Peradeniya number one in the country

According to the latest world university rankings announced by Webometrics (http://www.webometrics.info/rank_by_country.asp?country=lk), the University of Peradeniya has topped Sri Lanka while the University of Colombo and University of Moratuwa have secured the second and third places respectively.

But it is so unfortunate that the number one in Sri Lanka holds 2220th position in the world which should lead to a debate among the university professionals. In its heydays, Peradeniya was the pick of South Asia, even though now it holds the 20th position.

It is true that Sri Lankan universities do not have the luxury of high tech facilities but we should admit that the exposure to graduate studies and researches done in the universities are not adequate, both quality and quantity wise, to climb up the world rankings. One can argue that these rankings do not reveal the real image of a university but the people who have conducted the study, Webometrics, have looked upon several aspects that make the rankings justifiable.

They have clearly mentioned that they formally and explicitly adhere to the ‘Berlin Principles of Higher Education Institutions’. Its ultimate goal is the continuous improvement and refinement of the methodologies according to a set of agreed principles of good practices.

It is important to look at three of the major criteria that the Berlin Principles adhere to when it comes to depicting the purposes and goals of ranking of a particular university:

Be one of a number of diverse approaches to the assessment of higher education inputs, processes and outputs.

Rankings can provide comparative information and improved understanding of higher education, but should not be the main method for assessing what higher education is and does. Rankings provides a market-based perspective that can complement the work of government, accrediting authorities and independent review agencies.

Recognize the diversity of institutions and take the different missions and goals of institutions into account.

Quality measures for research-oriented institutions, for example, are quite different from those that are appropriate for institutions that provide broad access to underserved communities. Institutions that are being ranked and the experts that inform the ranking process should be consulted often.

Specify the linguistic, cultural, economic and historical contexts of the education systems being ranked.

International rankings in particular should be aware of possible biases and be precise about their objective. Not all nations or systems share the same values and beliefs about what constitutes ‘quality’ in tertiary institutions and ranking systems should not be devised to force such comparisons.

Thus these rankings give us a hint so that the Sri Lankan universities should improve our researches and the quality in the graduate studies to climb up the rankings which is not impossible. Professors, senior lecturers, undergraduates, graduates and finally the government can get-together to discuss ways of improvement.