The New Flagship University: Changing the Paradigm from Global Ranking to National Relevancy

TLDR: The New Flagship University: Changing the Paradigm from Global Ranking to National Relevancy as mentioned in this paper proposes a more comprehensive and nuanced model for achieving excellence, which he identifies in the title of his latest book.

Abstract: Palgrave Macmillan 2016 217 pages Hardcopy ISBN: 978-1-137-50048-9 Reviewed by Karen Merritt SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THE 21ST CENTURY, higher education has seen an upsurge in global ranking systems that claim to identify the world's best universities. Countries ranging from Japan, China, and Russia to Nigeria, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam have set goals at the governmental level for placing and strengthening their own most competitive universities in those rankings. It is now a truism that to compete in what Clark Kerr in the 1960s presciently labeled the "knowledge industry," having one or more world-class universities is of the essence. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Historian John Douglass, a senior research fellow at the University of California, Berkeley's Center for Studies in Higher Education, presents this picture with the aim of critiquing its limitations. In its place, he offers the characteristics of a more comprehensive and nuanced model for achieving excellence, which he identifies in the title of his latest book: The New Flagship University: Changing the Paradigm from Global Ranking to National Relevancy. With an ambitious goal of influencing the international discussion of what constitutes excellence in higher education, Douglass offers an amplified vision that builds on what public flagship universities have traditionally been: home to the best students and faculty; recipients of the most robust state funding to support a tripartite mission of research, teaching, and public service; and possessed of the prestige that comes with an outstanding history of research accomplishments and contributions to social mobility, national leadership, and societal development. Douglass makes a special appeal to ministries of education to consider the "new flagship model" as a superior pathway to excellence in their countries. In keeping with the international scope of the book, his descriptive dissection of the constituent elements that make up the new flagship university is followed by commentaries from experts on higher education in Asia, South America, Scandinavia, and Russia. The commentaries critique the model from the perspective of each region's higher education history, culture, and goals for the future. Harvard University's Manja Klemencic concludes the book with questions yet to be resolved in the model. The core of the book presents a brief history of the flagship university and analyzes an expanded list of elements that constitute the ideal for the future. Douglass buttresses his analyses with snapshots of best practices drawn from a range of universities together with summary tables and graphic representations of how the elements interact. The issue of quality in undergraduate education represents one of the features of the model that has eluded easy measurement, yet is a sine qua non. Douglass brings to bear his insights as founder of the Student Experience in the Research University (SERU) survey, which is conducted annually by a coalition of University of California campuses, AAU institutions, and research universities in Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America. …