Sir, – Philip O'Kane proposes playing the universities ranking game by creating a "marginal cost" bureaucratic superstructure, rather than investing in staff and facilities ("Why Ireland needs to create a single super-university", Education Opinion, November 8th). Someone looking for UCC in the rankings, for example, would then find nothing. Hardly inspiring.
He compares with the situation in other countries. Sweden did not pursue this route. Karolinska is a medical institute, not a full multifaculty university. For this reason, it does not even appear in some rankings.
Switzerland, with a population of eight million, has two QS top 20 institutions (the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich and the École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne) and a third in the top 100 (the University of Geneva).
Singapore, with a population of 5.4 million, also has two institutions in the current QS 20.
These examples of countries, given by Philip O’Kane, run contrary to his argument. To explain the Irish lag, one should rather compare the funding available from the Swiss and Irish science foundations, for example. Another indicator is staffing levels.
My former university in Paris (Orsay, Paris XI, Paris-Sud, Paris-Saclay, depending on whom you ask) has more mathematical researchers than in the whole of Ireland. Orsay is still known as one of the great centres for maths in the world, even if we know longer know the name of the university.
Don’t just paper over cracks. You must invest if you want an “outstanding institution of higher education and research”. – Yours, etc,
NEIL DOBBS,
University of Geneva.