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USP ranks in the 'top 100' university in the world
O Globo
March 15, 2012
Citation: http://tinyurl.com/USPBrasil
The University of São Paulo (USP) ranks among the top 100 higher education institutions in the world according to rankings released March 15, 2012 by the Times Higher Education (THE) based on academic reputation. The result shows an improvement of USP in the rankings. Last year, no Brazilian institution appeared in the top 100 list, which takes into account the reputation of the university among researchers from academia. Harvard University, USA, received the highest score in the rankings released on Thursday. The survey asked academic experts to highlight what they believed to be the strongest universities for teaching and research in their own fields. Harvard scored 100 points. The United States has 44 institutions in the list of top 100. The UK has ten universities in the list. The presence of institutions in Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, China, South Korea and Taiwan in the "top 100" shows the improvement of higher education in Asia. In addition to USP, new to the list are Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, and Middle East Technical University, Turkey.
The University of São Paulo made news last October in The Economist for being the only Latin American university listed in the Times Higher Education (THE) world’s top 200 universities ranking. In this general university ranking USP ranked 178th in 2011-2012, up from the previous 232nd ranking. THE’s most recent publication based on university reputation cited in the O Globo article is based on the largest international survey of academic opinion. Whether it is based on reputation or their international university performance indicators, the USP is climbing up the ranks, but alone. The Economist article puts it bluntly: “Research output [in Latin America] is unimpressive, teaching techniques are old-fashioned and students drop out in droves. These failings matter.” I contend that economic growth has stimulated a greater demand for higher education in the region and it is about time to start assessing them. Private institutions have emerged to meet this demand, but unfortunately, quality assurance is not on the top of their to-do lists. Public universities are not necessary any better; however, USP’s growing recognition could guide the way for others in region. My post on "New Model for Research Partnerships for Latin America" also serves as inspiration for increasing academic excellence in Latin America and cutting ties of intellectual dependency.
The University of São Paulo made news last October in The Economist for being the only Latin American university listed in the Times Higher Education (THE) world’s top 200 universities ranking. In this general university ranking USP ranked 178th in 2011-2012, up from the previous 232nd ranking. THE’s most recent publication based on university reputation cited in the O Globo article is based on the largest international survey of academic opinion. Whether it is based on reputation or their international university performance indicators, the USP is climbing up the ranks, but alone. The Economist article puts it bluntly: “Research output [in Latin America] is unimpressive, teaching techniques are old-fashioned and students drop out in droves. These failings matter.” I contend that economic growth has stimulated a greater demand for higher education in the region and it is about time to start assessing them. Private institutions have emerged to meet this demand, but unfortunately, quality assurance is not on the top of their to-do lists. Public universities are not necessary any better; however, USP’s growing recognition could guide the way for others in region. My post on "New Model for Research Partnerships for Latin America" also serves as inspiration for increasing academic excellence in Latin America and cutting ties of intellectual dependency.
The fact that we are depending on an institution based in London to "rank" universities throughout the world is problematic in and of itself. The Global South depending on the Global North to assess the quality of their own educational institutions is only perpetuating the intellectual dependency models. These institutions - public, private, non-profit should start their own assessments based on their own criteria and emphasize quality. Even in the U.S. the fixation on rankings is overwhelming look at U.S. News & World Report. Higher education worldwide needs to focus more on quality and perhaps everyone can climb the ranks together.
I completely agree with your points about how the Global South depends on the North to validate its research institutions. It's essentially a form of intellectual dependency. I generally tend to have a problem with this assessment as it can be very problematic. For example, the race to be ranked as a world class university could result in perpetuating elitist mentalities, negatively impact access to universities, and lessen the importance of national needs and faculty confidences (Altbach, 2004). I agree with Evan that institutions should assess based on their own criteria and quality should be of the upmost importance.
ReplyDeleteEvan, I wonder how UPenn ranked?
ReplyDeleteWe must consider audience here in regards to not actually the article, but the rankings. Who reads it? Who is exposed to this ideology?
I don't believe it is actually possible to rank the Global N. and S. side-by-side as if they were equals. I don't think we can measure and thus quantify rankings across such diverse regions and universities.
There is a trend throughout the articles on this blog with regard to intellectual dependency, whether it be in my article regarding language rights in Puerto Rico or your other article regarding China's wage hikes. This is not a coincidence and needs to be addressed if Latin American countries will ever be able to "climb the ranks together." We should ask, what good does this ranking do for our mental representations of Latin American higher education, or really, what harm?
Great post, Evan. As far as I understand, there is a motivation to maintain academic publications (e.g., research papers) in Portuguese and not in English. This has repercussions in their chances to get published in major sources -from the North-. Again, this is an example of how countries from the South need to standardize their publications to the international rules (in English, following international guidelines, etc.) just to be considered for publishing. Brazil, like Spain, are examples of nations who give extremely high value to their language. So, do you think that the Portuguese is affecting Brazilians universities? Do you see this language protection positive or negative?
ReplyDeleteThis is a very important topic. Specially because, USP is founded by the government and, therefore, is supposed to be focused on issues of social relevance, which is not the goal aimed by other institutions evaluated by the mentioned research. I think you raise an important point, about the criteria used to make the rank.
ReplyDelete