In the presence of MU rector, Dr. Khalid al-Muqren, the committee assigned to follow-up the university ranking held the second meeting.
At the outset of the meeting, Dr. al-Muqren commended the work achieved by the committee members and the university employees in advancing the university ranking locally and internationally.
Prof. Mohammed al-Rukban, chairman of the committee, reviewed the reasons behind the selection of Webometrics and QS rankings, highlighting that one of the reasons that helped the university to improve its ranking is its great concern of research and all criteria relevant to ranking.
Dr. Abdullah Bajahzar, secretary of the committee, introduced the ranking and its importance as well as the criteria for each ranking, pointing out that each of these criteria have been given equal importance. He also talked about the significance of stakeholders in QS ranking as it amounts to 50% of the criteria.
Highlighting the university ranking over the past four years locally and internationally, Dr. Bajahzar attributed this success to a wide-range of activities carried out by the committee such as workshops, regular visits to departments, seek advice from top universities in ranking, creating sub-committees, regular reports and nominating coordinators at colleges and deanships.
Dr. Mohammed al-Aydarus talked about the impact of research on the university ranking, particularly funded research which resulted in a big increase in the number of published research and citations.
By the same token, Dr. Fereih al-Anazi explained the timeline which includes goals, initiatives and indicators, concluding his remark by the necessity of learning from the College of Science in Zulfi in how to ramp up the number of published research.
Dr. Bashayer al-Rumaih’s presentation focused on improving the university ranking using technology and the criteria associated with that, namely impact and presence. She reviewed the number of links and webpages that have a direct impact on ranking.
A Q&A session was held at the end of the meeting which featured some feedback from the vice-rectors and deans such as having short and long term goals, raising faculty members’ awareness of ranking, utilizing activities held by Deanship of Admission and Registration and Deanship of Student Affairs.