The Visions Of World-Class Universities

Abstract

The visions of the top 26 world-class universities of the first 30 in the Shanghai ranking list have been evaluated and compared with the missions of the world’s top 20 universities. Applying the content analysis, a group of 48 keywords, which describe the essence of these visions, has been revealed. The average amount of keywords in one vision is 51. According to the relevant characteristics, the missions are three times shorter (respectively 15 and 18 words). All keywords in missions, except one, are present in the list of words for visions. The main keywords for visions are “world”, “research’, “students”, “education” and “knowledge”, each of these words is present in half and more than three quarters of visions. For missions such words are “education’, “research”, “knowledge” and “create”, and have the same degree of use. The main content differences relating to visions and missions occur due to a lower word frequency (less significance). Comparison of visions and missions using 20 characteristic parameters shows that in quantitative terms, except the range of normalized frequencies for a certain number of institutions and the average frequency of keyword use, visions substantially prevail the relevant characteristics of missions (from 1,3 to 5,0 times). Regarding the qualitative structure of visions and missions – they are almost identical (mismatch within 0,9–1,2 times). This can be explained by the fact that mission in general as the generic purposes of the top institutions are more specific, unambiguous and stable in formulations, so to speak, statutory and the degree of their interuniversity variations is less. At the same time, the strategic visions of their implementation are more diverse and creatively formulated like a sort of expected predictions; therefore, they are less accurate and more approximate, and of course they are frequently reviewed in the process of development.