The GV Ranking?

Faith asked me how I come up with a university ranking for a country. I tried to explain and bounced off the maximum character limit for a reply in LinkedIn :-)

For some countries there are variable multifactorial rankings where you can set your own priorities as a student. Look at U-Multirank by CHE Centre for Higher Education - I love the idea!

However, when you are new to a country, and you need a first overview of the higher education landscape, a ranking is a good starting point. I did this in Thailand, when I was new. I do it in Ghana, because I'm still new.

This is my personal GV tool? - Sometimes, I like to play around with data in my free time. No official statement by any institution implied.

"Methodology"

I started with a list of (probably) all universities and looked for university rankings Ghana. The really reputable rankings only list less than ten well established universities. If you know the country, you can guess who's going to be on there. These rankings count with a weight factor of 4 in my personal ranking (Times Higher Education & QS Quacquarelli Symonds, U.S. News Education).

There are other rankings that are based on research publications and citations like EduRank and AD Scientific Index with a less sophisticated approach ranking a lot of universities worldwide, still based on scientific criteria - coming in at a weight factor 2 for my taste.

Third tier are random rankings with a lot of universities on them like Webometric or Unirank - these rankings are basically looking at the website traffic, which is not the best way to judge a university - but still better than nothing: weight factor 1.

The sum of all the rankings with

(MaxRank - Rank) / MaxRank * Weight

give a value per university, the higher the better. So basically, it's an afternoon of web search and excel.

Scope and limitations

First of all, University rankings are a very limited tool! Don't let your decisions in life be guided by rankings.

Secondly, high-ranking universities may still provide bad services for students. Realistically, the undergraduate student will not be allowed to use the large hadron collider which made the physics department of the university famous.

Thirdly, the result is absolutely disputable. Should there be other rankings considered? Could the weight be calculated differently? Do those rankings favour old and well-established institutions? Could the institution assigned to rank 25 be ranked at 15? Yeah, all of the above ...

The GV Ranking? can only be a rough estimate.

"Findings"

Some universities have a high reputation, and chances are that good teaching and research is done there. I can easily identify them by looking for bright yellow or greenish confetti on my map.

Other universities may have very strong research going on just in certain faculties or departments. Some universities are very young and dynamic. Those places typically do not show up high in any ranking - I am still curious to learn about them like the University of Environment and Sustainable Development, where I went in September. And I'll always do my best to identify potential partners! So, please take the map with a grain of salt.