Talk:World's largest universities

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[edit] About Virtual "universities"

Most universities on the top are "virtual" or "open" universities which claim millions of students without any clear reference. I think it should be only included well-known established institutions. Universities without a clear and trustable reference should be also removed. Even a "television" university was in the list! Was that a joke?

The article should be impartial -- if they are valid, degree-granting institutions, they stand. Many valid universities incorporate or soley conduct television-based education (this was true for a number of open universities. Although many are become online engaged now, poorer countries are likely to continue TV-only based teaching for students who can't afford online access). I'm going to revert your changes because I can't see reason for these institutions to be excluded, based on the current definition of the page. BTW, many of these institutions *are* well known, in University circles -- the study of mega-universities is an active topic of discussion internationally. They are also recognised by the press and the United Nations, for example.
I can say nothing about India or Turkey, but as concerns my country, the Centre national d'enseignement à distance is certainly NOT a University, does not grant University diplomas, and -quoting the Wikipedia stub about this institution «offers range from kindergarten to university level». If a fair amount of the institutions in the list are more or less similar to our French CNED, I shall strongly support renaming of this page to something like "World's largest educational institutions". French Tourist 19:03, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
What about http://www.cned.fr/en/university.htm, which implies it does provide tertiary education? Is it doing this as a gateway/third party for another provider?
I feel that the main content of this article ought to be moved to the bottom of the article, with another table of information replacing its position on the top. The listing at the top should contain the information most people actually expect when they come to this article: a listing of the university campuses with the most students physically present. Say nothing of TV universities, as an ex-California resident I immediately recognize the inherent absurdity in allowing the UC and CSU systems to aggregate their student counts into one conglomerate blob of students when the campuses in question are over a days drive apart one way, even with no traffic! These aren't sister campuses in another suburb with slightly different specialties, with respect to the UC and CSU systems, these are unquestionably separate entities with a parent funding organization. Its not hard to find inconsistencies in these universities, their grading, admissions procedures, etc that all support them being listed separately rather than as a group. Zaphraud 06:29, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't agree with that. Many, many universities have multiple campuses spread out at least throughout a city if not further afield. The article makes very clear that some of the listed entities are systems of universities rather than entirely discrete entities. If information is available for what are the "largest" (I presume in terms of area or student body) campuses) then it would be worthwhile listing it as a subsidiary to the main table, not a replacement for it (frankly I suspect though that that information is going to be hard to come by). Badgerpatrol 09:13, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] General questions seeking answers :-)

1. Do we really need to spell enrolment with two ls?
2. I can understand the merger of mega universities, but largest != mega, since mega was defined as > 100,000. Reference for mega university is Daniel, John S (1996) Mega-universities and Knowledge Media: Technology Strategies for Higher Education, Kogan Page, London 212 pp., but this doesn't stand as a reference for these numbers, since they are all updated based on web searching
3. What references would be appropriate when most of this is googled? Do you want a link to the referent web page?

[edit] US public universities

Many of the largest US public university systems are absent from this list. I added the State University of New York and a link to pertinent information from the university's web site. Anyone who knows where to find pertinent info on, for example, the University of California and California State University systems should add it at their convenience. Tcatts 02:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the US system- what's the criteria for state university systems? Are their degrees all awarded from a common central body, i.e. if one were to graduate from the UoC at Berkeley, would one receive a degree certificate labelled Berkeley college, or labelled University of California? Badgerpatrol 12:38, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
It varies by state, but most US public university systems with more than one campus have a degree of central administration while retaining a substantial amount of autonomy in setting curricula, raising endowments, admitting students, granting degrees, etc. Unfortunately, I'm not qualified to compare that state of affairs to, say, the University of London or the University of Paris. Tcatts 16:52, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
I think the definition should be at the presidential level. SUNY has separate presidents for each college, and no SUNY-wide president that I could find, which leads me to be believe that it is a consortium rather than an institution Natebailey
Notwithstanding the merits of your criteria, SUNY has a chancellor [1] and a board of trustees [2] who serve to administer the university system as a whole and are superior to the college presidents. Additionally, I believe that New York State funds the system, not individual campuses. I'll try to find a cite on that. Tcatts 04:15, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
It's tricky to define exactly what a university is. My original point was that a good definition would be 'what name is on the degree certificate, i.e. are degrees conferred by the central university (in which case it's in) or are they awarded by the individual colleges (in which case, is it really a megauniversity?). But if, as in NY, the university has a central board of governance and a single figurehead chancellor, then that is as good a definition as any, I guess. Badgerpatrol 15:24, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What should the minimum be?

