Sri Lanka’s so-called ‘top universities’ have fared miserably in the latest survey of ranked Universities in the world according to the internationally recognized Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) Asian University Rankings for 2018.
The University of Colombo is ranked as 156, just one ranking higher than the little known Beijing Foreign Studies University. It has slipped even lower than the University of Dhaka at 124th place according to the rankings. The University of Colombo at one time offered honorary doctorates to former President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brother Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Colombo Telegraph learns that Former Minister of Justice Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe’s doctorate in law was approved by the University Higher Degrees Committee despite numerous spelling and grammatical mistakes in the thesis.
Meanwhile the University of Peradeniya is ranked even lower, at 242nd place.
The QS ranking lists over 400 universities. It assesses universities looking at 10 primary indicators, including academic and employer reputation, the proportion of PhD qualified academic staff, and the proportion of inbound and outbound exchange students at the university. The list is topped by the US based universities, MIT, Stanford, Harvard and Caltech respectively. The UK’s Universities of Cambridge, Oxford, University College, London (UCL) and Imperial College, London, are placed at 5, 6th, 7th and 8th places respectively.
The Nanyang Technological University (Singapore) is placed at 11th place and is the highest ranked from Asian Universities.
MF1986 / October 25, 2017
The Sri Lanka university ranking reflect the quality of the academic people and their lack of motivation to do research. All universities located in Colombo and university of Peradeniya have enough facilities. If Sri Lankan universities want better rank, academic people should publish their research in SCI and SSCI indexed journal. UGC should change current scheme of recruitment and scheme of promotion. Lecturers should recruit base on PhD with relavent major. Promotion should base on SCI and SSCI journal publication and international pattern. There are lot of opportunities do research in community medicine, agriculture, Business management, marketing, finance and other social sciences without much financial resources. But, lot of academic people do tuition classes, visiting lecturing, agriculture or business. how do they have time for research?
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Lecturer / October 25, 2017
Reasons for the dismal ratings are:
1. Ragging which produces half baked graduates with no English knowledge and independence of thought.
2. Appointment of VCs based on political affiliation and not academic merit.
3. Students do not read books even when they are available. since lecturers deliver their 25 year lecture notes and do not require or expect students to read any books..
4. Stupid merit promotion scheme where instead of research output various other aspects are considered.
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SJ / October 26, 2017
1. Ragging above all destroys the integrity of individuals.
Lack of knowledge of English not solely due to ragging. There is lack of motivation from school days. But what has that to do with independent thinking?
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2. The VC is elected in many universities. A screening procedure will help.
But we have greedy people who will do anything, including wrecking institutions, to get what they want. Where do we go from there?
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3. Awarding points for lecture notes without assessing quality of content is not good either. However, some subjects (like mathematics) need extensive notes and there is little to revise once a comprehensive set of notes have been developed.
A lecture should not be for taking down notes but to enable intelligent discussion of the subject matter– the less the notes the better.
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4. “Stupid merit promotion scheme where instead of research output various other aspects are considered.”
I agree that it is bad to award points for things that should be done selflessly with a spirit of community.
Given our context, priority should be for good teaching, teacher commitment and performance should be a major criterion.
As for research, the point scheme has led to much abuse. Predatory journals have proliferated. They take advantage of the desperation of academics to collect points for promotion to Professor, and publish for a fee with turnover time much less than a month. There is also plagiarism, which is often overlooked.
Research need and opportunity are not equal across the board. Research should primarily seek to serve the community at home.
Research outcome is more important than research output (mostly in the form of papers which are seldom read by others).
Prolific publication is no indication of good research or scholarship.
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whywhy / October 27, 2017
Lecturer ,
There are more to it Lecturer , I suppose ! It all starts from Kindergarten .
Children need to grow with sound psychology in parallel with their
physical and mental growth . And for this we need leaders who are in
deep interest to see everything goes really well with the system and
the final product released from universities are up to the expected
standard . What is the expected standard ? What do we need from them ?
What do we have in store for them ? After all , they are all our
institutions and our children and we spend a fortune for them and they ,
the children , are put in them by us ! All what for ? What are these
children being trained for , so many of their best YEARS ? ONLY FOR
SOME CLERICAL WORKS ? THIS HAS BEEN THE RESULT OF MORE
THAN 95 % ! AND THIS HAS BECOME THE GOAL OF UNIVERSITY
EDUCATION AND IT’S BECOME WORST WITH FOREIGN DEGREES
WITH NO GENUINE MOTIVATION ADDED TO IT ! NOTHING CAN WORK
WITH WRONG INTENTION AND FALSE MOTIVATION !
