Search

In order to help students make well-informed choices, reliable college ranking systems with comparable information about higher education institutions worldwide have been welcomed by many students. Because traditional college rankings had many methodological problems, a new type of user-based ranking, called 'personalized college ranking' started to develop in many nations in the late 1990s. In 2008, Higher Education Evaluation and Accreditation Council of Taiwan (HEEACT), launched a ranking project called 'College Navigator in Taiwan' which developed the first Asian student-based college search engine to provide local and international students with transparent information on Taiwan's higher education institutions. The main objective of this paper, therefore, is to compare the rational, strategies and pathways for establishing personalized college rankings. In order to analyze the gap between students' preferences and university presidents' concerns over ranking indicators, HEEACT's 'College Navigator in Taiwan' is adopted as a case study at the end of paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic dishonesty has been an important issue. However, only few researches had been done in Asian countries, especially a nationwide study. A sample of 2,068 college students throughout Taiwan was selected and surveyed on four domains of academic dishonesty, including: cheating on test, cheating on assignment, plagiarism, and falsifying documents. The major findings of this study were: (1) the prevalence rate for all types of dishonesty behaviors among college students in Taiwan was 61.72%; (2) the top five most practiced academic dishonesty behaviors in Taiwan are provided paper or assignment for another student, gave prohibited help to others on their assignment, copied others’ assignments, passed answers to other students, and copied from other students; (3) students’ attitudes correlated with behaviors in all four domains of academic dishonesty; (4) females reported less acceptable to and behaved less academic dishonesty behaviors than males; and (5) freshmen had more dishonest practices than other class ranks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher education in Taiwan has expanded dramatically in the previous three decades. The number of students enrolled in higher education institutions has nearly quadrupled from 348,290 (1984) to 1,345,000 (2013). In 2012, the gross entrance rate of higher education reached 84.43 %, which is higher than most higher education systems in Asia. Higher education that transforms from a mass system to a universal system raises public concern regarding its quality. This study explored situations arising from a change to right-based higher education, particularly in pursuing a balance between quality and quantity in the process of establishing research universities. We selected two top public universities to illustrate how institutional arrangements play crucial roles in balancing quality and quantity. The findings reveal strong pressure for a world-class university within both universities, whereas student opinions reflect a neglect of instruction. In this case, faculty focused less attention on teaching compared to their research. These two universities should focus more efforts on teaching to balance quality and quantity toward a world-class research university. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]