QS World University Rankings 2011 – Results for UK universities
The UK presence in the QS top 100 for 2011 is largely unchanged although there is some jockeying for position in the top 10 where Cambridge is ranked first for a second consecutive year ahead of Harvard, MIT and Yale and Oxford moves up to fifth ahead of Imperial, while UCL drops from fourth to seventh. UK institutions do tend to do rather well in this table though, probably because of the significant score derived from a reputational survey (where age counts for a lot). There are 37 UK universities in the top 300, second only to the US. Despite Cambridge’s table-topping performance, US institutions continue to dominate, taking 20 of the top 50 places and accounting for 70 of the top 300.
Six indicators are used in the ranking:
40% Academic reputation from a global survey
10% Employer reputation from a global survey
20% Citations per faculty from SciVerse Scopus
20% Faculty student Ratio
5% Proportion of international students
5% Proportion of international staff
2011 ranking of UK universities (2010 in brackets)
1 (1 )University of Cambridge
5 (6) University of Oxford
6 (7) Imperial College London
7 (4) UCL
20 (22) University of Edinburgh
27 (21) King’s College London (KCL)
29 (30) The University of Manchester
30 (27) University of Bristol
50 (53) The University of Warwick
59 (77) University of Glasgow
64 (80) LSE
67 (59) University of Birmingham
72 (69) The University of Sheffield
74 (73) The University of Nottingham
75 (81) University of Southampton
93 (85) University of Leeds
95 (92) Durham University
96 (88) University of York
97 (95) University of St Andrews
Full details at QS World University Rankings Results website.
Warwick up to number 50. Does this mean we have achieved the Vision of top 50 by 2015? Perhaps not but certainly “en route”!
Read another one that said LSE was like top 5. Don’t know how any of these surveys get to their ranking but don’t trust any of them. Go see them for yourself.
Too many surveys and ranking systems, in the end they are subjective, subjective about which indicators or criteria to use, subjective about the weightings of each criteria. Little more than a marketing exercise.
http://gjismyp.wordpress.com/2012/03/15/university-rankings-2012-what-do-they-mean/
I’m sure the QS people would take issue with you but many more would agree with your comments about choice of indicators.
QS do make a very good effort with their choice of indicators, but the main point in the end is that one size cannot fit all.