Original article (in Serbian) was published on 4/9/2025; Author: Teodora Koledin
A group of 230 professors, researchers, and public figures signed a petition “for the normalization of the educational process at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Novi Sad.” The petition and an accompanying letter were published yesterday, listing a series of adverse circumstances that, according to the signatories, resulted from the student-led blockades. The petition also mentions the loss of the University of Novi Sad’s (UNS) position on the Shanghai Ranking of the top 1,000 higher education institutions. However, the Shanghai Ranking organization gave Tragač a clear response, stating that “student activities or protests do not affect university rankings.”
Although student activities are not scored, could they have had an indirect effect on the ranking, for instance, hypothetically demotivating some researchers or disrupting research projects? Even an indirect effect was impossible: by the time the blockades began, the race for positions on the Shanghai Ranking was practically already finished. It is also worth noting that the University of Belgrade, under identical blockade conditions, remained in the same group on the Shanghai Ranking.
Shanghai Ranking: Student protests cannot affect university rankings
The petition text claims that the University of Novi Sad “no longer exists on the Shanghai Ranking” after a dramatic statement that it is now “the last moment to save the University of Novi Sad!” While the signatories believe the blockades harmed the university in various ways, they cannot be linked to the loss of the university’s position on the list. The consulting organization that manages the ranking – Shanghai Ranking – emphasizes that only research-related indicators are considered in the ranking, and that student protests have no impact on it.
On their official website, Shanghai Ranking provides a detailed methodology used for scoring, and these are the indicators relevant to determining a university’s position on the ranking:
| Indicator | Definition |
|---|---|
| Alumni | Number of the institution’s alumni who have won Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals |
| Award | Number of staff members at the institution who have won Nobel Prizes in Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, and Economics, as well as the Fields Medal in Mathematics |
| HiCi | Number of highly cited researchers according to the Institute for Scientific Information in Philadelphia |
| N&S | Number of research articles published in Nature and Science from 2020 to 2024 |
| PUB | Number of papers indexed in the Science Citation Index – Expanded and Social Science Citation Index (Web of Science) in 2024 |
| PCP | Weighted results of the five indicators divided by the number representing full-time academic staff |
Impact of blockades on the indicators
Regarding the first two criteria, the blockades could not have prevented former students or current professors and researchers at UNS from winning a Nobel Prize. The 2024 winners had already been announced just under two months before the blockades began (1, 2, 3, 4). The last Fields Medals were awarded in 2022, with the next scheduled for the following year.
For the third indicator, HiCi, it is explicitly stated that the list of highly cited researchers from November 2024 was used. Specifically, students at the Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad began their blockade on December 2 – exactly one week after students at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade were the first in the country to do so. The conclusion is that student blockades could not have had any effect on this indicator.
Another important criterion is the number of research articles published in prestigious journals Nature and Science between 2020 and 2024. The editorial board of Nature makes “first decisions” on manuscripts within 45 days of submission, while articles in Science are published four to eight weeks after acceptance. All of this follows a complex and usually lengthy peer-review process. Taking all this into account, student blockades that began at the end of last year could not have affected the number of scientific publications in these journals.
