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Organized in cooperation with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the World Bank, the Forum brought together representatives of the most widely observed and influential university rankings, policy-makers and key higher education stakeholders.
Individual sessions dealt with the value of rankings, their impact on policy and practice, proposals for the development of accountability tools based on methodology and indicators, and also at the need for benchmarking as an alternative to rankings. The Forum concluded with the message that rankings are here to stay but that they should develop to be of greater relevance to universities, students and policy-makers, and to take into account local contexts.
In summing up, Stamenka Uvalić-Trumbić, Head of the UNESCO higher education section noted predictions that higher education enrolment would peak at 263 million students in 2025 from 158 million today: "Accommodating the additional 105 million students would require more than four major universities to open every week for the next 15 years," she said. Sir John Daniel, President of the Commonwealth of Learning echoed this, observing that the massification of higher education and increasing enrolments mean that there is a need for world-class systems rather than just a few high-class institutions.
Sources: UNESCO education section and University World News
27 May 2011