Owais Mughal
Higher Education Commission (HEC) of Pakistan has recently released the university rankings of Pakistan. The rankings are generating so much interest that I am receiving four to five emails daily with people forwarding me the same link to HEC’s ranking web page. (Scroll down to see rankings and details).
I am kind of disappointed with my alma-mater, NED University of Engineering and Technology Karachi, ranked at number 10 out of the 13 Engineering Universities of Pakistan. The photo to the right-below shows few views of NED University.
I genuinely and of course with a little bias think that NED university should have been ranked among the top 3. When I make such claim; I do it on the basis of sheer engineering talent I’ve personally seen at NED. But rankings do not take into account the student talent. They look at finances, faculty, number of students etc. My university mates as well as the university officials have already started the discussion on how to improve the rankings next year. This discussion is going on at many NED online alumni groups. I am sure similar discussions are going on within other university alumni too. This I think, is a positive sign of publishing a list like this as it does create competition.
Here are the key leaders in the ranking:
Agriculture / Veterinary
1. University of Agriculture (UAF), Faisalabad
2. NWFP University of Agriculture , Peshawar
3. University of Arid Agriculture, Rawalpindi
4. Sindh Agriculture University, Tandojam
Art / Design
1. National College of Arts, Lahore
2. Textile Institute of Pakistan, Karachi
3. Indus Valley School of Art & Architecture, Karachi
Business / I.T.
1. Lahore Uni. of Management Sciences (LUMS), Lahore
2. Institute of Business Administration (IBA), Karachi
3. Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Sci. & Tech. Karachi
4. Iqra University, Defence View, Karachi
5. Lahore School of Economics (LSE) , Lahore
6. Institute of Business Management (IBM), Karachi
Engineering
1. Pakistan Institute of Engg. and Applied Sciences, Islamabad
2. National University of Sciences & Technology Rawalpindi
3. Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering, Swabi
4. University of Engg. & Technology (UET), Lahore
5. Mehran University of Engg. & Technology (MUET), Jamshoro
6. University of Engg. & Technology (UET), Taxila
General
1. Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU), Islamabad
2. University of the Punjab, Lahore
3. University of Karachi, Karachi
4. University of Peshawar, Peshawar
5. Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan
6. Government College Lahore University, Lahore
Health Sciences
1. Aga Khan University, Karachi
2. Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences, Jamshoro
3. Baqai Medical University, Karachi
4. Zia-ud-din Medical University, Karachi
You can have a look at the complete rankings, including the scores, the criteria and the methodology of scoring here. I would like to hear your opinion.
ATP’s another post related to University Education and rankings system can be seen here.
[quote post=”341″]The last two are clearly about student quality. The first focusses only on ‘university’ eductaion, so even a BA degree will not count. And number 2 and 3 focus on research aspects, which is what universities are for.[/quote]
No, it is still not about student quality. Would a PhD produced from say LUMS or GIKI not have more value than one from PU?
Case in point: a few months ago a few professors from the PU faculty were charged for plagiarism at an international conference. If this the sort of supervisors and atmosphere you work then what sort of product would you churn out? My point still holds – the criterion is just looking at it quantitatively, not qualitatively.
Dear Farrukh. You are right. A case needs to be made if I think NED is better than others. I also admit that I am a bit biased towards NED because I studied there.
Owais,
All my siblings studied at NED, and only the youngest has recently moved to KU for his Ph.D. work. So I can tend to have a natural bias as well.
But I think this discussion could also focus a bit on the general state of higher education in Pakistan, and how deplorable it is despite the sheer talent in students that pass through them. I have had the privilege of visiting a few departments in Pakistani universities, and I have been utterly disappointed at the lack of motivation (or even ability) in the faculty’s ability to teach and/or conduct research. Infact, a group of us have already proposed to HEC to establish a faculty training academy which essentially re-teaches undergraduate level stuff to all the existing faculty. It is unfortunate that most faculty in Pakistan (and I stress, not all) don’t even know their basic subject matter as well as a good undergraduate student in their fields from good universities in the US or Europe or Japan would. I know people who studied at NED and are doing terrifically well, but its probbaly because they were geniuses themselves, not because their institutions developed them.
[quote comment=”3713″]Owais few days back I emailed to Adil bhai with some links about same issue. NED did react back strongly. Dr. Shamsul Haq and Dr.NOman wrote a lengthy article on last Sunday’s dawn.[/quote]
Link????
On the student ranking, if you look at teh details on the page it is quite clear that, no, places liek PU will not have an advantage because of what you say. The 17 points reserved for student are further distributed as follows:
Student produced having 16 years of education (2)
Student produced having M.Phil/16 + years of education (3)
Number of Ph.D. Produced (4)
Student Selectivity (5)
% of students getting admission having 60% and above marks (3)
The last two are clearly about student quality. The first focusses only on ‘university’ eductaion, so even a BA degree will not count. And number 2 and 3 focus on research aspects, which is what universities are for.
The methodology section is very good because of the openness and transparency. Well done HEC.