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Marlen Fonseka / October 25, 2017
Why do you expect only Universities in this country to do well when the entire country has fallen to abominable depth. The VC’s are appointed by the political heir achy of the country. During the last several years President and the Minister directly got involved in appointing mongol VC’s faithful to them. Those dimwits then manipulate the system to get stupid academics appointed as Deans/Heads etc. Entire set of academics at Peradeniya VC and some Deans cannot string together a coherent statement. Ridiculous!. Sir Ivor Jennings would be spinning in his grave if he knows the situation at Peradeniya which was one time a world class university.
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Suzy / October 25, 2017
There is no doubt about this conclusion when looking at its products – GMOA
Nothing to be surprised why this is so-
– VC’s are appointed on political connections
– Most of the times students don’t attend lectures but are protesting on the streets
– There is no process to suspend students involved in anti social acts.
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SJ / October 26, 2017
“Most of the times students don’t attend lectures but are protesting on the streets”
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How did you work this out? Have you been tracking students, stop-watch in hand?
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jehan / October 26, 2017
Free loaders and garbage as input, what do you expect. Garbage in garbage out.
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SJ / October 26, 2017
Quite a few who are bitching about “free loaders and garbage” would belong to that category if their own criteria are applied to them when they had everything free, without which they will not be what they are.
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whywhy / October 28, 2017
SJ ,
The whole of Srilanka ty to live on a continued false image !
One such instance is the ‘ quality’ of our education boast !
And then the illusion of FREE education . Is the education
truly FREE ? Teachers work free ? Other supplies free ?
One is not individually made to pay for it directly does not
mean , IT IS RUN FREE ! It is the same with HEALTH CARE .
IT IS SHAME UPON THIS SO CALLED DEGREE HOLDERS
WHO CHEST BEAT AS THE TOP MOST EDUCATED LOT IN
THE OUNTRY , NOT SPEAK LOUDLY TO TELL THE PEOPLE
THAT THE COUNTRY IS BEING MISLED TO BELIEVE THE
EDUCATION IS FREE . THE GOVT TAKES IT FROM YOUR
SALT,SUGAR AND OTHER PROVISIONS . IN THE MIDDLE
OF SCANDALS ARE ALL TOP NAMES TODAY , FOR
ROBBING PEOPLE’S MONEY FROM PROJECTS AND EVEN
THE CENTRAL AND ALL OTHER MAJOR BANKS . IT IS
OUR STUPIDITY THAT ENABLES THEM BLIND US WITH
SUGAR COATED PROMISES LIKE ” THIS IS AND THAT
FREEBEES.” BASICALLY, THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS
FREE . Too many doctors are behaving like GODS with the
patients specially in govt hospitals , as if they are working
for free ! Is that the case ? High time people need to wake up
and look in the mirror .
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edwin rodrigo / October 26, 2017
Who will pluck the coconuts? During my vacation I wanted the coconuts in my trees plucked. Unable to find the ‘Gedi Kadanawa, Gus Kapanawa’ guy, I consulted my neighbor who gave me the phone number of the new plucker.
I called him and started to tell him how to reach my house in Bulathsinhala, not an easy task even for a seasoned explorer. The guy, Sunil by name, told me ‘Sir, just give me the address and I will come there tomorrow at 08:00 AM. My charge is Rs 10 per nut plus Rs 7 per meter height of the tree.” I agree.
Next morning Sunil appears exactly at 08:00 AM on his new Kawasaki, although I was sure he would lose his way. I ask him, “No problem in finding the place?”
Sunil: “No Sir, I have GPS on my Samsung. Show me the trees please.” Sunil takes out his Samsung and directs it to each tree root and the nuts, makes a few key strokes.
“Sir, there are 6 trees with a total height of 53 m and 83 nuts. My charge is Rs 1,200 – rounded”.
ER: How did you calculate all that so soon?”
Sunil: “Well Sir, my app calculates the tree height trigonometrically, from the elevation angle and the length of the base, using Pythagoras theorem. There is another image recognition app, which tells me how many nuts there are”.
ER: “Really, so you know trig”?
Sunil: “Yes Sir, got a D in OL Pure Maths”.
