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Arab Strap · Joined: 25 Feb 2004 Posts: 246 Location: under your bed

Saudi universities ranked the worst on the planet.

http://www.saudigazette.com.sa/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=19237&Itemid=116

discuss:

One's chest swells with pride.

Queen of Sheba · Joined: 07 May 2006 Posts: 397

Why do you feel responsible for this? After all, we dont teach academic courses as ESL teachers. This is what we are always complaining about anyway - Administration rarely supports our needs or understands our intent to provide a better education than they are used to in KSA. So is this really a big shock? I think its great they are taking notice of the problem, and in another 10 years, maybe we will see the much needed change in attitude towards education and teachers for that matter.

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

Check out the original source:

http://www.webometrics.info/

It states that this is an organization based in Spain. I haven't heard of them before. Very interesting...

VS

Stephen Jones · Joined: 21 Feb 2003 Posts: 4124

The Saudi Gazette article gets it all wrong.

What is being ranked is not the academic standards of the university, nor the quality of the teaching, nor the quality of the research, but simply the web site.

This explains the dire Saudi position, and also the fact that the US dominate the top 50 positions, and that Cambridge University, considered the second in the world in academic ranking
http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2006/ARWU2006TOP500list.htm
comes 19th on the webmetrics form.

Arab Strap · Joined: 25 Feb 2004 Posts: 246 Location: under your bed

I was struck by the headline not the content sorry.........still I wonder what the truth is and how you can really measure the quality of an educational institution.

Stephen Jones · Joined: 21 Feb 2003 Posts: 4124

The content of the Saudi Gazette story is plain wrong, so the fault is not yours.

Perhaps we could have had another headline:
"Saudi newspapers the worst on the planet"?

Cleopatra · Posted: Sat Nov 11, 2006 9:26 am Post subject:

The Saudi Gazette is like "The Sun" or "Bild Zeitung" operating under strict censorship. IE. a tacky tabloid with none of the lurid scandals that make the former two rags a sometimes guilty pleasure.

furiousmilksheikali · Posted: Sat Nov 11, 2006 12:00 pm Post subject:

Cleopatra · Posted: Sat Nov 11, 2006 12:09 pm Post subject:

Actually, Bild doesn't have Page 3 either! It does have lurid pictures of car crashes though....

None could be as obscene as your pic of a former Trotskiyite turned neo-con. That is "Hitch" in your avatar, is it not?

furiousmilksheikali · Posted: Sat Nov 11, 2006 12:37 pm Post subject:

Queen of Sheba · Joined: 07 May 2006 Posts: 397

Given the turn of events, I retract my previous statement and edit it to: Since Administration has not taken notice of their short-comings, it will take another 20 years for the education system to become lucid.

Henry_Cowell · Joined: 27 May 2005 Posts: 3352 Location: Berkeley

Stephen Jones · Joined: 21 Feb 2003 Posts: 4124

The SJTU listing has 17 US universities in the top 20, and 37 US universities in the top 50 -- still domination.

The list is partial; it is biased towards the Sciences and also excludes non-university institutions even though they perform the same function as universities; the 'grandes ecoles' in France or the Indian Institutes of Technology.

Also it will reflect past glories rather than present acheivments; Nobel prizewinners count for a pretty high proportion of points, yet there is a massive time lag between the research that leads to a Nobel prize being carried out and the prize being awarded (and of course an even greater lag between the work to set up the potential for Nobel prize winning research and the actual prize).

englishgibson · Joined: 09 Mar 2005 Posts: 4345

Cleopatra · Posted: Sun Nov 12, 2006 9:01 am Post subject: