MP: It’s quality, not quantity of research output that’s vital

DAP’s Zairil Khir Johari says Idris Jusoh is playing around with statistics to paint a rosy picture of the calibre of the country’s universities.

PETALING JAYA: The quantity of academic publications churned out cannot be used as an indication of how well our Malaysian universities are doing unless the impact and quality of the research output is proven to be noteworthy, said DAP’s Zairil Khir Johari.

In a statement today, the MP for Bukit Bendera criticised Second Education Minister Idris Jusoh for boasting that Malaysian universities had surpassed those in Singapore by churning out more academic publications, calling it a “disingenuous” claim because there was no consideration on the impact and quality of the work.

“A more nuanced assessment should not only take into account the number of publications, but the impact and quality of the research output.”

“For example, the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore recently placed first in Asia in terms of quality and impact of research, based on a study by Thomson Reuters and Elsevier,” Zairil said, telling the minister to reveal the ranking of Malaysian universities in the Thomson ISI Index.

He also said Idris Jusoh was adamant about tracking local universities’ progress via QS rankings only and none others.

“The QS results are indeed a positive achievement, but the only way to prove the success of our universities in an objective manner without the bias inherent in any single methodology, is to compare the results with other international assessments,” Zairil, who is DAP Parliamentary Spokesperson for Education, Science and Technology said.

“For example, the latest Best Global Universities Ranking by Thomson Reuters placed UM at 423rd in the world while the Centre for World University Rankings had the same university at 492nd.”

He said this underperformance was actually consistent with the fact that UM had failed to make it into the top 400 of the Times Higher Education World University Rankings since 2010.

“Therefore, the use of the QS rankings alone as proof of our ‘progress’ is nothing more than cherry-picking.”

Pointing out that Singapore showed “sterling results” across all surveys and rankings, he added that even Thailand, Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Iran had shown great improvement.

“If Malaysia wants to be ‘world-class’, then we should not be afraid to compete with the rest of the world.

“If we are only able to rely on selective statistics and fudged truths, then we have no right to make such grand claims.”