On 2-4 of December representatives of best universities from BRICS and other countries have participated in the University summit, organized by the British publication Times Higher Education (THE) jointly with the O. P. Jindal Global University (New Delhi, India).
The central and most expected event of the summit was summarizing of results of THE BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings, which included 15 Russian universities this year.
Addressing the participants, THE rankings editor Phil Baty expressed confidence that the largest academic event would stimulate new partnerships and cooperation: “The summit will help to unite the universities in the right context, will give the opportunity to share good practices, to find common problems and to identify further prospects on the way to global leadership”.
Heads of universities from India, South Africa, UK, USA, Singapore, Turkey and other countries discussed various issues of higher education. Speakers were: Kavita Sharma (President, South Asian University), Phil Baty (THE), Cesar Wazen (Director, Scholarships and Partnerships Office, Qatar University), Ihron Rensburg (President, University of Johannesburg), Mohandas Pai (Manipal Global Education Services).
The panel session “Future of subject ratings” touched on such issues as: the role of ratings in University development; existing indicators and their applicability for the implementation of the state policy in the field of higher education; adaptation of ratings to cover a wider spectrum of University’s missions and national/regional priorities; further segmentation of ratings: does future belong to subject ratings or those focused on a specific mission?
Among others a presentation was made by the rector of MEPhI M. N. Strikhanov. He focused his speech on the need to improve the ratings methodology, including the subject one. First of all, it’s necessary to return results of scientific collaborations in the ratings, as well as to exclude self-citations from the calculating of indicators related to citations of universities.
