What’s your university’s reputation in the world? -By Niyi Akinnaso

Niyi Akinnaso

At least, in the conception of Times Higher Education, a university’s academic reputation or prestige in the world is the esteem or standing in which it is held in the areas of teaching and research by the global community of experienced university teachers and researchers.

The world reputation rankings of universities, now in its seventh year, should be distinguished from the world rankings of universities, which assessed universities across 13 performance indicators, focusing on the core missions of teaching, research, knowledge transfer, and international outlook (see, “What’s your university’s rank in the world?”, The PUNCH, December 13, 2016).

The 2017 reputation rankings, released recently, are based on 10,566 responses from 137 countries by over 10,000 experienced, published scholars, who offered their views on excellence in research and teaching in their disciplines. The scholars were asked to name no more than 15 universities that they believe are the best in research and teaching, based on their experience and professional networks. The data were then analysed, university by university, as well as country by country. The results are then used to rank the top 100 reputable universities.

The results show that the most reputable university in the world is Harvard University. It is followed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford University in second and third places, respectively. Oxford and Cambridge tied for fourth place, while the University of California at Berkeley came sixth. Rounding up the top 10 are Princeton, Yale, University of Chicago, and California Institute of Technology in that order.

On the whole, 42 American universities made the top 100, followed by the United Kingdom (10); Germany (6); China (6); Japan (6); The Netherlands (4); Australia, Canada, France, Hong Kong, South Korea, and Switzerland, each with three universities; Singapore and Sweden, each with two; and one each for Belgium, Brazil, Denmark, Russian Federation, and Taiwan. Needless to say, no Nigerian or even African university made the cut.

There are several notable features of the 2017 world reputation rankings of universities. I offer below a brief discussion of those features and discuss their implications for university education in Nigeria, especially in the light of the proposed ministerial retreat on the fallen standard of education in the country.

First, the 2017 reputation rankings show that top academics now consider leading Asian universities to be more prestigious than many distinguished Western institutions. For example, two Chinese universities, Tsinghua University and Peking University have overtaken leading American and British universities, including Imperial College, University of Pennsylvania, and Cornell University. Tsinghua came in as the 14th most prestigious university in the world, while Peking climbed to 17th.

Second, the two Chinese universities attained their new status as a result of China’s determination to develop world-class universities through various excellence initiatives since the 1980s. These include improved research infrastructure, especially in “big science” and a newly developed tenure system, which both pulled and pushed academics to develop a “publish or perish” culture as in the West. Thus, going by citations in the areas of mathematics and complex computing, Tsinghua is now number one in the world, ahead of MIT, and it is fourth in physical sciences and engineering.

Third, it is important to emphasise that excellence initiatives alone cannot make a university become world-class. Adequate and regular funding is critical to achieving world-class status. Asian universities are rising on the ranking tables because they are well-funded, some now even better than some leading brands in the West. Theirs is targeted funding, however. While all their programmes are generally well-funded, priority funding is targeted at STEM education; that is Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics programmes. These are the areas in which they excel today.

Fourth, as Socrates noted centuries ago, “The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavour to be what you desire to appear.” The top 10 prestigious universities, now being emulated by top Asian universities, are excellent brands, which have maintained their brand by reproducing the same tradition of excellence year after year. I studied in one of them and networked with professors and students in the others. I also have visited all 10 campuses for teaching, seminars or conferences. What is old about these institutions is their age, not their infrastructure and facilities. Rather than deteriorate like those in Nigerian premier universities, they improve and become cutting-edge, and their curricular offerings improve accordingly.

Fifth, the prestigious universities are driven by purposeful and accountable leadership; outstanding teachers, staff, and students; dedicated alumni; and a Governing Council that assists the university management in achieving the university’s mission and in maintaining its brand. According to Phil Baty, Editorial Director of Global Rankings, “a university’s brand and reputation are highly influential in attracting talent – among both students and staff – and can influence philanthropy and investment. In many respects, reputation is the currency of global higher education”.

It was partly in defence of its brand that Harvard rescinded its offer of admission to at least 10 candidates for sharing sexually explicit and offensive images in a private Facebook group. Part of its brand maintenance is the admission of only 5.2 per cent of applicants, that is, 2,056 prospective students from nearly 40,000 applications.

The implications of the reputation ranking for Nigerian universities cannot be over-emphasised, not simply because they did not feature in the ranking, but because most of our public universities have drifted far from their mission due to poor funding, inadequate infrastructure and outdated facilities, poor and corrupt management, compromised governing councils, militant unionism, inadequate and often poorly trained lecturers, and poorly prepared students, both for admission and for graduation.

It will not be enough to simply throw money at these problems or develop a nebulous blueprint, many of which have been produced in the past but were never implemented. A comprehensive restructuring of university education in this country is now warranted. The first step is to stop the establishment of new universities for a few years and reorganise existing ones.

In reorganising the public universities, it is important to have each one focus on specific programmes. Universities of Agriculture should focus on agriculture and those of Technology should focus on technology. Moreover, as once suggested by Prof. Ladipo Adamolekun, it is high time certain Centres of Excellence were developed, each with specific objectives, set targets and appropriate funding.

Similarly, private universities should begin to focus on those programmes in which they have the most facilities and faculty, rather than aim at expanding programmes merely to expand their student population. Their proprietors should realise that, over time, students will converge on a few excellent programmes for which an institution is branded.

Ultimately, each university should struggle to be the university of first choice in certain specific programmes. This is the secret behind the rise of Tsinghua and Peking Universities to the top 20 in the world. It also is important to remember that the feat was not achieved overnight. As indicated earlier, the steady rise of leading Chinese universities on the ranking table resulted from initiatives developed, nurtured, and improved upon since the 1980s.

Accordingly, our ministers must think long term, when they go into their retreat on education, even as they may come up with some short-term measures to at least arrest the downward trend in the country’s education at all levels. It is hoped that they will invite some consultants, including schoolteachers and seasoned academics, who are familiar with the problems and may be better positioned to proffer solutions.