HAVING PARTICIPATED ONCE again in the Times Higher Education (THE) University Impact Rankings 2024, San Beda University (SBU) remained in its 1001-1500th spot out of the 1,963 universities and placed 23rd among the 56 other participants from the Philippines last June 12.
With all the 17 available Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) of the United Nations (UN) that a university can choose to apply to in the THE, SBU applied for eight and excelled in four SDGs, being SDG 3 (good health and well-being), SDG 5 (gender equality), SDG 16 (peace, justice, and strong institutions), and the sole requirement for all universities, SDG 17 (partnership for the goals).
SBU first participated in THE Impact Rankings last 2022 where the University was in the 801-1000 bracket. Since then, the University gradually declined, with last year placing in the 1001+ spot, and now 1001-1500th spot for this year.
Yet contrary to what the numbers have stipulated, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS), Prof. Christian Bryan S. Bustamante PhD., believed that the University did not lose its foothold. The problem, he emphasized, was the high number of participants.
“Kung titignan mo, steady tayo sa mga score [sa University Impact Rankings]. Ang problema nga lang ay marami nang sumasali unlike before the first time we participated there were only 1500 Universities and only a few from the Philippines. At ngayon, more than 2000 na,” said Dean Bustamante.
Dr. Fernandino A. Fontanilla, the Vice President (VP) of Research and Innovation, added that SBU’s THE performance has been “keeping up” in the rankings despite the University’s “limited programs and documentation” in comparison to other universities in the country.
“A lot of the team members who are contributing to the evidence for submission are existing administrators and faculty members who have other roles including the administrative functions and teaching roles, and we are just doing this on top of that. Given that scenario, I think we’re still doing well,” said Dr. Fontanilla.
Both the CAS Dean and the VP for Research and Innovation believed that SBU can improve its rank if the institution would “invest more on the funding of the research papers” to be publicized in a website called Scopus Indexed Journals while still incorporating UN’s SDGs. Moreover, they added that improving the documentation of the activities is also a crucial consideration to improve the University’s rank.
As observed by Dr. Fontanilla, “Impact rankings are based on what we submit because [THE] don’t do physical inspection of the university, they don’t really monitor a university, they just rely on what we submit. [Because of this,] I think we’re missing out on activities that we actually do.” Moving forward, Dean Bustamante contended to let the results of THE serve as a “free consultancy” for SBU to receive feedback on what needs to be improved on.
“We always look at it as a challenge, we always look at it as a means for us to improve, that must be our perspective when it comes to ranking… What is important for me is we know we assess what are the things we need to improve, and we have to keep on improving, and that must be our attitude,” he stated.
On the bright side, they both agreed that the rank has satisfied the Bedan community. But of course, it comes with a goal to achieve. “Congratulations to everyone, especially to those who actually contributed to the Impact rankings. I think as I said there’s a lot of work to do, but as long as we continue to work together… we increase the awareness among our Bedan community and I think we have a really good chance of improving our rank,” Dr. Fontanilla expressed.
(with Aaron Peralta)