Collins Dictionary tells us that, “If you say that something is futile, you mean there is no point in doing it, usually because it has no chance of succeeding.” It is difficult to think of a better description of a student scanning the Times Higher Education or QS World Rankings or any of the multiplicity of other rankings that have proliferated from those organizations. They don’t really tell students anything useful about whether the institution is right for them as an individual or whether it will allow them to fulfil their life and career ambitions.
All the evidence suggests that the primary motivator for going to higher education is to enhance job prospects. Chegg’s survey across 21 countries, INTO’s research with agents and Gallup surveys are among indicators that for both home and international students a degree is largely a means to an end. That is not to say that people don’t want to study something they enjoy – just that the degree is the aim.
Most existing rankings are, however, just an attempt to monetize industry data for commercial ends and the sector collaborates, possibly because it’s the way things have always been done. The rankings, as someone said, “Xerox privilege” by reaffirming existing hierarchies and usually allow institutions to manipulate their data, sometimes beyond the point of criminality. For the institutions they are vanity projects which lead to dubious internal resource allocation, avoid hard questions about graduate employability and distort the decision making of Governments, funders and students.
Utility, on the other hand, is “the quality or property of being useful” and we may be beginning to see the glimmer of some media developing data to be genuinely useful to students. It is a timely and smart move because we are nearly at the point where AI will give students the opportunity to have near total, instant and absolutely personalized university search capability at their fingertips. That should send a shudder through ranking organizations that are wedded to a business model and presentation based on early 2000s thinking.
Money magazine’s Best Colleges 2023 may point the way. It still has a vapid “star” system to allow colleges to be ranked but the database begins to say some useful, student oriented, things about Acceptance Rate, tuition fee (both headline price but more importantly average actual price) and graduation rate. Imagine if that database approach married itself, in the US, to the work of a company like College Viability, LLC which gives an insight into reasons which a college “…may not be financially viable for the time required to earn a degree from that college.” Then, add to the mix comprehensive information on the graduate outcomes and career payback from specific degrees – the Princeton Review Best Value Colleges gives a flavour but still ends up as a ranking with limited coverage.
In the UK, the growth of private universities and the significant difference in tuition fees at graduate level between public universities makes the approach equally appropriate. Such a database would begin to answer the most pressing of student needs – will I get in and with what grades, am I likely to graduate, and what are my career and earning prospects thereafter? There could be plenty of further nuance added, including grades required, accommodation, measures of student experience and so on.
All of this could be done without the need for a grading system. The problem with rankings is that the company doing the ranking sets an arbitrary test which institutions do their best to pass with a high grade. This entirely excludes the student from having any input into the criteria but the results are then presented as an aspirational or emotional nirvana for them to consider.
A smart organization would be ensuring that their data collection is driven by the real world needs and concerns of students. It’s time to remove the worthies who make up the Advisory Groups and Panels for the major ranking organizations and find ways of engaging directly with potential students. The outcome would be relevant, dynamic and have utility for millions around the globe.
It would also be a driver for universities to engage more effectively with the issue of graduate employment both through on-campus services and establishing strong data on careers and jobs. Colleagues including Louise Nicol of Asia Careers Group and Shane Dillon of CTurtle have been demonstrating for years that smart use of technology even makes it possible to leave antiquated, email driven surveys of graduates behind in collecting the data. The answers might even begin to convince Governments around the world that universities are engaging effectively and adding value to economic growth and sustainability.
McKinsey and many others have written about personalization of the customer experience in retail with much of the impetus being given by technology. The insurance world has seen the rise and rise of aggregators and there is talk of the “personalized insurance engine” that gives a fully automated customer journey. Potential students are hungry for better decision making option and education needs to catch up fast with the opportunities that exist.
Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay
