On quality of higher education and university ranking
Bangladesh will reap the benefit of demographic dividend if it is possible to build our 80 million young population that is aged between 15 to 35 through modern skills, technology and quality education
Md Sazzad Hossain
Bangladesh, the new economic wonder and model of development success, has long historical background in the higher education. Even though the journey of formal higher education began in this region after the establishment of Dhaka University in 1921 which was based on modern thinking and ideology, the country has long golden history of higher education for centuries.The number of universities and university-going students has been increasing remarkably since the independence of Bangladesh. Enhancement of quality higher education will play an important role to make Bangladesh a developed country as declared by The Prime Minister by 2041.
It is expected that Bangladesh will reap the benefit of demographic dividend if it is possible to build our 80 million young population that aged between 15 to 35 through modern skills, technology and higher education. The government is working relentlessly aiming at the purpose. At present, the literacy rate in Bangladesh is 63.08 per cent and the rate higher education receiving students is 12 per cent. The number of university students was 1.9 million in 2009 which has increased to 3.9 million in 2019. However, in the recent years such rapid growth in higher education has raised questions about the quality of education and research. And a methodical ranking system for higher education is a demand of time to improve the quality of higher education in Bangladesh.
All the universities of Bangladesh can be categorized into three categories(i) Public: these universities belong to the government and are receiving grants; (ii) Private: these universities belong to an organization and are managed by a board of trustee; (iii) International: these universities are getting funds from various international organisations such as OIC. The total number of universities in these three categories now stands at 155. Among these 155 universities 49 are in the public sector, 104 are in the private sector while 2 are functioning as international university.
Quality Education is the 4th and one of the important goals of the SDGs. Government has been working to build a modern and tech savvy nation through IT based quality education and innovative research so that Bangladesh can meet the challenges of global demand. Hence, the necessity of a scientific methodical ranking system for the universities of Bangladesh cannot be ignored anymore. Such ranking system will play an important role to create a fair competition among the universities to keep them in right track of teaching, learning and research. Unfortunately, a ranking system for higher education is absent in the country whether in the web or in the physical state.
A widely accepted ranking system would help students in choosing their right institutions to pursue higher degrees. In addition, the research fund can be distributed among the universities based on the outcome of this ranking system. Most importantly, such an approach would definitely help to develop a constructive competition among the universities, especially in the area of teaching and research.
It is our focal target to develop a method for a ranking system that will showcase transparency in all grounds and will be beneficial for all the stakeholders of this system. The proposed methodology is mainly divided into different indicators including Research facility, Institutional facilities and infrastructure, university reputation, Alumni and Employability, and Faculty-Student ratio.
The proposed initiatives to raise University Ranking
1. By developing a guideline to train each university to manage information and documentation according to the requirement of the international ranking system and submit them on due date to the international ranking authorities and UGC. The training should include the updating of each university web site with this information. Each universitys IQAC could be responsible for the following:
There should be developed a common faculty and research information database according to international ranking system.
All universities should start opening a central research management and commercialization centre.
National Research Council should be built for proceeding researches collectively.
Challenges that work as barriers should be found out and analysed profoundly for encompassing the international ranking system.
Reputation can be considered as one of the important ranking variables to rank the universities because it can be very easy to separate an institution based on reputation.
The university will have to work for the creation of a pool of highly talented graduates to meet the industry demand.
Performance of the universities should be considered for ranking. So all the institutes have to perform the best work from their respective ends.
Universities need to be more digitalized since now-a-days everything is becoming technology-oriented. Therefore, the high-tech facilities need to be ensured in every university.
2. Developing an internal ranking system and assessment tool for evaluation of each university in general, faculty wise, and subject wise should be made. Such ranking system will create competitive environment and encourage universities to perform better. The following ways can be considered in this regard:
Each university will set up own internal ranking system which will grow a competitive mentality among the universities.
