LettersHong Kong’s academics mustn’t be caught up in flawed university rankings

This is no time to rest on our laurels, however. The methodology of QS rankings is unreliable and subject to manipulation, such as when universities charged with the task of educating the next generation of youngsters selectively hire and provide monetary incentives to professors based primarily on the publication of scholarly articles. These practices may sound benign or even logical. But perverse incentives play a part in the troublingly large number of retractions in recent years. Even major journals like the gold-standard Nature have had to issue retractions. And scholarly output has little to do with a professor’s ability to teach.

Another – I would argue, better – metric on university attractiveness is what economists call revealed preference. This method involves A/B testing, wherein researchers record which universities are selected by applicants who have choices between them. For instance, if a student is admitted to both Yale and Harvard before choosing Yale, then Yale “wins” that match-up. Aggregated across hundreds of thousands or millions of tests, such data give us a clearer idea of which universities appeal most to the people with the most skin in the game: the students themselves. Crucially, revealed preference avoids the negative externalities of ranking systems such as those published by QS and the US News and World Report.

As Hong Kong universities continue along the path of continuous improvement, they have an essential role to play in the ascendancy of the Greater Bay Area. Highly proficient in both English and Chinese, situated right next door to mainland China’s tech hub of Shenzhen, and benefiting from unparalleled connectivity to international financial markets, Hong Kong’s academics can dominate the 21st century as long as we remain focused on our core values while ignoring flawed ranking systems.

Andrew Williamson, founder, Williamson Education

US is just protecting commercial interests