I'm currently maintaining the minimum at mid-to-high 90,000s, since these are likely to become "mega" in the next few years -- thoughts?

That seems like a good policy to me. --79.73.99.219 (talk) 10:31, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ToDo

  • www.irfol.ac.uk/publications/pdfs/asiarpt.pdf says that Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University (STOU) has "approximately 250,000 students"; need to see if other sites support this number.

http://www.u-air.ac.jp/eng/table/09_ove1.html is nearly there, but I don't think "non-degree" students count; however, other Universities haven't necessarily distinguished this...

  • http://www.hoise.com/vmw/03/articles/vmw/LV-VM-08-03-32.html says that Complutense University of Madrid has 109,000 students (Wikipedia only reports about 90,000)
  • http://www.ru.ac.th/oasc/oasc_eng/ru_in_brief.htm says "the total number of students enrolled at RU is nearly 600,000, consisting of over 500,000 undergraduate and nearly 25,000 postgraduate students"
  • http://www.eng.muh.ru/zarubezh_uc.htm provides some "new" mega universities, eg. Athabasca University ([3] lists only 30,000/year), Modern University for the Humanities ([4] lists 140,000/year), Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Open University ([5] lists 85,000/year), Jiangsu Central Radio and TV University (can't find any info about it), University of Maryland ([6] lists 90,000/year, cf. current figure on the page for USM)
  • http://www.insurat.com/sgu/Open%20Universities.htm provides very different figures for the Indian universities (as does http://www.ignou.ac.in/sou/)
  • According to [University_of_the_Air_%28Japan%29], this uni is a mega University -- but the enrolment number in the infobox doesn't support it?
  • Regarded as Mega-Us: (need enrolment numbers) Athabasca University; City College of San Francisco; Fern University in Hagen; Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico

[edit] "this page is quite bogus" <= please support your views with citations/scholarly criticism?

i've tagged this page as disputed and npov. many of the "distance" or "open" university figures look quite bogus to me, and even if they're not, there's no way they can reasonably be compared to real universities -- it's likely that most of the "students" are people simply listed on the books who may occasionally take a class or two. as a simple example of the problems, consider Indira Gandhi National Open University. it has 1,433,490 students "on rolls" but only 429,542 students "registered". either figure seems problematic, since there are only 325 teachers; even with the lower figure, this works out to more than 1,000 students per teacher, an absurd figure. there are plenty of places in the US that might be similarly claimed on these lists, e.g. the Learning Annex, but which are hardly universities (regardless of whether they have the word "university" in their name). the figures for these places are quoted from their own literature, which is not necessarily a reliable source.

even more suspicious is this: [7] which indicates that the "mega-universities" in John Daniel's report refer specifically to distance "universities"! given that this guy himself was one of the leaders of the British Open University, i suspect that his report is largely propaganda.

note that 6 of the top 8 (all the non-us institutions) are distance institutions, and that numbers 9 and 10 have enrollments on this list that differ from (and are inflated relative to) the numbers on the wikipedia pages of these universities.

furthermore, it's hardly reasonable to consider SUNY and CSU to be one institution. these are clearly university systems. a much more reasonable is to consider the figures on List_of_largest_United_States_universities_by_enrollment. Benwing 03:15, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Why are distance universities not valid in your definition of 'university'? They are certainly recognised as universities in academia. Distance universities have a much higher student to teacher ratio by their very nature, although I agree 300 students at IGNOU would be a bit hard to believe -- where did you find the "325 teachers" number? I'm not sure why you feel so passionate about these issues when you can see that they are clearly being discussed in the above comments (pretty much everything you've raised is in open discussion up there). eg. the 'US public universities' specifically addresses the definition of University and the inclusion of SUNY.

I don't think this page can be tagged with both npov and disputed. The article itself is, IMHO, npov, whether you think Daniel is NPOV or not, most of the numbers are directly from the institution's website (which addresses the 'disputed' claim).

