Lies about Malaysian Universities - Stupid move by government

There are three kinds of lies; Lies, LIES and STATISTICS.

And yes, I am calling the OIC University Ranking given in Parliament by the Minister above as LYING STATISTICS, because it gives an impression that the OIC ranking are ACCEPTABLE comparison against the THES statistics. I implore the readers to ignore the final half of the video, which was reported widely (the use of bad Tamil word, and Gobalakrishnan's whisper). Listen carefully to the BN Minister.

Here goes.

The world-wide recognized higher education ranking system, the Times Higher Education QS World Ranking, gives the following results for Universities ranking for 2007, as quoted by the Minister above:

UM is 246
UKM is 309
USM is 307
UPM is 364

Now, he claims that this is not too bad, because among OIC countries, the SESRIC body for the OIC reports

UM is 14
UKM is 12
USM is 41
UPM not ranked

The TRUTH is, our Malaysian Universities are unable to compete in the professional league. So we went and created our own league; the OIC league, an idea mooted by...who else? Malaysia!

The JOKE is, this Minister is either lying by omission, or he is ignorant.

Because the ACTUAL TRUTH is the following:
1. In the OIC ranking, there were only 84 Universities surveyed, because of "unavailability" of data from the possible list of 322 Universities. So we are top 50 of 84 Universities!
2. In the OIC ranking, the top 11 ranked Universities above UKM are
(1) University is Quaid-e-Azam, Pakistan
(2) Koc Univ, Turkey
(3) Razi Univ, Iran
(4) Tarbiat Modares Univ, Iran
(5) Univ Tabriz, Iran
(6) Hacettepe Univ, Turkey
(7) Istanbul Univ, Turkey
(8) American Univ Beirut, Lebanon
(9) United Arab Emirates Univ, UAE
(10) Suez Canal Univ, Egypt
(11) Kuwait Univ, Kuwait

Now, lets cross reference these Universities against the THES top 400.

What do we find? An earth-shattering news for those in the higher education ministry!NONE of these Universities are in the THES top 400 ranking!

The only "Istanbul" found is for Istanbul Technical University ranked at 390! But this is a different University than the one listed at number 7. I finally found Istanbul University at the 401-500 listing.

So I demand an explanation from the Higher Education Ministry:
1. Why are we worse off than the Universities ranked even worse in the THES system?
2. Why is the minister duping the MPs in Parliament by bringing up OIC ranking, when a pathetic 84 Universities took part in the survey?
3. How can the Minister blatantly give a FALSE impression that OIC ranking can be compared against THES, all in one single breath? These two rankings are worlds apart, in terms of the sample size, scientific methodologies, integrity and international acceptance!

Please answer ASAP. This is a subject of national interest.

Because if we keep going on like this, by comparing ourselves against the worst, instead of the best, our Universities will soon be kicked out of the top 500 list! Especially since NUS, which was part of UM before the separation of Malaysia-Singapore is at 33, while UM has been flushed down to 246!





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