Blog for the third mission

There are several commonly accepted ranking systems for the First and Second Missions, which provide indicators to measure excellence in Higher Education Institutions around the world. Rankings improve quality assurance by allowing the institutions to understand their own performance, develop best practices, and provide effective and efficient value to society. They also provide quality indicators to governments, society and industry. However, there are no commonly agreed indicators or methodologies to assess quality in Third Mission activities.

This project will develop such indicators, promoting excellence in Third Mission activities, and encouraging Higher Education Institutions to share best practices across Europe.

Friday 24 June 2011

EUA publishes first review of main international university rankings

EUA has published a major new report “Global University Rankings and their Impact” that analyses the methodologies used in the main international university rankings and also refers to a number of other ongoing projects seeking to measure university performance.

Tuesday 14 June 2011

No Data for Measuring Third Mission?

In an interview with the Austrian daily newspaper "Die Presse", Phil Baty, editor of THE World University Ranking, said that rankings are not able to reflect on some activities of universities (e.g. "a university's contribution to society") as their is no data available worldwide to measure these activities.


***Extract from Interview, Die Presse, 29.05.2011***

Die Presse: Kritiker bemängeln, dass Rankings viele der wichtigsten Aspekte von Universitäten nicht erfassen können.

Phil Baty: Da stimme ich zu. Für manche der tollsten Dinge, die Universitäten leisten, gibt es keine Daten, die man weltweit vergleichen könnte. Wenn es darum geht, jemandes Zukunftschancen zu verbessern, in einem Studenten eine Idee zu entzünden oder um den Beitrag, den eine Uni für die Gesellschaft leistet. Rankings können das nicht widerspiegeln, aber was sie können, ist andere Dinge zu untersuchen, die für Universitäten, für Gesellschaften und für Studenten im Kern wichtig sind. Die Fähigkeit etwa, einflussreiche Forschung zu betreiben, ist in einer Wissensgesellschaft ausschlaggebend.