presentation prof liu

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Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) February 16, 2006 at Leiden University By Professor Nian Cai Liu Institute of Higher Education and Center for World-Class Universities Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China

Outline : 

Outline Purposes of ARWU Methodologies of ARWU Results of ARWU Problems with ARWU Future Efforts of ARWU

Slide3: 

Purposes of ARWU

Dream of Chinese for WCU: 

Dream of Chinese for WCU WCU is a dream for generations of Chinese. It’s not only for pride, but also for the future of China. Recently, Chinese governments has launched several initiatives for research universities. The best-known one is specially designed to build WCU.

Extra Funding in 985 Project (2001-2003): 

Extra Funding in 985 Project (2001-2003)

Goals of Top Chinese Universities: 

Goals of Top Chinese Universities Many top Chinese universities have setup their strategic goals as WCU. Most of them has also set a time table for reaching the goal of WCU. For example: 2016 for Peking University 2020 for Tsinghua University

Questions About WCU: 

Questions About WCU Is there a clear definition for WCU? Are there any common characteristics for WCU? How many WCU should there be in the world? What are the positions of Chinese universities in the world? How can Chinese universities improve themselves to reach the goal of WCU?

Characteristics of WCU: 

Characteristics of WCU There is no clear definition for WCU. Nevertheless, there seem be to common characteristics: Top departments/programs of the world Excellent research of international standard Best professors and students from the world Academic freedom and atmosphere of innovation Adequate financial resources and facilities Excellent leadership and effective governance ------

Ranking of World Universities: 

Ranking of World Universities Our original purpose of doing the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) was to find out the position of Chinese universities in the world and the gap between them and WCU. ARWU was put on the internet upon on the encouragement of colleagues from all over the world. There have been more than 2,000,000 visitors since 2003, an average of 2000 every day.

Features of ARWU: 

Features of ARWU It’s done for pure academic interests, without any external support. It has nothing to do with any commercial business activities. Only non-subjective indicators and internationally comparable data that everyone could verify in some way were used.

Cautions About Ranking: 

Cautions About Ranking The quality of universities may not be precisely measured by mere numbers. The quality of world universities may not be accurately compared because of the huge differences of various types of universities in different countries. The choice of indicators and their weights make significant differences to the final ranking results.

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Methodologies of ARWU

Selection of Universities: 

Selection of Universities Any university that has any Nobel Laureates, Fields Medals, Highly Cited Researchers, or papers published in Nature or Science. Major universities of every country with significant amount of papers indexed by SCIE, SSCI and AHCI. Number of universities scanned: >2000 Number of universities actually ranked: >1000 Number of ranked universities on our web: 500

Design of Ranking Criteria: 

Design of Ranking Criteria It would be impossible to rank the quality of education, administration, campus culture, and national contribution etc. We chose to rank universities worldwide by their academic or research performance, which is a good indication of its international reputation.

Ranking Criteria and Weights: 

Ranking Criteria and Weights

Scoring Procedures: 

Scoring Procedures For each indicator, the highest scoring institution is assigned a score of 100, and other institutions are calculated as a percentage of the top score. The distribution of data for each indicator is examined for any significant distorting effect; standard statistical techniques are used to adjust the indicator if necessary. Scores for each indicator are weighted to arrive at a final overall score for an institution. The highest scoring institution is assigned a score of 100, and other institutions are calculated as a percentage of the top score. The scores are then placed in descending order. An institution’s rank reflects the number of institutions that sit above it.

Definition of Indicator: Alumni: 

Definition of Indicator: Alumni The total number of the alumni of an institution winning Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals. Alumni are defined as those who obtain bachelor, Master’s or doctoral degrees from the institution. Different weights are set according to the periods of obtaining degrees. The weight is 100% for alumni of 1991-2000, 90% for alumni of 1981-1990, 80% for alumni of 1971-1980, and so on. If a person obtains more than one degrees from an institution, the institution is considered once only.

Definition of Indicator: Award: 

Definition of Indicator: Award The total number of the staff of an institution winning Nobel prizes in physics, chemistry, medicine and economics and Fields Medal in Mathematics. Staff is defined as those who work at an institution at the time of winning the prize. Different weights are set according to the periods of winning the prizes. The weight is 100% for winners since 2001, 90% for winners in 1991-2000, 80% for winners in 1981-1990, 70% for winners in 1971-1980, and so on. If a winner is affiliated with more than one institution, each institution is assigned the reciprocal of the number of institutions. For Nobel prizes, if a prize is shared by more than one person, weights are set for winners according to their proportion of prize.

Definition of Indicator: HiCi: 

Definition of Indicator: HiCi The number of highly cited researchers in 21 broad subject categories in life sciences, medicine, physical sciences, engineering and social sciences. The definition of categories and detailed procedures can be found at the website of Institute of Scientific Information. The total number of HiCi is about 5000, about 4000 of which is university staff.

