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Where Are the Global Rankings Leading Us? An Analysis of Recent Methodological Changes and New Developments
Author(s) -
Rauhvargers Andrejs
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
european journal of education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.577
H-Index - 45
eISSN - 1465-3435
pISSN - 0141-8211
DOI - 10.1111/ejed.12066
Subject(s) - reputation , ranking (information retrieval) , higher education , profiling (computer programming) , rank (graph theory) , data science , political science , business , public relations , computer science , sociology , economics , information retrieval , economic growth , social science , mathematics , combinatorics , operating system
This article is based on the analysis of the changes in global university rankings and the new ‘products’ based on rankings data in the period since mid‐2011. It is a summary and continuation of the European University Association ( EUA )‐commissioned report ‘Global University Rankings Their Impact, Report II’ which was launched in A pril 2013. It covers the changes in the ranking methodologies which have been the most visible in the CWTS Leiden Ranking and Webometrics and which have replaced some indicators with newly designed ones. Changes have been made in other rankings as well, but they are less visible. A new U21 ranking was launched in 2012. It is an attempt to rank national higher education systems rather than individual universities. New rankings by conventional ranking providers have demonstrated that in reputation rankings or reputation indicators the scores drop even more sharply than in the most élitist rankings and therefore can be used for even narrower groups of universities. Several ranking providers have started their own data collections and combine ranking data with the data from the newly established data collections and use them for several multi‐indicator classifications or profiling tools. QS has been most productive and has added not only classification and profiling tools, but has also launched a ranking of student cities, and ‘stars’ that universities can obtain. Generally, the rankings’ impact is growing. Let us see where it will bring us. At the same time, some rankings providers have changed language and explain the biases, flaws and misunderstandings created through misuse of rankings or using ranking indicators without proper knowledge.