Azerbaijani universities do not appear on the lists ...

The report was prepared by the experts of the World Class Universities Research Center (CWCU) of the Academy of Higher Education of the Shanghai University of China.

Today in the world several authoritative publications and specialized international agencies are involved in the ranking of universities and educational programs. These are the magazines "Times Higher Education", "Forbes", analytical company QS (Quacquarelli Symonds), which apply various systems of assessing the activities of universities in the world. The most prestigious is the Shanghai rating or ARWU, because this list includes the best of the best. It is the most objective, since it takes into account not only the bibliometric indicators of the activity of universities, but also the availability of holders of prestigious awards among employees and graduates.

Four criteria are used to compile the ARWU. This is the number of graduates and employees who received the Nobel Prize and Fields Prize, the number of researchers with a high citation index, the number of articles indexed in the Science Citation Index-Expanded (SCIE) and the Social Science Citation Index (SSCI). Finally, the fourth parameter takes into account the effectiveness of each employee of the university (Per Capita Performance), that is, the sum of scores for all the above parameters is divided by the number of scientists and teachers of the university.

About 1200 universities in the world correspond to these criteria, among them 500 best fall are included onto the Shanghai rating. The University, which has demonstrated the highest scores in all categories, is assigned 100 points, for others the percentage of the highest score is calculated.

This year, the study involved 1500 universities around the world. The 500 best universities were selected from them. The current rating on the results of the evaluation parameters headed the Harvard University. Stanford University and Cambridge University rank the second and third, respectively. The leading places also occupied the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of California at Berkeley, and Princeton University. The famous Oxford University ranks the 8th position.

The University of Istanbul (Turkey), Tehran University and the Technological University of Amirkabir (Iran), the Moscow State University, the St. Petersburg State University, the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, the Novosibirsk State University (Russia) are on the list of favorites.

It is unlikely that among the teachers of Tehran University or Novosibirsk State University there are Nobel laureates. Hence, on other parameters, their activities received such high marks that they were among the favorites.

Azerbaijani universities do not appear in the Shanghai list, as well as in other ratings. Not only because among the graduates of our universities there are no Nobel and Fields Prize winners. An important criterion, as mentioned, is the scientific activity of higher schools, the number of indexed articles and the scientific productivity of teachers. But here, too, Azerbaijan has nothing to boast about. Our university teachers are engaged in tutoring, writing diploma works for students or dissertations for deputies of the Milli Majlis and ministers.

In his comments on this occasion, the expert on education, Nadir Israfilov, notes that Azerbaijani universities, even if they are included the regional ratings, occupy the last places.

"Shanghai is a prestigious rating, and it's rather difficult to get there. The selection criteria are complex. If you look at the list, it's easy to see that many universities have a centuries-old history, have a huge scientific potential, projects are carried out under the auspices of Nobel laureates. Unfortunately, in terms of our higher schools there is really nothing to be missed. A lot of work has to be done to meet international criteria. This concerns both the quality of teaching students, and the teaching staff, scientific productive activities," the expert points out.

The doctor of pedagogical sciences Ajdar Agayev does not agree with the opinion of Israfilov. According to him, in Azerbaijan there is a university with 100 years of history (BSU). Other universities also function for decades, but they are not even close to international ratings.

"The main thing is not the age of the university, but its effective activity, contribution to national and world science, economics, the demand for graduates by the labor market. We do not have this. There are several reasons. The most important is the inadequate funding of higher schools. As a result, a weak financial and technical base, a low rate of informatization of the educational process, a low level of scientific research, irrelevance of scientific topics, a low level of quality of study. In such conditions, what scientific works can be published in international scientific publications? ", the expert notes.

The problem is that the country does not even rank universities at the national level. National ratings prepare the universities to global competition, so they should be as close to international standards as possible. The rating, compiled annually, reflects only the priorities of applicants with high scores in the choice of specialties: which higher education institution they prefer.