The Hebrew University dropped nine places to the 102nd place, Tel Aviv University maintains the 114th place and the Technion was ranked 132nd (a drop of 23 places) * Difficult results also in a survey by a Sephardi institute that rates the degree of accessibility to the researchers' publications
Five years of cuts in higher education since Benjamin Netanyahu's term as finance minister are starting to give their signal. No Israeli university is among the 100 best universities in the world by The Times. On the one hand, China and Europe are investing billions of dollars and euros in the development of universities, Israel is cutting back, and this is the result.
A year ago it was The Hebrew University is placed in the 93rd place, and this year it is only in the 102nd place. Tel Aviv University is ranked 114th, exactly the same place as in 2008. And the Technion is ranked 132nd (109th in 2008). The ranking includes only universities that also teach undergraduate degrees, a fact that excludes the Weizmann Institute from the ranking.
The three Israeli research universities ranked among the top 200 universities in the world place Israel 14th in the list of countries represented in the ranking, after countries that are mostly much larger, much richer and invest in their higher education more than Israel.
Tel Aviv University stands out in the average citation index per faculty member, whose weight in the overall ranking is 20%: it is ranked 17th to 21st, ahead of leading universities such as Yale, Cornell, Duke, Columbia, etc., and is the first among Israeli universities.
Another index in which Tel Aviv University excels is the peer evaluation, which weighs 40%: in this index, it ranks 77-84. According to these two indicators - citations and peer evaluation - whose total weight in the ranking is 60%, Tel Aviv University is ranked first among Israeli universities, in 36th place in the world.
The indicators that lower Tel Aviv University in the overall ranking are the ratio between the number of students and faculty members (which weighs 20%), the evaluation of graduates by employers from all over the world (10%), the proportion of international faculty members (5%) and the proportion of international students (5%).
At the same time, a Spanish institution published a ranking ranking the universities according to the activity of their researchers that is reflected on the Internet (studies, citations, outreach to the general public, etc.). site ranking web of world universities Ranks the Hebrew University in 171st place in the world (16th place in the Asian ranking led by the University of Tokyo).
The Technion is on this list in second place in Israel - 221st in the world ranking, 25th in Asia. Third, Tel Aviv University is ranked 238th in the world, 26th in Asia. Fifth is the Weizmann Institute, which is in 314th place in the world (32nd in Asia), sixth is Haifa University (526th in the world - outside the TOP 500 ranking, which in previous years all Israeli universities belonged to it, 62nd in Asia. And the list is sealed by Ben-Gurion University (561st place in the world, 70th in Asia ).
To illustrate, all the 23 best universities in the world are in the USA. In first place is the Massachusetts Institute of Technology - MIT, and in second place is Harvard. Stanford third, UC Berkeley fourth and Cornell fifth.
The ranking is an initiative of Cyber-Matrix Laboratories, a research group that belongs to the largest public research body in Spain - CSIC. Its initial goal was to promote online academic publications as a substitute for the established and expensive scientific journals, and to provide open electronic access to scientific publications and other academic material. During the research it became clear that there are many parameters that need to be considered in order to examine the visibility of the universities towards the rest of the global academic community.
While other rankings focus only on a limited number of relevant aspects, in particular research results (scientific publications), the CSIC ranking uses additional indicators to better define the whole picture, and additional activities of the faculty and researchers as seen in their web presence.
The activity covers not only the formal publications (electronic magazines, archives) but also informal communication. Publishing on the Internet while maintaining the high standards of peer review is cheap, and thus allows it to reach a wider public, and allow access to scientific knowledge for researchers from institutions in developing countries and third parties (economy, industry, decision makers) in their communities.
The research was carried out by examining a number of parameters related to the scientific articles - the number of pages of the studies as captured by Google, Live (Microsoft) and Exalead engines; Visibility - the number of unique external links pointing to each academic site, something that can only be done through Yahoo Search, access to files - after the evolution that the scientific publications went through, and considering the volume of the different formats, only articles written in the following formats - PDF, PS, DOC (of Microsoft Word) were selected ), and PowerPoint. The data was derived from the Google, Yahoo, Live (Microsoft) and Exalead search engines; Google Scholar: Provides the number of articles and citations for each academic site. These results represent articles, reports and other academic items.
22 תגובות
In my opinion, all the bees do not change anything. Israelis including the students, the maximum they will do is strike.
Students don't have money for studies. Young people who are above average sometimes don't get to universities at all, I'm talking about the south.
Ministers and prime ministers will only change.
What's more, actions like student demonstrations in France have always helped. The young people need to strengthen their status as students, the status of the universities, so that the wonderful minds that are here do not flee to the United States and the lecturers will make the change, but not by bees and articles. Because the government will not do it for them.
sympathetic:
I understand the rationale of your words but I am afraid there is a certain problem with it for two reasons.
