MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
US universities top world ranking; Asia surging strongly but Latam disastrous
Untied States universities dominate the Times Higher Education global rankings for 2012-13, occupying seven of the top 10 spots, but Asian institutions are on the rise while only four Latin American figure among the best 400. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesThere are too mañy Univérsities in the countries.
Oct 10th, 2012 - 08:55 am - Link - Report abuse 0Sôme University námes are great ,but their académists and stúdents are won't do.
Rubbish - The amount of universitys in a country reflect the need for them. In the UK they are evenly spread out so students can choose ones that suit them best or one that is closer to home. In fact their is not enough universities as a lot of students that get the grades required, and can afford the fees to go to university, don't get to go simply because there is not enough placements to go around.
Oct 10th, 2012 - 09:47 am - Link - Report abuse 0If we cut back on universities then the damage it would do to all of us, not just to students would be immense. Not enough teachers, not enother scientist or scientific researchers, not enough doctors/nurse (already in short supply), not enough buisness academics, resulting in poorer business management and therefore lower GDP, not enough fincanciers, therefore poorer banks and financial system (another recession). Not enough conservationist resulting in more animal and plant life extinction, jesus the list is endless.
You clearly didn't think things through before you made your statement did you!
As an exception I agree with TipsyThink when it comes to Argentina and Chile.
Oct 10th, 2012 - 12:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I have lived in both countries and know that a medium sized town can have seven universities. This means a too wide spread of able professors and other UNI-level teachers. If these 5-6-7 universities in a town are joined to e.g. 2 they will experience a synergy effect, where the teachers supplement each other and co-operate to increase their expertice.
I live in Chile but my kids were educated in high school in the USA (one is still in school). There the kids take calculus and advanced science and microbiology courses and advanced English courses if they want to. The problem over here in Chile is the high schools are not pushing these kids into taking these advanced courses instead they do geometry or algebra. So they go to college unprepared to do difficult critical and abstract thinking. One reason the USA is better (at least in the best schools) is there are so many Asian students who work so hard. This makes everyone work harder just to keep up. The debate here in Chile is whether to shorten the college education from 6 years to 4 like it is in the rest of the world. But the universities say because the high schools are so bad this is why the 6 year program is warranted. On this score the Chilean universities might be right but still 6 years is far too long to study, for example, business administration. I did my math degree in 4 years in the USA.
Oct 10th, 2012 - 12:54 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Walker Rowe
Southern Pacific Review
I Think that it's all statistics. The main purpose of education is to give a person the basic skills and knowledge to make him/her functional in any department or job position that he/she enters upon graduation and to have enough skills to keep them employed for as long as possible The real learning happens on the job.
Oct 10th, 2012 - 05:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The problem with these articles is that they focus on Institutions that are deeply involved with research and give little care to undergraduates, because their work is focused on advanced studies and research grants. The real learning for the employment world happens at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
Unless I want to pursue advanced education, requiring a lot of time and investment, or research, I choose a University that has a practical program that will help me make a living upon graduation. At least, that is the way I see it.
@4 werowe
Oct 10th, 2012 - 11:04 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The debate in Chile is whether or not education should be public and not just for your kids.
Man, what is a guy like you doing here anyways?
5 ProRG_Argentinean aka The Liar In Chief
Oct 15th, 2012 - 02:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0What you are talking about is trade schools, not universities.
Not everyone wants or has the intellect to become professional engineers (my chosen profession) or any other discipline and without the demonstration of intellect and the ability to reason and 'argue' (in the intellectual sense, not like AGs argue) they will not progress further.
Why, when I see the lamentable inability of many LatAm posters to string a cohesive thought process together and express it in writing, am I not at all surprised that they have no universities except one in Brasil in the 400?
Only those argies trained in the UK or America, etc. are worthy of their degree certificates and they invariably decide to work elsewhere in the civilised world.
Who can blame them once they see for themselves what society can offer when it is not shackled by the likes of TMBOA / Chavez, et al?
“ The main purpose of education is to give a person the basic skills and knowledge to make him/her functional in any department or job position that he/she enters upon graduation and to have enough skills to keep them employed for as long as possible”
Oct 15th, 2012 - 05:26 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Once again you are wrong sussie, what can we expect for a SAican. You can get skills at a trade school by learning to be a plumber or electrician. College on the the other hand teachs one to inquire, examine and research, basically it teachs you how to better use your mind. Then in particular, it teaches one a profession based from it's theory. No wonder LAtam colleges are rated disasterous.
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