Setting the criteria for quality matrices and methods in a view to developing the university ranking system in Bangladesh is a must. All universities will be evaluated according to the method of ranking.
Different standards and techniques to ensure the overall status of the universities should be identified.
Academicians who are working outside the country should also be involved with our education management. All the presentations or publications done by them should be affiliated with local institutions in the country.
Expatriate educationists of Bangladesh can be categorized for research and development.
Citation or quoting is an important tool for ranking. Though many of our teachers publish their international standard research works in many national and international journals, their citation is less because the research works are not included in the internationally recognized journal systems namely: SCOPUS, WEB OF SCIENCE, ISI, GOOGLE SCHOLAR OR RESEARCHGATE.
Improving quality of Higher Education:
There is a sayingeducation is the backbone of a nation. It does not go with todays context. It would sound better if we say higher education is the economic backbone of a nation. In the context of global economy, no country can survive without having properly educated population. Historically higher education institutes have always been run by government in Bangladesh. But the public universities were too few in number to keep pace with the increasing number of students.
Currently, according to UGC there are 49 public universities and 104 private universities and 2 international universities in Bangladesh. This surge of universities has increased the number of universities and also raised question regarding the quality of these universities. Traditionally, it is assumed that public universities in our country are better than private ones. If such a ranking system can be developed and applied to the concerned institutions, it will become a milestone in the history of higher education in Bangladesh and will provide guidance for the students and the researchers in their way of selecting university that fulfils their purposes. Moreover, significant improvement is required to change the outlook of higher education and reputation in Bangladesh and that will help to improve international ranking.
The following initiatives can be taken for improving the quality of Higher Education:
a. Universities must disseminate new knowledge through adapting the culture of research and development.
b. UGC should introduce a target oriented approach to each university for producing good teaching, research and quality graduates with industry-required skills. The approach can be linked to their performance and fund allocation each year.
c. Research outcome can be evaluated with defined criteria, such as publications in indexed journals, conferences, high impact journals (like ISI), and commercialization.
d. Structured Academia and Industry collaboration for improving course curriculums, soft skills, core knowledge and skills that is required for employability need to be introduced.Mandatory4-6months productive and monitored internship can enhance the skills of graduates for employment.
e. Continuous training program for faculty members for upgrading pedagogy and new teaching and subjects required skills and outcome of the training should be evaluated and monitored regularly.
f. An adaptation of intelligent system for guiding students according to their potential for identifying desired higher education and career pathways need to be installed.
g. The development of an approach for identifying and defining skill set for different degree qualification can be aligned with outcome based education (OBE).
h. Considering to permit PhD programs in private universities which have permanent certificates with very strict criteria needs to be observed. Similar criteria can be adapted for public universities.
i. Building a University Innovation and Incubation Centre (UIIC) for Research, Development and Commercialization in every university, like IQAC can work as a boon for ameliorating university ranking.
j. Promoting research and commercialization culture through rewarding, recognition and monetary incentive should be taken into consideration.
k. Certain percentage of faculty members can be recruited from people having 2-5 years of industry experiences.
l. There need to develop University Brand Reputation through academic excellence activities.
m. Recruitment of qualified persons should be ensured to improve the quality of research and education.
n. National industry act should be amended following that of Japan so that our industries spend some portion of their profit on research.
Government has already established some specialized universities to create skilled and interested in entrepreneurship young generation. Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Maritime University (BSMRMU) was established in 2013. It is the 3rd maritime university in South Asia and 12th maritime university in the world. Besides, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Digital University and Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Aviation and Aerospace University, 2019 Bill was passed in the parliament on 2nd February this year.
Ranking of universities is one of the most important issues for higher education for any nation. Bangladesh is still having trouble regarding university ranking and developing its methodology.
This proposal has introduced an initial framework for the very first time, and this proposal can be used for any ranking system as well as improving the quality of higher education in Bangladesh.
The writer is a Member, University Grants Commission of Bangladesh
