【明報專訊】RECENT YEARS have seen a downward trend in Hong Kong universities' positions in international higher education rankings. People in Hong Kong universities maintain that, as the phenomenon has to do with changes in evaluation methods, one should not attach much importance to it. However, if the organisations that compile those rankings have enough authority and credibility and if they have changed their methods in the light of actual situations, one should say the decline in Hong Kong universities' rankings evidences their failure to move with the times or the success of universities in other places in doing so. If we only want to "feel good" and pay no regard to the fact that others are pressing forward and we are falling back, we will lag further behind in the highly competitive international community. Our competitors always have the bit between their teeth. They will not "wait for Hong Kong".