Universities not ready for online learning – U-Multirank

Universities around the world were largely unprepared for a sudden switch to online learning prior to the COVID-19 pandemic – with only a third providing full online courses in some form, according to data collected for the 2020 edition of U-Multirank.

The comparison university website, launched with support from the European Union, is now in its seventh year and once again it bucks the norm in shining the light on corners of global higher education often hidden from view.

But with uncanny foresight, the latest version also includes the first results of an investigation into online alternatives to traditional face-to-face teaching.

The data collection period finished shortly before the coronavirus forced physical campuses to close, but the information received suggests that universities all over the world were largely unprepared for the impact of the pandemic, according to Frans van Vught, the Dutch joint project leader of U-Multirank.

Risk management strategy lacking

He said: “Few institutions appeared to have a risk management strategy in place that would allow them to respond to a pandemic, particularly the capacity to offer online programmes and support when the crisis hit.”

While he agreed that universities had “reacted in a flexible way to the crisis, few were prepared for the provision of full online programmes”.

The data showed 60% of higher education institutions reported online learning provisions in their strategic planning prior to COVID-19, but only one third appeared to provide full online courses in some form.

Universities with a significant focus on business studies, economics and education and larger institutions with a broad disciplinary scope were the best prepared.

In science and engineering less than 3% of the programmes were available fully online.

Professor van Vught said the insights into online learning provision at different institutions should help applicants “make better informed choices about what and where to study” as they can use the website to compare and contrast aspects on the digitalisation of degree programmes in the new norm post COVID-19.

The data already collected for the 2020 U-Multirank will be followed up with new surveys in the autumn to see how well different universities have done in terms of student satisfaction with the new online and blended learning environments which are likely to be in place in the new academic year.

Strong performance by China and Japan

Although the concept of U-Multirank was originally proposed by the European Commission under the French presidency in 2008 and it is seen by some as a way of promoting European universities, Professor Frank Ziegele, the German joint project leader of U-Multirank, said it also shines the light on particular strengths of less well-known institutions around the world and aspects of higher education that may get overlooked by the traditional world university rankers.

This year’s edition includes 27 country profiles which look at the performance of universities in each nation across five dimensions – research, teaching & learning, knowledge transfer, international orientation and regional engagement.

Ziegele told University World News he was struck by the strong performance of China for research and Japan for knowledge transfer in this year’s data.

“The indicators we use for the research dimension show that 72% of the scores of the 117 universities that we rank from China, Hong Kong and Macau performed above the global average for research, which is only just behind the strongest country for research, which was Switzerland with 73% of its scores above average for research.

“This compares with a figure of 63% above average in the United States, which is traditionally seen as the strongest for research, and 51% for UK institutions.

“When we look at the strongest country for knowledge transfer among higher education institutions, it is Japan with its 34 universities we’ve included, which stands way out in front with 88% of the scores above the international average in this dimension. This contrast with 62% in the US, 48% in Germany and 39% in China.

“So different countries have different strengths in their higher education systems, according to our data.”

European strengths in working with industry

Ziegele also singled out the strength of European higher education institutions for students looking for a more vocational or technical approach, pointing to the indicators for institutions working closely with industry such as the Fachhochschule in Germany.

“Europe always does well in terms of international orientation and for things like student mobility in our rankings, but it is interesting to see the model of universities of applied science, which is a particular strength of higher education in countries like the Netherlands, the Baltic states and Ireland as well as Germany, performing so well in this year’s U-Multirank. For example, 24 of the 25 top performers in the category for joint publications with regional industrial and research partners are from Europe.”

Although Ziegele and Van Vught go to some length to stress that U-Multirank is more of a comparison site than a league table and stress that it highlights the particular strengths and weaknesses of different institutions, they reluctantly accept that many will look for winners and losers.

Among the winners this year based on institutions scoring the most ‘A’ scores across the five dimensions – research, teaching & learning, knowledge transfer, international orientation and regional engagement – are ETH Zurich, which had 19 ‘A’ scores, and EPFL Lausanne, also in Switzerland, which had 17.

Télécom Paris was the top performer in this year’s rankings in France, with 18 ‘A’ scores. The University of Antwerp in Belgium had 17 ‘A’ scores and Osaka University in Japan had 16 ‘A’ scores, as did Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Since 2017, U-Multirank has been funded by the Bertelsmann Foundation, the European Union's Erasmus+ programme and the Santander Group. It is run by an independent consortium led by the Centre for Higher Education in Germany.

The Center for Higher Education Policy Studies at the University of Twente and the Centre for Science and Technology Studies from Leiden University, both in the Netherlands, as well as Fundación Conocimiento y Desarrollo in Spain are partners in the project.

Nic Mitchell is a British-based freelance journalist and PR consultant who runs De la Cour Communications and blogs about higher education for the European Universities Public Relations and Information Officers’ Association, EUPRIO, and on his website. He also provides English-language communication support for European universities and specialist higher education media.