Sunil plucks the coconuts. ER pays. Sunil rides away to his next customer on the Kawasaki guided by GPS. (Actually, there were only 81 nuts, well within the expected accuracy of the image recognition software. But ER pays 1,200, thinking F… the extra).
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argon / October 26, 2017
Edwin, don’t you realize the two missing nuts are you and the plucker? You and your Maths! Get lost.
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Leelawathie / October 27, 2017
Edwin he himself shared that he got through his Eng exams with narrow margins.
Now being a man in his sexities or 80ties, he should better learn to respect the people. He is no means consistent.
I sometimes feel if his both ends have been abused by likeminded men over the period of tme. Today s is no consistent with other day. That is how the bugger ticks.
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Edwin Rodrgo / October 27, 2017
True, I got through my final narrowly on my 3rd shy. But afterwards, I perfected the art of getting through many narrow things. I can show you if you give me the chance.
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Edwin Rodrigo / October 27, 2017
Argon, may be you are the missing banana between the two missing nuts. Do be careful. There are monkeys around and you know how much they love bananas.
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Not Funny / October 27, 2017
End of the way, Sunil earned extra 1200 Rs to support his family by using a smart phone and his math skills. He also got enough exercises to tune up his heart and muscles.
But ER lost 1200 Rs and got more than enough coconuts to screw up his heart. He is also going to waste his money to make Pharma companies and health care professionals richer!
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Edwin Rodrgo / October 27, 2017
Look at it this way, I could have lost Rs 1201 but lost only Rs 1200. Don’t you think it was not only the Samsung that was smart. Edwin was smart too. Perhaps smarter.
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Dan Fernando / October 27, 2017
This alone proves how one can fool Edwin.
Edwin thought it was the truth the boy may have just added.
This man Edwin would never learn it.
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Edwin Rodrgo / October 27, 2017
Oh Hi Danny the intellectual dog. Nice to have you bark (sorry back). It is possible. But you see dog, the kids today are more stupid than you dogs. They cannot add 1 and 2 and come up with 3. They need a calculator for that. Not only the kids even the adults are stupid. just have a look at the crap people like Leela, Argon, Dan, Samson and Delilah etc. are writing. They cannot write 2 words of English without making 3 mistakes. What a sad lot!
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Malliurin / October 27, 2017
There is also an another app for improve QOL of the elederly like Edwin. That surely helps them to get on with their incontinence well. So that the creatures would not cause smells. Please Edwin it is your turn to try it. Get well soon.
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Muthal Ganesan / October 26, 2017
I support the ETCA mainly because it will allow Sri Lankans to attend the well developed institutions in Mainland India – these institutions tend to be more well-funded and command the ability to attract talent from a wider pool.
The ETCA will also allow Sri Lankans to fill vacancies at the various major academically worthy companies throughout India – companies that Sri Lanka simply does not have.
I am wary of total integration with the Mainland due to concerns about racism and immirgration, but I don’t think that a “middle path” solution is too risky or stupid for Sri Lankans to consider.
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Misery / October 27, 2017
The sad fact is the miserable rankings of the universities are just a reflection of the miserable state of the country as a whole.
The worst part is that most of the elites and the rulers are unaware of the miserable state the country is in. Thanks CT for the role you play in exposing the truth. Hopefully enough relevant players are paying attention.
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Shifan / October 29, 2017
Can expect worse. When the racists run the system, when racist lecturers support Myanmar Junta’s atrocities, when the so called academics selected based on political mileage rather than merit, you can expect worse. The Sri Lankan Uni students think, succeeding in A/ (largely through ROTE learning, they are the best and they protest, protest, protest for what???? To prevent other students from learning. In a nutshell, academics and students don’t have time for learning and reserach as they are busy with supporting racist thugs and Medical mafia.
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dayal / October 30, 2017
once a person was appointed a VC by the political authority. . he/she was a student when most of us were lecturers!
=dayal
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Edwin Rodrgo / October 30, 2017
Michael Faraday: On many occasions, major contributions to Scientific & Technological progress have been made people who have had no formal education. Faraday is an example of this. He discovered the electromagnetic laws on his own way, with no mathematics involved. The set of Laws known as Faradays Laws of electromagnetic induction is a prime example of this. Clerk Maxwell, after years of hard work, gave these a mathematical foundation in the what are known as Maxwell’s Equations.
What all this shows is that, one need not have a formal education to do things. What one needs is intelligence and an unwavering willingness to work hard to achieve one’s goals.
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