news
World beaters
Aussie universities feature big
in THE Impact Rankings.
A
ustralian universities have
dominated a ranking that looks at
efforts to solve global challenges.
Four top spots in Times Higher
Education’s (THE) Impact Rankings were
taken up by Australian institutions – a huge
jump from last year’s result, as no Australian
university appeared in the 2019 top 10.
The ranking uses the United Nations’ 17
sustainable development goals to measure
the extent to which universities are having
a positive social and economic impact on
the planet.
U21 ranking
Australia scores well for
environment and output.
T
he United States has again nabbed
the top spot in the ninth and final
Universitas 21 ranking.
Produced under the leadership of
Professor Ross Williams at the University of
Melbourne, the ranking evaluates national
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campusreview.com.au
Last year, Australia’s top performer
was Western Sydney University, debuting
at 11. It was followed by the University of
Wollongong at equal 13, and the University
of South Australia at 22.
This year, the University of Sydney was
Australia’s best (2) – up from 25 last year –
but was pipped at the post by the University
of Auckland, which nabbed the pole
position for the second year running.
USyd performed particularly well in the
‘sustainable cities and communities’ and
‘decent work and economic growth’ goals.
Vice-chancellor Dr Michael Spence said:
“The contribution universities make has
never been more important – with climate
change, unprecedented bushfires and the
coronavirus affecting us all.”
Explaining its success, the university
pointed to its work on keeping local
Indigenous languages from extinction and
on a report that explores the sometimes
illegal arrangements emerging in parts of
Sydney in response to unmet housing need,
as well as a trip by students last year to
Pune, India, to work on artificial intelligence
to address air pollution, water management
and drought, along with events like the Sydney Summit II, which focused on
sustainable development goals.
Sydney Environment Institute director
Professor David Schlosberg said the
university’s forthcoming sustainability
strategy – expected this year – would make
its work in this area more visible to the
campus community and “put some of our
best research into practice in the everyday
life of the campus”.
Rounding out 2020’s top three was
Western Sydney University, which was
followed by La Trobe University at
number 4. Australia’s other top 10 finisher
was RMIT University (10).
The United States typically dominates
higher education rankings, yet only three
US universities ranked in the 2020 top 100.
Arizona State University (5) gave the country
its only top 10 result.
This is the first year the Impact Rankings
recognised all 17 sustainable development
goals, up from 11 last year.
In the 17 individual SDG Rankings, 16
universities from nine nations took out
number one positions, including China,
the US, Ireland, Denmark, Australia, New
Zealand, Japan, Canada and the UK. ■
systems of higher education rather than
individual universities.
It zeroes in on a system’s resources, the
environment, connectivity and output by
examining a number of institutions within
a nation.
Australia was named in the top 10 on the
list but trailed leaders like second-placed
Switzerland and third-placed Denmark,
as well as Singapore, Sweden, the United
Kingdom, Canada and Finland. The
Netherlands rounded out the top 10. It was
a slip of one position from its place on the
2019 instalment.
Williams said that over the last decade
the ranking has tracked the movement
to international connectiveness in higher
education and its positive effect on national
performance.
“Domestic links with the private sector
and other external stakeholders are also
important,” he said. “National systems that
are inward-looking flounder.”
He also noted the strong relationship
between increases in research funding
and measurable increases in research
performance after three or four years.
“The project has demonstrated that
international connectivity increases the impact of research – knowledge of the
research is expanded [and] the researchers
become better known and are thus linked
into new international research projects
and findings.”
Breaking down the overall list, the
top three countries for resources were
Norway, Singapore and Switzerland, while
the countries with the most favourable
environment – scoring well on the diversity
and autonomy of their institutions and the
extent of external monitoring of institutional
performance – were the US, Australia and
New Zealand.
Australia was also a top performer when
looking at output and its impact, coming in
at number 3 – up from 4th place last year –
after the US and the UK.
And when looking at which countries
boast institutions with superior connectivity,
Switzerland, Austria and Singapore come
out on top.
Singapore and Denmark gained ground
on the overall list compared to their
positions last year, climbing three and two
places, respectively.
After allowing for differences in
income levels, the top ranked countries
were Finland, South Africa and the UK. ■