BTW, the wikipedia figures are often incomplete; eg. NAUM has only 162392 students in wikipedia but the Chronicle of Higher Ed puts it at 270,000 in 2004. (See "Armed Students Raid Office at Mexico's Largest University", MARION LLOYD. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Washington: Apr 16, 2004. Vol. 50, Iss. 32; p. A.41) Similarly, the Chronicle (Oct 25, 1996. Vol. 43, Iss. 9; pg. A50) discusses University of Rome I "La Sapienza as having more than 200,000 students in the mid-1990s. Finally, the Chronicle also asserts (Sep 22, 2000. Vol. 47, Iss. 4; pg. A41) that Anadolu University had 504,000 students in 2000, affirming its status as a "real" University 203.45.42.178 00:18, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
The World Bank cites Daniel's work (eg. http://www.worldbank.org/fandd/english/0398/articles/0110398.htm). Note also their quote 'Even the highly esteemed U.K. Open University had difficulty in providing unequivocal evidence of the quality of its programs until these were actually compared with courses offered by conventional higher education institutions in the United Kingdom: programs in 6 of the Open University's 11 subject areas were awarded "excellent" ratings. Does distance education really work? Is it just as effective as conventional education? The answer to both questions is yes.' (from the same article). It is clear from a survey of the literature that Sir John Daniel is a well-respected leader in academia and the Open University (UK) is a well-recognised tertiary institution. I think it is fair to dispute some of the institutions on this page (eg. Shanghai doesn't seem to have many references, cf. CCRTVU), it is incorrect, however, to dispute the credentials of Daniel or open universities in general, both of which are well-recognised. (eg. see Mirth, D ADULT EDUCATION QUARTERLY 51 (1): 79-80 NOV 2000; Schwartz CA JOURNAL OF ACADEMIC LIBRARIANSHIP 25 (2): 149-149 MAR 1999 and Heseltine R STUDIES IN HIGHER EDUCATION 24 (1): 125-127 MAR 1999 for reviews of Daniel's revised book; some of which criticise its datedness and bias toward open learning, but none of which dispute the right of open universities to be recognised as Universities. If you wish to substantiate your claims of bias in this article, please cite some references that would dispute the role of these institutions (in light of the above information from World Bank, scholarly journals and Google). Thanks Natebailey 02:07, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Open University credentials

Creating this section to help those who don't recognise open universities be aware of their equivalency with other institutions

  • IGNOU is a CENTRAL UNIVERSITY established by an Act of Parliament in 1985 (Act No. 50 of 1985) IGNOU Degrees / Diplomas / Certificates are recognised by all the members of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) and are at par with Degrees / Diplomas / Certificates of all Indian Universities / Deemed Universities / Institutions vide UGC Circular No. F1-52/2000 (CPP-II) dated 5 May, 2004 & AIU Circular No. EV/B(449)/94/176915-177115 dated January 14, 1994. -- (reference removed) Natebailey 03:13, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Some citation information

This reference (Jung, Insung [2005]. "Quality Assurance Survey of Mega Universities", in Christopher McIntosh (ed.): Perspectives on Distance Education: Lifelong Learning & Distance Higher Education (PDF), UNESCO/COL. ISBN 1-894975-21-9. Retrieved on 2007-06-22. , found via Anadolu University) includes useful information about mega universities, including: on p79, Insung Jung indicates Anadolu's _active_ (cf. cumulative) enrolment is greater than 500K on p81, statistics from a survey are provided (although it isn't clear if the survey made sufficient distinction about current vs. cumulative enrolment) on p94, a list of some recognised mega universities is provided

[edit] Removing US systems that are not a single institution

I am going to remove US state-based institutions from this list unless they truly constitute a single university (ie. not state systems that include a bunch of differently named universities that are otherwise unrelated - except for the fact that the state governs them). This would leave SUNY (where all the university's have SUNY at the start of their name) and remove University System of Ohio, State University System of Florida and similar state systems constituting many completely separate universities. I will tighten the definition at the top of the main article to clarify this. Open for discussion until 11th April. Natebailey (talk) 08:11, 24 March 2008 (UTC)