Not enough PhD degrees

NTNU is graduating too few PhDs. The goal this year was 350 doctoral degrees, while the prognosis for the second planning period is 282. The university also fell short of its goal last year, and had to lower its estimates for each of the university’s four-month planning periods.

One hundred behind schedule

At Friday's board meeting, it became clear that the faculties are even farther behind in producing PhDs than they were at the same time last year. Based on historical figures, Frank Arntsen, director of the university’s finance and property division, estimated that NTNU will produce between 230 and 260 doctoral degrees in 2010. The university has initiated follow-up efforts, along with measures to increase the speed with which degrees are completed and efforts to decrease the dropout rate, but these initiatives are not expected to have an effect for some time. The challenges facing the PhD programme will be addressed as a separate issue during the November board meeting.

Not even close

“We are not even close to our forecasts. It is certainly time to forget the argument that candidates are being delayed. Candidates who are behind schedule still complete their degrees at some point, so that is not what is affecting the numbers we are ending up with here,” commented Professor Helge Holden.

NTNU is now in its third year of prioritizing five target areas. These priorities are closely followed by the university’s seven faculties and the Museum of Natural History and Archaeology. In three of the five target areas —externally funded activities, scientific publishing and educational quality—the university appears to be on track. However, the university is struggling to reach its goals for 2010 for researcher education and gender balance. These were also the areas where NTNU had its worst results in attaining last year’s goals.

A memorandum presented to the Board on Friday raised the question as to whether there are flaws in the way the university’s goals are determined. If so, this also might mean the goals themselves are too ambitious. The memo suggests that the existing indicators and the manner in which data are collected should be reviewed again. This will be undertaken as part of the university’s strategic development.

Reserves a problem

The university had a surplus of NOK 2.6 million at the end of August, but it was NTNU's relatively large reserves that got the most attention from board members.

The reserves are unused funds that are kept “on the books” for future use. At the beginning of the year, the university had reserves of NOK 330 million, and it now turns out that the planned downsizing of these funds has not gone as planned. Last year, university administrators were told to shrink reserves, so that no one could have appropriations for regular operations of more than 12 percent by the end of 2013.

To motivate administrators to shrink reserves, the Board threatened to transfer these funds to the central office for reallocation.

Risk of a boomerang effect

NTNU is a special situation, with existing appropriated funds that are far higher than the two other major universities, where money is much tighter. These funds are found at every level of the university -- from the faculty and department level, right down to individual research budgets.

Board chair Marit Arnstad expressed concern that these appropriated funds are not being spent down quickly enough, and pointed out that the extra funds can actually pose a risk to NTNU.

“These funds can be seen as evidence that we manage our finances well. But in these hard times, the extra funds might also be seen by the government as evidence that it can tighten our budget. This could effectively have a boomerang effect for us, because we’re not where we should be when it comes to budget allocations,” Arnstad said.

Finance director Arntsen says some of the unused funds relate to appropriations for construction projects, scientific equipment, PhD positions and the like. However, roughly NOK 100 million of the surplus is not clearly assigned to a specific project.

International ranking

Although it was not an item on the agenda or related to the report on university strategy, the board also addressed NTNU’s poor showing on several recent university ranking lists.

“I want an analysis of why we don’t measure up as strongly as we should, and why we have dropped in some of the rankings. Why have we dropped off these lists, when both the University of Oslo (UiO) and the University of Bergen (UiB) are on them? I'd like a clearer picture of this,” Board Chair Arnstad said.

She made it clear she was not interested in excuses that blame the various rankings by saying there is something wrong with the ranking criteria.

“UiB and UiO have placed better than we have. One thing is certain: These rankings are here to stay. I want an analysis and the reasons behind why we rank the way we do, and what we can do about it,” Arnstad said.

Business reputation an issue

“We’ve already ordered an analysis,” replied Rector Torbjørn Digernes, who said he looked forward to delving into the ranking issue.

External representative Anne Kathrine Slungård and Professor Bjarne Foss also said they wanted an analysis of NTNU’s performance in the rankings, because it will be important in the ongoing work on the university’s strategic plan. Statoil’s Morten Loktu shared this position. He was concerned because NTNU has an outstanding reputation in the business community – which is something quite different from what is reflected in the university’s international rankings. Loktu also called for a media strategy to address the issue.

“We have to be honest about what we are bad at, what we are good at and where we should be better. Rankings can easily create an unfortunate attitude out there that NTNU is a third-tier university,” said Loktu.