The research capacity of Lingnan University is superior to any liberal arts college in the United States, the university's president has claimed.
Referring to the Research Assessment Exercise that ranked Lingnan fourth in the quality of research among eight public tertiary institutes in Hong Kong, Edward Chen Kwan-yiu said he was proud of the university, especially as it had only limited resources and few research students.
'Lingnan has entered a new era,' he said. 'This isn't a miracle. Our staff has worked really hard.'
Professor Chen said Lingnan's research was stronger than liberal arts colleges in the US, which usually focused more on teaching.
Liberal arts colleges are known for their emphasis on interactive teaching as well as smaller enrolment and class sizes than universities. Unlike tertiary education institutes in Hong Kong, liberal arts colleges in the US were free from the pressure to seek government funding through beefing up research, Professor Chen said. In Hong Kong, more than 20 per cent of funding from the University Grants Committee was based on performance in research.
The assessment, the results of which were released earlier this year, measures the quality of research at UGC-funded institutions and counts towards the amount of funding allocated to an institute.