Following the announcement of results of the Kurdistan national university ranking for the academic year of 2015-2016, Salahaddin University could be seen in Group B, the University Council would like to show disagreement with the results because of a number of reasons as follows:
1. Without referring to the Ministry Council, the Ministry of Higher Education (MHE) set up a committee of four members. Unfortunately, the committee did not consist of representatives of all the universities in KRG, except two universities. Moreover, MHE has not referred back to the no. 10 in 2008 regulations of MHE which is concerned with the key issues in higher education. National ranking of the universities is considered one of the vital issues and its criteria should be set by the Ministry Council.
2. Last year’s committee was disbanded. Although SU formally asked to have a member of the new committee, the request was overlooked despite the fact that the minister of MHE and his counsellor approved of the notion.
3. It is observed that the ranking criteria are in favour of some universities.
4. The University Council deems it necessary for the ranking to be carried out according to the university’s size as opposed to assessing all the universities together so that the procedure is more scientific and unbiased as Deputy Prime Minister mentioned in the opening speech in the announcement conference of the Kurdistan National University ranking. On the other hand, the Minister of MHE shed light on the role that the students can have in the ranking process. However, in some universities the student attendance was below average compared to SU and SU has the largest number of students in KRG.
5. First, we would like to congratulate the universities which have achieved a high rank. However, we would ask: Were the set criteria reliable? Were they scientific? If so, how come SU achieves a low rank when a single SU instructor can carry out 32 in a year and publish them in the Impact Factor journal so that garners 40 points for research in the ranking process? What about the rest of SU researchers and their research projects?
6. For more information, the university has 100 professors and 2300 university teachers who have carried out 600 research projects in the academic year of 2015-16.
7. How possible is it for a university’s research project to be counted the second time to affect the universities ranking?
8. One criterion is the university’s environment. How come a university’s edifice is counted as a criterion meanwhile building SU’s campus is not under the university’s control?
9. The universities which went on strike during the academic year should have been removed from the list of the ranking.
10. MHE has been contacted frequently by SU to either open Medical Departments at SU or reintegrate SU and Hawler Medical University (which was part of SU before); however, the request has been overlooked. Obviously, this has influenced SU ranking.
Therefore, as SU Council, we ask the Minister of MHE to respond to our complaints because we believe that our university has not been ranked aptly with the criteria and mechanism employed. We ask that data should be assessed by an unbiased committee taking into account the points we have referred to here. They should set accurate and dependable criteria.
Finally, we do not approve of the result of the ranking, and we have reached a decision; if our request is not responded, we will not be part of the ranking process in the future, and we will take the necessary action to return to the university its entitlements.
The University Council-Erbil
19/10/2016
Date :20th Oct 2016
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