The future of our country and the answer to the question of whether we will succeed in the face of the threats and opportunities of the modern-day economy lies within the classes of our schools.
Within the four walls of every classroom, in the sparkle of the eyes of every single student of ours, in each minute during which the teacher patiently educates our children, lie the keys to the success or failure of our country.
Since we obtained our sovereignty, our economy has grown from strength to strength under successive governments. However, when compared to our colleagues in the European Union – not to mention other micro states outside the European continent – we are still not competitive enough, not creative enough and our economy is definitely small when compared to its potential.
A brief look at some nominal GDP per capita figures says it all. Our nominal GDP per capita is at €14,000 per person, well below the EU average of €23,600 per person. Other small European countries like Cyprus (€21,200) and Iceland (€27,200) fare much better than us while other small states which are outside the European continent, like Singapore and the Bahamas, have a nominal GDP per capita akin to that of Finland and South Korea respectively.
Our future definitely lies with education, education and education. And leaving aside all the cheap, political talk and catcphrases about the terrific new schools we’re building and the loads of millions the Finance Minister is allocating each year to education in the Budget, we have to ask ourselves: are our schools succeeding?
There are a number of international benchmarks and assessments which allow us to ascertain the level of progress of our educational systems.
For instance, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’s Programme for International Student Assessment presents the results of testing 28 million 15-year-olds in 74 educational systems that together account for 87 per cent of the world economy. Malta, unfortunately, does not feature in this study.
In the field of higher education, there are three important benchmarks for universities: The Times Higher Education University Rankings, the QS World University Rankings and the Academic Ranking of World Universities. These benchmarks are effective because they directly help international students to diligently pick and choose a particular foreign University on the basis of the success it obtains in those results.
Unbelievably, despite all the talk about Vision 2015+ and of excellence, the University of Malta, is not even listed in any of the three leading benchmarks in the field of higher education. Apart from the fact that by not being listed in any of the three leading international benchmarks we as a country are effectively rendering ourselves invisible to potential prospective foreign students (the University needs to attract foreign students in order to survive financially in the long term); this unfortunate reality does little to enhance the reputation which we all believe the University should have in a modern, knowledge-based economy.
Our University is one of the oldest in Europe – it was enacted on November 12, 1595 – and has produced along the years a number of leading academics. However, the fact that our University has failed to appear anywhere on the radar of the three most important benchmarks is definitely something not to be proud of.
Let me breeze through the rankings one by one. The QS World University Rankings is a ranking of the world’s top 500 universities by Quacquarelli Symonds using a methodology that has been published annually since 2004. According to the last research (2010-2011), our University does not feature in a list of 600+ universities.
The QS also provide a hotlist of countries which offer the best tertiary education to foreign students. While small countries like Singapore are prominently featured in this list, Malta is not mentioned anywhere. Similary, the British Council-sponsored Global Gauge, which gives a list of “top countries” for foreign tertiary students, does not even provide a passing mention of Malta while another small country by the name of Malaysia is specifically listed among the countries to go to for tertiary studies.
The Times Higher Education World University Rankings is the second international ranking study of the world’s top universities, published by Times Higher Education. Our University is not listed in the top 200, nor is it listed by region or by reputation.
Finally, the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), commonly known as the Shanghai ranking, is a publication that was founded and compiled by the Shanghai Jiaotong University. There is a whole list of 500 universities. Our University is not mentioned anywhere in this list.
Not being at least mentioned in those leading assessments does not only harm our collective aspiration of being a centre of excellence in the field of higher education but it takes away from us a golden opportunity to identify our strengths and weaknesses compared to our competitors.
We cannot keep acting as if we’re happy to think that our University is the educational equivalent of a traditional parish church in the middle of a Maltese village which takes care of the spiritual needs of the immediate micro community. I am sure the persons leading the University right now have a much broader horizon in their mind and are well aware that Europe’s economic competitors are improving their performance.
If we truly believe that our University must become a centre of excellence in our region, then we should invest as hard as we can to portray ourselves as a truly competitive and modern University and thus a leading country with a strong and well-performing economy.
Benchmarking is the key to building a strong reputation of skill and competence.
owen@owenbonnici.com
Dr Bonnici is the Opposition spokesman for higher education, university, research and culture and member of the Foreign and European Affairs Parliamentary Committee.