As an effort to achieve world-class university status and an increase in the Quacquarelli Symonds World University Ranking (QS WUR) in the coming years, the Institut Teknologi Nasional (Itenas) Bandung organized a sharing session on Monday (9/1) in Room 14301 of the Faculty Building. Itenas invited Ms. Mandy Mok from Singapore, the founder and CEO of AppliedHE™ who also previously served at Quacquarelli Symonds Asia, as well as Prof. Dato Dr. Toh Kian Kok, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Global Rankings and Internal Audit from UCSI University Malaysia.

The event was attended by Itenas leadership (the Rector and Vice-Rectors) and several other structural officials. Itenas Rector, Prof. Meilinda Nurbanasari, Ph.D., stated during the opening of the event that ranking is not the ultimate goal, but rather a tool to ensure Itenas possesses quality on par with a world-class university.

“As we know that competition will be very tight in the future, our hope this afternoon is that we can share experiences and gain a vast amount of knowledge from Prof. Toh and Ms. Mandy Mok. We certainly hope Itenas can soon enter the ranks of world-class universities and also target to become a Top 500 university in the world within the next 2-3 years,” said Prof. Meilinda before starting the sharing session.

“It is not easy, but as long as there is the will, it can certainly be realized. This requires commitment from all of us,” she continued.

The event began with a presentation by Ms. Mandy Mok regarding the progress factors of an educational institution (employability & student experience, alumni, critical thinking) that must be developed in harmony. Additionally, she explained the QS World University Rankings (QS WUR), including the ranking mechanism, indicators, benefits obtained, and examples of several universities in Indonesia that have successfully achieved significant rankings in the QS WUR.

For the Asia region specifically, there are eleven assessment indicators for the QS WUR with different weightings: Academic Reputation, Employer Reputation, Faculty Student Ratio, Citations per Paper, International Research Network, Papers per Faculty, Staff with PhD, International Student Ratio, International Faculty Ratio, Inbound Exchange Student Ratio, and Outbound Student Ratio. The largest weighting is the Academic Reputation aspect at 30%.

The event then continued with a Q&A session followed by an interesting discussion from Prof. Toh. In his view, educational policy in Indonesia differs significantly from Malaysia because the relevant officials (in this case, the Minister of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology) support and take part in every program, allowing them to run well. Prof. Toh also mentioned that to achieve ranking targets, the cooperation of all parties within Itenas is required.

The event concluded with a group photo session. This sharing session is expected to provide insights for Itenas to reach global ranking targets and obtain the status of a world-class university.