Definition of Indicator: N&S: 

Definition of Indicator: N&S The annual average number of articles published in Nature and Science in the past five years. To distinguish the order of author affiliation, a weight of 100% is assigned for corresponding author, 50% for first author (second author if the first author is the same as corresponding author), 25% for the next author, and 10% for other authors. Only publications of article type are considered.

Definition of Indicator: SCI: 

Definition of Indicator: SCI Total number of articles indexed in Science Citation Index-expanded (SCIE), Social Science Citation Index (SSCI), and Arts & Humanities indices (AHCI) in the past year. A weight of 2 is assigned to articles indexed in SSCI and AHCI to compensate the bias against humanities and social sciences. Only publications of article type are considered.

Definition of Indicator: Size: 

Definition of Indicator: Size The sub-total scores of the above five indicators divided by the number of full-time equivalent academic staff. If the number of academic staff for institutions of a country cannot be obtained, the total scores of the above five indicators is used. For ranking 2005, the number of full-time equivalent academic staff is obtained for institutions in USA, China, Australia, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, and Belgium etc.

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Results of ARWU

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Top 500 Universities by Region

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Top 500 Universities by Country

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Distribution of Total Score

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Distribution of Scores of Indicators

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Pearson Coefficients

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Performance of Top Chinese Universities

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Problems with ARWU

Methodological: Social Sciences: 

Methodological: Social Sciences Many well-known institutions specialized in humanities and social sciences are ranked relatively low. Nevertheless, if a university specialized in social sciences and humanities had Nobel Laureates in economics and Highly Cited Researchers in social sciences, it should have good standing. Since 2004, the indicator of N&S is not considered for institutions specialized in humanities and social sciences, its weight is relocated to other indicators. Since 2005, a weight of 2 for articles indexed by SSCI and AHCI is considered.

Methodological: Language Bias: 

Methodological: Language Bias English is the language of international academic community. Any ranking based on academic performance will be biased towards institutions in English-speaking countries. Possible solution: any paper published in non-native languages are offered a special weight.

Methodological: Award and Alumni: 

Methodological: Award and Alumni Universities started after the 1911 do not have a fair chance. Disciplines not related to the awarding fields do not have a fair chance. Other important awards include Abel, Pulitzer, Turing, Tyler, etc. Institutions for winning awards and those for doing the researches may not be the same. Institutions for obtaining degrees and those for pursuing the studies may not be the same. Postdoctoral training is not considered.

Methodological: Per Capita Performance: 

Methodological: Per Capita Performance The weight of the Size indicator for per capita performance is rather low. Large institutions have relatively high positions in the ranking. However, it’s very difficult to obtain internationally comparable data on the number of academic staff. The types of academic staff: such as purely teaching staff, teaching and research staff, purely research staff. The ranks of academic staff: such as professor, associate professor, reader, lecturer, instructor, scientist etc.

Technical: Attributions: 

Technical: Attributions Many universities have more than one commonly used names: such as Virginia Tech and Virginia Polytechnic and State University. Variations due to translation: such as Univ Koln and Univ Cologne, Univ Vienna and Univ Wien. Abbreviated names: such as ETH Zurich for Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich. Some authors only write their departmental or institute name without mentioning their university name.

Technical: Definition of Institution: 

Technical: Definition of Institution University systems: such as Univ California system, Univ London system. Affiliated institutions and research organizations: such as Ecole Polytechnique Montreal (affiliated to University of Montreal), CNRS Labs (affiliated to French universities). Teaching and affiliated Hospitals: complex! Our answer: according to author’s expression.

Other Technical Problems: 

Other Technical Problems Merging, splitting, inheriting, discontinuing, name-changing of institutions such as: Univ Kwazulu-Natal in South Africa merged from Univ Natal and Univ Durban-Westville. University of Innsbruck in Austria splitted into Univ Innsbruck and Innsbruck Medical Univ. Humboldt Univ Berlin and Free Univ Berlin inheriting the Nobel Prizes of the Berlin University before world war II. Vrije Universiteit Brussel and Universite Libre Bruxelles share the same English name of Free University of Brussels.

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Future Efforts for ARWU

Future Efforts: 

Future Efforts Study all the above mentioned problems and continuously improve the ranking methodologies. Establish more comprehensive databases of WCU. Update ARWU annually (in August) . Provide ranking of broad subject areas such as physical sciences, social sciences, life sciences, clinical medicine, and engineering etc.

Future Efforts (Cont’ed): 

Future Efforts (Cont’ed) Provide ranking of universities specialized or oriented in engineering, medicine, etc. based on the scientific classification of world universities. Provide ranking with a much higher weight of the Size indicator once internationally comparable data on the number of academic staff were obtained.

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Thank you very much for your attention! http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/ranking.htm http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/en/