Talk:Masaryk University

Measure of quality / stature used
Hi, I changed the text saying MU is the second oldest in Czech Rep., as that's not so (2nd oldest is Univ. of Olomouc). This text was probably a trivial replacement for the earlier "second largest" which I originally posted here. Back then I used size as a measure of quality, and someone took it down on the grounds that it's not a good measure. I agree in general that is not true. I originally posted it because in the Czech Rep., the size-quality correlation has historically been strong. However, since this Wiki has global readership (with a predominance of Americans most likely), the average reader would not make that connection. I understand that the US in particular is one of the countries where size is a poor predictor of university quality.

However, since I wanted the text to say something positive about the school (note: I have no personal interest in doing so beyond being Czech; I studied at the Charles U. in Prague), I wrote in something along the lines that the MU is considered of high quality within Czech Rep. I have no sources to properly support this; all I can offer is local knowledge: Among Czechs, the perceived stature and reputation of MU is probably second best in the country after Charles U. (again no personal bias for Charles U, although I did study there; if I searched for a while I could produce citation and publication index-based rankings to confirm; I have seen such although I don't remember where exactly at the moment). Of course, these rankings are fluid over time and varied across different fields of science, but I still think that it's accurate enough for what is a highly peripheral article on this Wiki (come to think of it, this commentary is probably TLDR considering the relative unimportance of the topic to SG; sorry :-) ).