“But enough of us explaining how triffic we are, how ‘triffic do you think we are?”

“Academic reputation” accounts for 40 per cent of university scores in the QS World University Ranking.  It’s based on a survey that, “collates the expert opinions of over 130,000 individuals in the higher education space regarding teaching and research quality at the world’s universities.”

That’s a bunch of experts to ask – but fortunately universities help, approaching academics outside their organisation for permission to give QS their contact details.

“We feel that your impartial responses would contribute to the insight and precision of the survey’s outcomes,” states an invitation, just sent out by a Queensland university, to people on its database.

Perhaps QS could include praise successfully solicited in university scores.