Will the Ranking Game Continue After a Decade?

not certain anymore, because trust in the validity of their assessments is challenged. In recent years, an inflation of assessments occurred in academia: indicators, evaluations, reviews, rankings, ratings, and tests, etc. The credibility of these assessments is on the decline, because universities yield to pressures of bad evaluations rather than counteract collectively. For example, irresponsible producers of rankings succeed by and large in dictating erratic criteria of world class universities. Moreover, they reinforce the view that the future of higher education and research depends on its elite, whereas mass higher education is residual. Similarly, universities yield to the notion that academics should strive for visibility in peer-reviewed journals thus indicating their productivity. Again, they accept by and large that erratic lists of top journals are manipulated. Thereby, they reinforce the view that quality according to the internal views of academia is important and relevance can be ignored in the knowledge society. There is an additional problem of a structural nature: can universities preserve trust as regards the key element of student assessment—i.e., the granting of degrees? Actually, the courses of study become more flexible. Some students acquire relevant competences prior to enrollment and get credits for prior learning. Moving from one university to another during the course of study, a highly appreciated tradition in Germany, gets more popular in various countries. Internships—i.e., periods of learning and experience outside higher education—often become mandatory. Opportunities increase to take individual courses at other universities—e.g., through Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). Study periods abroad gain popularity. In sum, the proportion of study time spent at the degree-granting institution declines. As a consequence, single universities might loose their credibility. Their capability might be questioned of assessing properly the competences acquired at different locations. Subsequently, a need might be felt for organizations in charge of consulting and assessing students, which are independent from universities. Institutions of higher education face a decline of status on the way toward the knowledge society, not only as a consequence of their shrinking share in the overall knowledge production and dissemination, but also because trust declines that academics and higher educations institutions themselves assess the results of research, teaching, and learning properly. The multitude of evaluations, rankings, and indicators actually might be increasingly externally controlled, if the visible distortions cannot be counteracted by universities and academic profession. Moreover, the last resort of academic power—that of degree granting—might erode as well, if the changing context of teaching and learning does not lead to new ways of guidance and assessment Will the Ranking Game Continue After a Decade?