One is that creative and educated people are needed in industry just as much as in academia.
The second is that a large part of the people with high potential do not know at all, at the beginning of their studies, whether they want to continue research or move to industry.
The decisive consideration is often economic and there are also other factors that influence the choice.
Reservists, for example, who are undoubtedly one of the more talented populations that come to university, interrupt their course of study for the purpose of military service.
More often than not, this truncation of the path and subsequent entry into the industry is a decisive factor in the reservist's decision not to return to the academy.
I also think that the idea that the colleges will be able to afford to compromise on the level of the material taught (I assume that this is what you meant and not the "teaching level" because I think that in any case it is desirable that those who are engaged in teaching should try and even be required to be a good teacher) is not good and that if someone does not want to learn that they should not learn - No one is forcing him. There is no reason to establish academic institutions for the benefit of those who do not want to study at an academic level.
If he only wants to learn to program - he should go to a non-academic programming course. There is no reason to crown him with a title he did not earn.
The problem is not in grades, yes or no. The phrase I used for the first time is a factory for degrees (response 12) and only later the discussion was converted to a factory for grades following (response 13). The main question I tried to discuss is whether the universities live up to their mission of training a generation of researchers and scientists and whether they actually reach the desired target audience, or whether society simply turns them into a continuation of high school. The point I was trying to make is that high school should train citizens for life in the modern world, while the purpose of universities should be to impart knowledge to those people who wish to engage in research. If that were the case, the students would not complain so much about the level of teaching. And those who wanted to acquire a profession or a certificate would turn to colleges.
On one of the occasions when my subordinate was about to be expelled from the officers' course (I have an impressive record of 3 out of 3 in saving people in this position) the command staff who was in charge of him in the course claimed that he was unmotivated and interested in nothing but the grades.
I, as his commander who came to save him, was not supposed to talk about what happened in the course itself (because I wasn't there) and the arguments I was supposed to present in his favor were supposed to be something along the lines of "Working in our unit - he never showed a lack of motivation" or "Working in a computer unit is different It's very different from the work in the fighting units and the indices with us are different" or some other such nonsense.
Instead - I asked the instructors:
"But his grades - are they good?"
The instructors answered me: "Yes - they are very good."
"Then," I told them, "the problem is yours! You don't give grades for the things you really want the trainee to demonstrate, and therefore he has no way of knowing that he doesn't meet your requirements. After all, the grades are your way of conveying to him your degree of satisfaction with his performance, and if you give him good grades The message he receives from you is that he is one hundred percent!"
The instructors became silent and Mofaz - who at the time was the commander of the 1st Battalion - decided to keep him on the course.
I think this is the case in universities.
If the grades express what they are supposed to express, then good grades mean meeting expectations.
After all, the very statement that someone does not meet expectations despite his good grades is simply giving another grade - but on a subject that the student was not told in advance that he was going to be tested on.
It's been a long time since I studied at the university... but nowadays I hear from people that there is pressure on lecturers to transfer students and raise the average in the courses. The approach in some universities that do not understand that they are actually spreading the word is that the student is a customer who must be pleased. On the other hand, I don't necessarily agree with the Technion's approach that you mention, but it at least helps the institution maintain its good name as an elitist institution.
If that's the case, then what does the Technion care, for example, that the grades will always reflect the Gaussian curve. And what would happen if everyone studied the material well and got a 90? It should be taken from them by force and weaken them in negotiations with employers in front of colleagues from other universities where this accounting is not done?
I say this from my bitter experiences as a student at the Technion, although some years have passed since then, although I remember the rest of the things well.
The main question to ask is whether most students come to universities to acquire knowledge or degrees/grades
which are necessary as a threshold condition for acceptance to jobs. The role of universities is to produce research and knowledge and not to be used as a means of filtering between candidates for jobs. The exams at the university should be used as feedback on the teaching and a factor in setting standards and not as an end in itself.
Friends:
I am afraid that the rejection of the term "grade factory" is nothing more than a matter of fashion and not of substance.
When the grades are given on the qualities and skills that the student is expected to demonstrate - there is nothing better than a university that prepares him in the perfect way to receive high grades.
It may be that some of the complaints formulated in this way express frustration with the fact that the grades are given for the wrong things, but I think that understanding the above will allow people to express themselves more clearly and say which things the university should give a grade on and does not give, and which grades it gives are not necessary to express the The qualities and skills that interest us.
This understanding should also be applied at the higher level - that of giving grades to universities.
If - as it is written in the article - one of the indicators of the quality of the university is that of "employers from all over the world evaluate the graduates", then it is certainly possible that the survey editors actually expect the university to train people who will not necessarily engage in research (it does depend on the interpretation of the term "employers", but it seems to me that the correct interpretation in this case is not only "research bodies").
