Ranking matters most to overseas students

Students considering an overseas education first look at how well a university ranks, instead of the courses being offered or the size of the fees.

This was revealed by a study of nearly 500 students heading abroad.

The survey, conducted last year by international student recruitment agency IDP, also found that a university's reputation was especially crucial for students from China, followed by those from India and the Middle East. Rankings also mattered more to postgraduate students than to undergraduates.

Times Higher Education rankings editor Phil Baty, who presented the IDP survey findings at the World Academic Summit session held at Swissotel The Stamford, said it showed the growing influence of university rankings.

With international students and their families spending "five-figure sums of money" on an overseas education, "they are investing in their future, their CV (curriculum vitae), their brand for life", he explained.

Close to 15 per cent placed "attractive course structure and content" as the most important factor, while 14 per cent favoured "affordable tuition fees" first.

But a third of those surveyed said the international ranking and reputation of an institution was the most important consideration in choosing where to study. Coming in second was whether the school is internationally recognised by potential employers.

Mr Baty, however, warned students against relying just on rankings, such as the one released by Times Higher Education on Thursday.

"Any ranking, however objective or comprehensive has its limitations," he told The Straits Times. For one thing, the quality of teaching is difficult to quantify. "Ranking companies have to resort to proxy measures such as the number of staff with PhDs and ratio of academic staff to students." He also told university academics and administrators who were there for the results of this year's Times rankings that it applied only to research-intensive universities. "That's about 2 per cent of higher education institutions worldwide," he said.

He noted that there are many examples of smaller institutions that do very well in fulfilling a social mission, such as providing higher education to working adults. These schools cannot be measured using the same criteria as more mainstream universities.

"The ranking should just be the starting point," advised Mr Baty.

National University of Singapore and Nanyang Technological University (NTU) made their mark in the latest Times rankings, with the former taking 26th place and the latter climbing 10 rungs to 76th. NTU president Bertil Andersson told The Straits Times that as education becomes more global, university rankings have taken on greater significance. He said: "Singaporeans want to know how a university is performing so they can decide which one is best for them and which universities are best for what courses."

But he stressed that although rankings give an idea of how NTU measures up to others, "it will not shape or drive our mission or strategies"

. The Straits Times is the official media partner of the three-day World Academic Summit which is jointly organised by NTU and Times Higher Education. The summit ends on Friday.

sandra@sph.com.sg

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