In Asian University Rankings, UP Is Up – In Science Serving The People, UP Is Down!

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So what if the University of the Philippines, UP, rises 30 notches in Asian University rankings, as Aurora Quadra-Balibay says (03 June 2020, Good News Pilipinas[1])? That is self-serving! Not serving the people.

Do you know where UP got its higher rank? Ms Aurora says it comes from its high scores in Citation, 86.9 pt, and Industry Income, 39.4 pt. To me, an Editor In Chief of many an aggie technical journal since 1975, only the high Citation points have significance:

High Citation means, having been published in technical publications listed as ISI – the Good Housekeeping seal of approval of science publications – many UP scientists have been cited in other internationally respected journals.

Since UP is not publishing many ISI-listed journals, my guess is the high Citation score comes from many UP researchers publishing outside the Philippines – which is a shame!

Do you know why there are few ISI-listed UP journals? Many journals do not meet the 4 criteria for inclusion in the ISI list, especially 2 of those: (1) they do not come out regularly as scheduled, and (2) the papers published do not have much international impacts.

How come I know all those? From experience. In 2003, I was hired as Editor In Chief of the Philippine Journal of Crop Science, PJCS, based at UP Los Baños. The superimposed image above is from my very first PJCS issue. As a one-man band including being the layout artist, from being late 3 years. I made the PJCS up-to-date within 3 years, meaning I worked double-time. The next year, 2007, the PJCS became ISI.

Why am I telling you all that? To tell you that I know what I am saying when I criticize UP for not serving the people in the matter of science (knowledge). UP researchers conduct so many studies, but only a few studies reach the masses. Because only a few research studies are published, and so the rest cannot be laymanized for the citizens. In science, UP is neglecting the people!

What should UP do? UP should publish more high-quality journals and publish more of its scientists so that they contribute to the world’s knowledge and be recognized, and eventually, their findings will reach the people.

It’s not IQ; I know there is only 1 major & pervasive problem with UP journals:

UP editorial works are not digital-based.
So everything is in s… l... o... w… motion.

As Editor In Chief and layout artist, for the PJCS I was 100% digital, so I was fast and perfect (well, almost).

To give you an idea of how slow UP is, with 10 papers to publish for 1 issue of a journal:

5 months – review of 10 papers
4 months – authors’ corrections and editors’ final editing of 10 papers
2 months – final corrections, text formatting and page layouting before going to press.

So, for an issue, UP needs almost 1 year to publish – that’s as fast as a turtle walks.

UP, nakakahiya!
This is a UP alumnus speaking.@517

 

[1]https://www.goodnewspilipinas.com/breaking-news-university-of-the-philippines-rises-30-notches-in-asian-university-rankings/?fbclid=IwAR10eF104EGaqH1xn3gFooM4F2LWo8j5eSI_WahHzqYsbufD9kGIh-iy7Gg


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