news
UNSW breaks
world top 100
University says one indicator
set it back in the rankings.
S
even Australian universities are
celebrating top 100 positions in a
global academic ranking – one for
the first time.
The 2019 Academic Ranking of World
Universities (ARWU), compiled by the
ShanghaiRanking Consultancy, put the
University of Melbourne in 41st place.
Despite dropping three spots since last
year, Melbourne still topped all the other
universities in Oceania, but its regional
campusreview.com.au
dominance didn’t extend to Asia, where it
was beaten by the University of Tokyo (25)
and Kyoto University (32).
It also finished just ahead of Asia’s third
best performer, Tsinghua University (43).
Harvard topped the list for the 17th time.
Stanford and Cambridge retained their
podium positions.
Australia’s next best performers were the
University of Queensland (54) and Monash
University (73). The Australian National
University (76), University of Sydney (80) and
University of Western Australia (99) were
also top 100 entries. And the University
of New South Wales made its first ever
appearance in the top 100. At 94, it was the
highest position UNSW has held since the
rankings were first published in 2003.
UNSW president and vice-chancellor
Professor Ian Jacobs said it was working
towards a spot among the world’s top 50
universities by 2025.
“The ARWU ranking is the latest evidence
of our progress,” he said. “In just two years
we have risen 39 places in ARWU from
133rd to 94th.”
He put some of the success down
to breakthrough research work in quantum computing, HIV prevention and
photovoltaics.
“I am optimistic this momentum will
continue and will be reflected in the Times
Higher Education ranking, which will be
released in September.”
Deputy vice-chancellor (research)
Professor Nicholas Fisk said the ARWU was
heavily weighted to Nobel Prize and Fields
Medal recipients. He said the consultancy’s
Alternative Ranking, which did not include
the 30 per cent score for awards, was a
better indicator of UNSW’s performance.
“If we remove [this score], UNSW is 50th
globally – up 17 places from 2018 – an even
more encouraging result,” Fisk said.
The ARWU rankings are based on the
number of alumni and staff winning Nobel
Prizes and Fields Medals, the number of
highly cited researchers, the number of
articles published in the journals of Nature
and Science, the number of articles indexed
in the Science Citation Index Expanded and
the Social Sciences Citation Index, and per
capita performance.
In total, about 1800 universities were
ranked by the ARWU, but only the best
1000 universities were published. ■
The University of Sydney just scraped
into the top 100 – at 100. It was followed
by Monash University (102), the Australian
National University (108) and the University
of New South Wales (113).
After the University of Queensland’s
position at 115th and the University of
Western Australia’s at 126th, Australia
doesn’t feature again on the list until spot
217, with the University of Adelaide.
CWUR’s upper echelons were dominated
by the United States, a top 10 clean sweep
that was only broken by two UK entries – the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge,
at 4th and 5th, respectively. This sort of
domination has been the case since the
ranking began in 2012.
All Ivy League institutions featured in this
year’s top 50.
Harvard University topped this list for
the eighth year in a row. Other top three
finishers were the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology and Stanford University.
It’s the same podium as last year, albeit a
little jumbled.
The only other country to break the top 20
was Japan, with the University of Tokyo (13).
CWUR grades universities on seven
factors: quality of teaching, alumni
employment, quality of faculty, research
output, high-quality publications, influence
and citations.
The following is a list of all the top 200
Australian universities and their position in
the previous year’s ranking.
• University of Melbourne – 64 (57)
• University of Sydney – 100 (71)
• Monash University – 102 (124)
• Australian National University – 108 (82)
• University of New South Wales – 113 (119)
• University of Queensland – 115 (74)
• University of Western Australia – 126 (145). ■
Rankings slide
Australia’s top ranked universities
slip down CWUR list.
A
ustralia has missed out on a
top 50 spot in a ranking of the
globe’s universities.
The Center for World University
Rankings (CWUR), headquartered in the
United Arab Emirates, put the University of
Melbourne, Oceania’s best performer, at
number 64.
Last year, Melbourne reached 57th place
on the list.
2