Of what quality are these global rankings?

Over the last month, there have been reports, statistics, data analyses on global higher education institutions (HEIs) and India’s performance in rankings, like for instance in the sought-after Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) Rankings. In another part of education, the Indian education ministry has put out a draft of the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) for school education, soliciting suggestions and feedback from the citizenry. Often, national and international bodies, groups and institutions like the Times Higher Education World Rankings, the QS Rankings, the Universities Grants Commission, the All-India Survey of Higher Education, the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC), publish data, recognise major trends, identify gaps in delivering quality education in institutions and much more. Among many public and private Indian educational institutions, there is regular, voluntary accreditation-seeking from many if not all of the assessing bodies.

These exercises to check where one stands as an institution involve large numbers of faculty time and investment. It’s like an institution with several departments, schools, centres, creating an attractive curriculum vitae of its own to obtain a good rank. Personnel collate a wide array of data about the achievements of faculty, unique and relevant practices and processes at work in the institution, the number and quality of conferences and symposia held, and much more. This transpires as they continue with teaching and grading in ever-increasing classroom cohorts, developing courses and participating in several committees to build their institutions. In many cases, functionaries from assessing organisations conduct inspections. Indian educational institutions pursue rankings from accrediting bodies which may themselves be under the scanner. Educationists and scholars have questioned the credibility of many assessors and their methods. Here are my two cents.

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Many ranking methods skew towards quantifiability and quantitative data. They tend to eschew qualitative, anecdotal knowledge-gathering. It appears to be a piece with the overall climate of corporate-style education that obtains now in private education and increasingly among public institutions. The stress on numbers means that they are ends in themselves that can automatically burnish and bolster the story of that institution which is applying for a quality ranking.

As a teacher I’ve often felt, why haven’t the assessors come and spoken and collected qualitative ‘data’ or information from faculty, students, and staff? Of course, the quantitative data is imperative, but what if that may not give one the full story of the conditions at an institution? We’re living in a time when data domination is monopolising ways of perception. Doesn’t ‘data’ have its limitations and blind spots? Is an educational institution a number- and data-generating body?

Since such is the framing, institutions can’t but respond to this data-driven framework. That itself is troubling for a field like higher education, where data matters immensely but can’t be the only touchstone. High-quality qualitative work on measuring the heartbeat of an institution is harder work for the assessors. It means spending time, getting to know people and the ethos of the institution, and understanding what lies beneath the surface of numbers and data. In many of the ranking systems, the relative lack of bringing in germane anecdotal voices is troubling.

Finally, there are times when the educational institution goes through all the motions of getting a rank, and what happens next? The rewards remain opaque and rarely trickle to the worker bees of the educational institution. They increase the number of departments, expand class sizes, and seemingly build some infrastructure. Educators who’ve worked overtime, sometimes for years, feel nothing has changed. Life goes on as usual. They remain unheard but not unseen, captured somewhere as ‘data’.