Of course, this conclusion also arises from the fact that there is a bachelor's degree!
Lenir A
Unfortunately today the universities are turning into a factory for grades since the minimum condition for getting a reasonable job is a bachelor's degree. Therefore the universities are full of students who are only interested in a degree and not the possibility of becoming researchers. In my opinion, the place for students interested in a profession or a certificate only should be the colleges.
The number of students does not always determine the attitude towards them on the part of the lecturer. Lecturers do like to teach about their research topics, but lecturers also like to teach students who are interested in the material and ask practical questions. It is difficult to have an intimate atmosphere in large classes containing dozens of students. It's hard to get an intimate atmosphere.
When a lecturer has to teach several courses to students who only want to know what will be on the test, the attitude is usually accordingly.
To the fan (12). First, no one claimed that the universities should be a factory for Zionism, they should train the next generation of researchers. A good researcher cannot be ignorant of basic topics and this is the current situation, students finish math courses but don't actually understand what a derivative is, or take programming courses and don't really understand what a computer program is.
Second, let me poke fun at the relationship between the ratio and the amount of students. I have already seen courses of 100 people where the lecturer was patient and I have seen courses of 20 people where the lecturer was incomprehensible. In fact the only time I have seen lecturers enthusiastic about teaching is when they are talking about their research topic.
The universities are supposed to be elitist research institutes and not factories that produce degrees. The insulting treatment of students stems from a teaching load that originates from the universities' per-student budget. Budgeting per student leads to an increase in the number of students which leads to a decrease in the personal ratio per student and a deterioration in the level of teaching as well as the level of research. A university bachelor's degree should be a privilege for individuals who plan to continue research and not for the general population. Those who are looking for a profession or a practical field to study at a college.
I believe that Bibi is preventing further deterioration. Streamlining is the key word, alongside 'Zionism' and values. Sociopathic professors are an evolutionary dead-end of academia.
Regrettably, I agree with the opinions expressed here already. The universities are deteriorating through their own fault. A student who is treated as empty air in the first degree will not be able to stay in Israel for the second or third degree. The lecturers treat the undergraduate students as a chore at best and a serious nuisance at worst. A lecturer will not be rewarded according to his ability to produce potential researchers, but solely due to his own research, everything else is someone else's problem as far as he is concerned. The junior staff is also not selected based on the quality of teaching rather than financial considerations and the moving film method.
And I don't even begin to talk about the mismanagement of funds (the university and the gambling of the stock market) or the reluctance to disclose the salaries of all university employees.
The main thing is that there is "security" in the country and we are ready for a nuclear war with Iran. tinsmith…
On the other hand, the tannery education here is the best in the world!
This is related to the fact that the parents neglect their role in the advancement of the children and imagine that the Ministry of Education is doing the work.
I agree with Ami. It's not all Bibi's fault.
The fact that the first 23 places are in the USA is not surprising, given that the ranking also refers to international faculty members and international students, it is likely that the USA will have the most, regardless of the level of the university.
Without your emphasis in the first line we would not have understood the article Mr. Blizovsky.
Glad you were able to cram your political agenda in here.
And as an outstanding graduate of computer science, the reason I don't want to return to academia is not the need to study, but the thought that I will have to study under the same type of lecturers again.
The lecturers have become worse than doctors in some faculties in thinking that they are God being sensitive only to their status and the Gaussian curve of the grades they give. There is no atmosphere of personal acquaintance here in Israel like in the sand and in order for a lecturer to know you enough to recommend you to an employer you have to stick to his tusks and lick... sorry for being blunt all the time....
There is no encouragement of teaching here, but encouragement of grades at best. Let's not talk about the relevance of most of the subjects that are taught at all which, as in my case, do not prepare you at all for professional life and insist on remaining on the border of theory and languages that have long since died
In such an atmosphere, and one that encourages not only those who have accumulated enough PAZM instead, but the better ones in terms of acceptance to higher positions... no wonder good people don't want to stay in the academy..
And it is no wonder that it has become something more reminiscent of a workers' committee in the Histadrut than a body of good minds.
We used to have no money for anything in the country and there were great minds....Try to explain it on top of a cut
Dear Mr. Blizovsky, the connection between budget cuts and the deterioration of academic education is your private conclusion, and it is appropriate that you state it. In my opinion, there is bad management, there are rampant irregularities in the universities, and above all, a lack of care for students and research staff stemming from foreign considerations, and the hand is tilted. Not only the "budget" is responsible for the situation.
Thanks. fixed.
In the penultimate paragraph there is a spelling error in the third line. should be wide. Also, in the first paragraph, the Hebrew University is mentioned twice
Leave quotes. The teaching staff at the Faculty of Engineering in Tel Aviv is simply atrocious and uncaring for the students.
With such a tsusiomat faculty, no one wants to pursue a master's degree.