‘World rankings are part of power politics’
NALANDA AND TAKSHASHILA ARE ARGUABLY THE ANCESTORS OF ALL OF THE WORLD’S UNIVERSITIES, AND HIGHER EDUCATION HAS BEEN A PART OF CHINA SINCE THE TIME OF CONFUCIUS
Laurie Pearcy of the University of New South Wales (UNSW), Sydney, is also former CEO of the Australia China Business Council. In Mumbai last week, he talked to HT Education on the varsity’s India strategy, international collaborations, and the importance of world university rankings.
What brings you to India?
What brings me to India is UNSW’S commitment to transformative partnerships across this country. Our vice-chancellor recently completed his inaugural visit to India, so last week was the beginning of a 10-year journey which will span research, knowledge exchange, industry engagement, and of course education.
How do you plan to take forward your vice-chancellor’s vision of adding 100,000 Indian students in the next decade?
When he said that, the vicechancellor was making the fundamental point that the global higher education community needs to play a major role in building higher education capacity across India.
This is not a mercenary quest to suck talent away from India. The global higher education community needs to forge new partnership models, but equally it needs to think about ways that graduating talent can return or remain in India to contribute to its development.
Our evolving India strategy is seeing UNSW partner with industry through innovative areas such as internships, joint research and investment in startups.
We are also looking at government as an important enabler of our plans and we are increasingly partnering with progressive state governments on higher-education capacity-building programmes, and joint learning and teaching.
How many Indian students do you have at UNSW? Has this number gone up in the recent past?
Currently, UNSW has more than 500 Indian students enrolled in a range of disciplines across undergraduate, postgraduate and research degrees. We have been very pleased to see our Indian student community grow by more than 50% over the last couple of years.
Are you looking to forge more academic collaborations in India in general, and in Mumbai in particular?
In Mumbai, we are talking to the Maharashtra state government about a range of areas including joint research, PHD training and student entrepreneurship, which is exciting.
Additionally, we have good links with Iit-bombay and are looking forward to taking this partnership even further next year as we organise joint symposiums and think about joint student training.
We have also done some really interesting work in quantum computing with Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, which was funded by the Australia India Strategic Research Fund. We’re also working with ONGC and TERI on biomaterials.
UNSW is among the top 100 universities in various world ranking lists. How important is it to score well in these rankings?
There’s no doubt that rankings play a major role in attracting quality staff and students and that rankings are a key part of power politics in universities around the world.
We aspire for excellence in global rankings not because we can boast about it, but because we genuinely believe that the world’s top universities can make a real difference to humanity and our research will have a global impact.
The challenge for universities that obsess about rankings is to not lose sight of the value of both research and teaching intensity.
Rankings aren’t always fair to the higher education systems of all countries as the majors arguably do favour traditional research outputs and definitions of quality which were designed by ‘old world’ players.
Every great university in the world would recognise that Asia’s education system is on the rise and I think the next leap of faith the world needs to make is a recognition that Asia has always been home to the world’s finest institutions of higher learning.
Nalanda and Takshashila are arguably the ancestors of all of the world’s universities, for example, and higher education has been a part of China since the time of Confucius.
Colonial power structures meant that for too long the West dominated science and technology, but few can argue today with the fact that Asia’s time has come once again.
With the Oxford and Cambridge interviews for undergraduate programmes approaching, aspiring students are grooming to present the best version of themselves during the question and answer sessions. However, there are preexisting notions around the interview system at Oxbridge.
If you are trying to crack one of these interviews, you must know that these are only to help the university staff decipher if you will be able to thrive in the rigorous academic atmosphere at Oxbridge. They are often styled to be a mini tutorial or supervision, in which you will regularly engage if you are accepted at one of these universities.
The interviews aim to assess whether you can cope with the supervision or tutorial style of teaching. No matter how brilliant you are on paper, if you cannot discuss your subject, you won’t be able to contribute to the supervisions or tutorials. Therefore, you will not get an offer. So, here are a few things to keep in mind:
First impressions do matter. So make sure you are dressed well. It doesn’t have to be too formal, just smart casual clothes will work.
Do not be afraid to think out loud and ask questions. They want to understand your thinking process and engage with you. The more interactive the interview, the better. Do not think of it as a Q&A session.
For many arts and humanities subjects, there is no right answer. They just want to see how you respond.
For many STEM subjects, you will be asked to solve equations. It is absolutely fine to make mistakes, as long as you explain your thought processes. They want to be sure you can learn, not that you already know it all.
The questions are meant to challenge but not completely take you off-guard. So, they will not ask you questions unrelated to your subject. But be prepared to apply the knowledge you have in entirely new ways.
In discussions, do not simply play along with the interviewer’s opinion. If you have a differing viewpoint, stand your ground and back your views. stumped by a question, break it into parts. Discuss what you understood and what you did not.
If you had submitted written material, be prepared to discuss it.
Read around your course as much as you can. Make sure you are well informed about your subject and any new breakthroughs.
THE POOLING SYSTEM
In January, you will usually receive a response from the university. The application can either be successful, unsuccessful or ‘pooled’.
Being put in the pool means that the university is giving other colleges a chance to offer you a place. All colleges would rather take a strong applicant from the pool than a weak applicant who applied directly to their college.
You can be pooled for several non-academic reasons, such as a gender imbalance or not enough supervisors for that course. Some pooled applicants may be asked to another interview.
Again, this is only a chance to prove yourself and should not be taken as judgment on your potential. Around one in five applicants every year are pooled, and one in four pooled applicants are offered a spot at another college. If no other college has offered you a place, you will be informed about this by the end of January.
The author is a study abroad
advisor and co-founder of The Red Pen. Email queries to
htspecialprojects@