. University of Costa Rica (885)
20. University of the West Indies St Augustine (1792)
32. National University of Honduras (3777)
40. Mahidol University, Thailand (548)
55. Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Indonesia (6394)
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