The universities in China have so many problems to tackle that it is pointless to pay too much attention to their exact rankings, says a commentary in Nanfang Metropolis News. An excerpt follows:

 

A list rating universities around the world was recently released by a research center affiliated with Wuhan University. Nine of the 10 best universities were in the US. Peking University won the top position for a Chinese university, ranked 192.

 

Among all kinds of university listings, this list surprised the public for the low rankings of Chinese universities.

 

However, the public is not as concerned about university rankings as it was years ago. The universities have been burdened with so many problems that the rankings no longer matter that much.

 

Jilin University ranks 382 on the list, making it one of the eight Chinese universities among the top 400 world universities. But this university shocked the country by announcing its 3 billion yuan (US$384.6 million) debt last month. The announcement triggered a national investigation to check the assets of the universities.

 

The university managers, the faculty, the officials and those concerned about higher education are divided on the heavy debts of universities, academic frauds and the mechanisms for managing universities.

 

Universities have been encouraged by officials or localities to expand quickly as a manifestation of local administrative performance. As a result, universities have to rely on the administration for more resources to support their expansion. This produces problems.

 

To ensure the sound growth of higher education, the key issues should be academic freedom, the pursuit of a humanist spirit and the search for truth through scientific research. These concerns are not likely to be reflected in simple rankings.

 

(China Daily April 12, 2007)