Universities All over the world to attract the estimated 270,000 Indians
The 2011 QS World University Rankings ® have been compiled
following the most wide-ranging surveys of their kind ever conducted.
Universities are complex, and numbers alone do not tell the whole story. While other
rankings focus primarily on measures of research productivity such as citations,
the QS exercise counterbalances this information with the views of global academic
and graduate employers.
In order to harness these views effectively, they must be drawn from a truly representative
global sample. To this end, QS has dramatically increased the scope of its surveys
in 2011. This year's rankings draw on the views of over 33,000 academics and 16,000
graduate employers from around the globe.
Despite the expanded sample size, this year's rankings are notable above all for
their stability. The QS methodology has remained unchanged since 2005 (the year
the employer review was introduced), allowing for valid year-on-year comparisons.
The line-up of the top 50 differs by just two institutions from that of 2010, while
there was a turnover of just five in the top 100. Changes to the international balance
of power can be traced over the last few years, but as the QS rankings have matured
they have largely balanced receptiveness to genuine change with resistance to artificial
volatility. Universities all over the world are competing to attract the estimated
270,000 Indians who study overseas each year, and many will be visiting Delhi on
13th September as part of the QS World University Tour. And with universities from
a remarkable 73 nations featuring in the 2011 QS World University Rankings®, the
range of options has never been wider. Investment pays off The 2011 QS World University
Rankings® give a clear illustration of the link between investment and results in
higher education. In particular, those countries that have injected funds into their
leading universities are beginning to see an impact. China is the classic example,
with Peking and Tsinghua universities leading an overall rise in the positions of
those institutions that have benefited from a series of huge funding programmes.
Japan, South Korea and Germany are among the other countries to have channelled
extra support into a limited number of universities judged capable of international
excellence. All have seen significant rises in the rankings by at least some of
the beneficiaries, while countries that have cut funding for higher education have
seen a gradual decline in the international standing of their universities.
In the United States, which remains the dominant force in global higher education,
the leading universities are sufficiently wealthy to ride out a drop to their endowments.
But state universities have suffered big budget cuts and several have been overtaken
in the latest rankings. The United Kingdom, which again provides the leading university
- Cambridge - is yet to feel the full force of higher education budget cuts.
Rise of Asian institutions: One of the talking
points in 2011 is undoubtedly the performance of Asian universities. Of the leading
25 Asian universities, 21 improve on their 2010 position, with just three moving
in the opposite direction. There are 47 Asian universities in the top 300 (two more
than last year), and 88 institutions make the top 500. Hong Kong University repeats
its 2010 performance by taking the top spot in Asia, moving up one place to 22nd
and increasing the gap with University of Tokyo to three places. HKU is joined by
fellow Hong Kong institutions CUHK and HKUST in the top 50, while HKU, University
of Tokyo and National University of Singapore cement their places in the global
top 30. However, the news for India is less positive, with all of the nation's universities
ranking lower than in 2010. IIT Bombay dropped from 187 to 225, meaning there is
now no Indian university in the global top 200. No Indian university ranks in the
top 200 for citations per faculty, indicating a lack of research impact. Large class
sizes are also reflected in the fact that no Indian university makes the top 300
for student faculty ratio.
However, there is better news among global employers. Four Indian universities were
rated as among the top 100 by employers for producing highly skilled graduates,
indicating that though they may lack research strength, the best Indian universities
are nonetheless doing a better job at equipping students with skills that help them
thrive in the workplace. Methodology While no single ranking can ever cover every
aspect of university performance definitively, most existing rankings methodologies
will provide useful information to the right audience. The QS methodology is devised
for a primary audience of prospective students and their parents, and focuses on
four key areas of academic life: research, employability, teaching and international
outlook.
To measure these areas the rankings use six indicators:
Academic Reputation (40%), Employer Reputation (10%), Citations per Faculty
(20%), Student/Faculty Ratio (20%), International Students (5%), International Faculty
(5%). A full explanation of the QS World University Rankings methodology can be
found at
www.topuniversities.com. For the full rankings candidates can go to www.topuniversities.com.
Courtesy: Times of India
