This is another body-blow for the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak just before the long-awaited 13th General Elections as it highlights the failure of Najib’s national transformation agenda to restore national unity, achieve excellence and regain international competitiveness from its slew of initiatives like the “1Malaysia, People First, Performance Now” programme, the Government Transformation Programme (GTP) with seven National Key Result Areas (NKRAs) and a host of impossible-to-remember acronyms from the alphabet-soup reform measures .
In Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings 2012-2013, for the second consecutive year, not a single Malaysian university is included in its 400 Top World University rankings.
The THE World University Rankings 2012-2013 is a sad but salutary warning to Malaysians about the four-year failure of Najib’s transformation programmes, with Malaysia completely excluded from the Asia-Pacific phenomenon highlighted by the THE World University Rankings 2012-2013 on the “the rise of Asia-Pacific Universities”.
As Phil Baty, editor of THE World University Rankings commented:
“The balance of power is shifting. Leading universities from across the Asia-Pacific region have seen significant improvements in their positions in the 2012-2013 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, gaining ground on the traditional powerhouses of the US and the UK.
“In the 2012-2013 table, top institutions in China, Singapore, the Republic of Korea and Taiwan have risen up the rankings. Asia’s Pacific neighbour, Australia, has also had a strong year, in contrast to the US and the UK: a majority of the Anglo-American representatives in the top 200, while still dominant in term of numbers, have lost ground.”
The “rise of Asia-Pacific Universities” in world higher education is highlighted by the following:
• Significant improvements for Australia and New Zealand. Australia’s number one institution, the University of Melbourne, has shot up from 37th in the rankings last year to inside the top 30, at 28th. Australia gained an additional top 200 university, with the University of Adelaide entering the top 200 at 176th. Of Australia’s seven top 200 representatives, six improved their positions. Eighteen Australian universities are listed in the top 400 Universities.
• China’s two top 200 institutions both rose, with Peking University moving from 49th to 46th and Tsinghua jumping 19 places from 71stto 52nd. Universities earmarked by the Chinese authorities for great things are improving: Fudan University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University have both moved closer to the top 200 while Nanjing has maintained its position in the 250-257 bracket.
• Singapore’s two top 200 institutions saw spectacular success. The National University of Singapore moved from 40th to 29th and Nanyang Technological University rocketed up the table from 169th to 86th.
• Every one of South Korea’s institutions rose up the tables, with the most spectacular improvement by Seoul National University, which rose from 124 to 59th. The country also gained a new representative in the top 200 – Yonsei University, entering at 183rd.
• Taiwan’s flagship institution and sole representative in the top 200, the National Taiwan University, moves from 154th to joint 134th, while Hong Kong’s institutions have held steady or risen.
• Thailand is represented in the top 400 universities with King Monghut’s University of Technology in the 351-400 bracket.
A total of 81 Asian-Pacific Universities made it into the THE 400 Top World University Ranking, but not a single one from Malaysia, and yet we have a Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin who recently claimed that Malaysia has one of the best education systems in the world – better than United States, Britain and Germany.
If Malaysia is to have a chance to partake in the “Rise of Asia-Pacific Universities and to be recognised internationally not only as having universities in the top 400 but even in the top 100, then there must be an overhaul of the entire education system in the country, right from primary, secondary to university level.
This is only possible if there is a new beginning for national renewal and regeneration in a change of Federal government in Malaysia – first time in the nation’s 56-year history in the 13GE.
“Muhyiddin Yassin, said in March 2012 that our education system is better than that of the US, UK and Germany”….as long as we are in denial, we can never improve. And as long as BN is in power we will always in denial. Out with the old BN in with the new Pakatan Rakyat. That’s our only hope.
We have professors who plagiarized and yet nothing is done. Instead he is being promoted. How to get into the top ranking?
Mooo has advised all public universities 2 enforce d use of CHOPSTICKS in campuses
NR n UmnoB/BN – Y educate students so smart n able 2 think? They will vote against n kick out UmnoB/BN
This is Mahathir’s dream….to see Malaysians stay stupid….and so our Educational system is good for so call….. helping ” Muslims” to catch up with others…for decades.
Self taught…doing researches…seems to produce smart Malaysians ….faster than learning from racists U teachers,
Reading books…surfing for ideas..hungry for knowledge.
That is what we are seeing…today..how smart Malaysians are produced.
Rosmah: No worry one,wait till 2020,my Permata’s geniuses would make our Universities the top of the world within 20 ranking surpasing China,Singapore,South Korea,Thailand or even knocked-out some of the elite ones from Uk and US.Sorry i do not have much time left to do the talking now cause tomorrow i would be sent to the intrusion sites asigned as a tarzan swinging among trees rescuing one village after another from celaka Sulu insurgents.Something like air-strike.Watch the action.Ross-Ross boleh!
no more vernacular ; full english
Mr Lim. You are sleeping.
Perhaps the Elections fever has got into you and your team. And of course the Lahad Datu insurgent case as well.
This 2012-2013 University Rankings by THES came out in early October 2012 and you are writing about it now, about 6 months late? I and a few others had highlighted and commented on it then about the absence of Malaysian universities in the top 400 but you had ignored this report. We thought you were not interested.
The rankings that came out today was the 2013 THES ranking of the World’s top 100 Universities by REPUTATION.
In this, we see NUS moving up one spot to number 22 in the world this year while NTU moved up about 10 places to number 71-80.
Of course none of Malaysia’s universities were in the top 100 as expected.
In fact MU and UKM are boycotting THES’ rankings as they feel the rankings are not fair. They say THES places a lot of weight on academic performance which our universities are sorely lacking scoring only 5 out of 100 points (5%).
Our local universities only score highly on the number of foreign students admitted and the number of foreign lecturers on their teaching staff and the ratio thereof and on physical facilities. This is really quite simple to manipulate isn’t it?
But these foreign students and lecturers are of the poorer quality and do not contribute to academic excellence and research hence their poor score of 5%. See QS rankings and the breakdown of their scores.
So our universities relatively high rankings (156 MU) on QS rankings is misleading about the academic standard of the universities (MU), (UKM) concerned.
At the end of the day, what matters is academic excellence. Other factors e.g. buildings, facilities, foreign students etc etc, are really secondary. If you admit garbage and process the garbage, you will end up producing garbage. And you will have no quality control and have no reputation.
Our ‘factories’ are outdated (thanks to BN) and we seem very pleased with them and we thereby lose out to our competitors. Perhaps a Pakatan government can take the necessary action.
Just privatise the Universities and take away the financial support and convert this financial support to scholarships.
Our Vice Chancellors, Deans, Lecturers, etc are taking the government and the Malaysian tax payer for a royal ride.
The government should just wake up and put a full stop to this. The comfort zone has resulted in our lecturers in manipulating and fooling everyone in the government. The Malaysian public has long since lost confidence in our local universities.
Its the management. It always is.
When you have garbage in, you have garbage out. It’s that simple! Even our industries are not fully automated, still depend on cheap foreign labors which become part of the Project IC scam. It’s a slow train coming!
MMK, NR, Mooooo, CSL, KTK, UmnoB/BN: WHAT me worry?
Listen (3X), nothing 2 worry 1, as long as our students r educated n brainwashed by BTN (BiroTataNegara), brilliant what
A great pity THES’ rankings do not take BTN education in2 consideration, otherwise surely our univ score high high
Sheriff, I think Uncle Lim probably wasn’t sleeping after all. He might have deliberately brought up the issue in order to heap pressure on BN’s bungled education policies. This is election strategy.
Sheriff singh, I think it is the other way round, ha ha ha ha ha.