The Observatory of the Colombian University created the «Web Transparency Ranking», which evaluates 17 aspects that must respond to the clarity in the basic information that all Higher Education Institutions in the Colombian territory must comply with in order to generate efficient, transparent and transparent communication processes. clear for the internal and external community, in the exercise of a process that seeks to guide, inform and establish community ties, beyond an advertising or commercial issue.

During the last year, 249 higher education institutions in Colombia were evaluated, with their communication and socialization strategies, through educational pages and portals, where the María Cano University Foundation ranked 25th at the national level by parameters such as:

Very important information: That identifies who is behind the institution and how it is oriented.

• Statutes and norms of creation that allow to identify the genesis of the institution, its creators, the founding interests and the administration and government system.
• Regulations, especially for students and professors, that allow knowing the rules of the game that the institution applies with its academic community.
• Minutes of the collegiate bodies, especially directive or superior and academic councils, through which it is appreciated how decisions are made and what are the substantive agendas in the direction of the university.
• Financial reports, such as balance sheets, budgets, criteria for the allocation of resources and executions, which allow us to appreciate the relationship between the academic project with the administrative reality.
• Clear instructions and guides on the registration and admissions process, requirements, candidates, admission evaluation systems and pecuniary rights of all kinds.

Determining information: That shows how the institution conceives its educational activity.

• Philosophical framework of the university, reflected in mission, vision, principles, values ​​and, in general, an institutional educational project that shows the ideology of the institution and its way of understanding the academy as its reason for being.
• Updated programs and curricula, to measure the operational and academic magnitude of each faculty, school or department, as well as the specialty and disciplinary focus of each one.
• Systems and reports of self-evaluation and accreditation that demonstrate the willingness of the institution to make public its strengths and, especially, its weaknesses and commitments, with the academy and its management.
• Names and resumes of administrative and academic directors, as well as teachers and researchers, that allow us to know who the builders of this educational project are.

Necessary information: That demonstrates the way in which the institution is organized and projected.

• Up-to-date indicators and statistical data that help to measure the size, growth and logic of distribution of personnel, resources and areas of development.
• Academic documents, such as online journals, articles, essays and debate scenarios, which additionally turn the institution’s page into a repository of results for the academy and its protagonists.
• Permanent and updated news, showing the cultural, academic, national and procedural life of the institution, and the actions of managers, teachers, administrators and students.
• Community of graduates and the interest of the institution to interact with them as a projection of the university towards society and a responsibility with its former students.

Complementary information: That allows the institution to show itself with more ownership and universality in the university environment.

• History of the institution, evolution over time, determining changes and growth.
• Version of the institutional page in another language, especially English, as an international dimension on the web and openness to other scenarios.

The María Cano highlights the generation of stories, the publication of news from the different venues at the national level, the accompaniment with legitimators, the support with different social networks and the publication of legal information, such as the electoral regulations and the different policies. that support institutional action; as well as the fact of having a portal in English that invites the practice and use of the second language.

It is important to note that the Observatory of the Colombian University clarifies that: “This ranking does not show which are the HEIs with a technically more elaborate web page, larger, with a better aesthetic presentation, with more modules or interactive functionalities, more visited or with more information.

Nor should it be confused with the ranking of visibility on the web, prepared by Webometrics, which measures which are the HEIs with the greatest presence on the internet through the number of visitors, references or related links. This ranking measures the relevance of the information published on the website or main domain of each of the Colombian HEIs, in terms of quantity and quality of information for the exact identification of each university, its academic performance, its protagonists, programs , accountability, complexity and institutional management ”.

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