THES Rankings
November 10, 2007 by Andrew
Not much time to write in recent days, but I thought I’d point out the interesting dissections at Beerkens Blog and University Ranking Watch on the Times Higher Education Supplement - Quacquarelli Symonds world university rankings. Searching around suggests that no one thinks that these studies are based on sound methodology - Eric Beerkens says his main finding, in producing his analysis of the top 200 schools on the THES-QS rankings, is that ‘MS Excel 2007 makes nicer graphs than MS Excel 2003′ - but as we know from the controversies over the US News rankings here in the U.S., simply ranking something takes on a life and significance of its own.
So here’s the top twenty - again, go to Beerkens or University Ranking Watch for a more detailed rundown.
1. Harvard University, US
2. University of Cambridge, UK
2. Yale Universiy, UK
2. University of Oxford, UK
5. Imperial College, London, UK
6. Princeton University, US
7. California Institute of Technology, US
7. University of Chicago, US
9. University College London, UK
10. Massachusetts Institute of Technology< US
11. Columbia University, US
12. McGill University, Canada
13. Duke University, U.S.
14. University of Pennsylvania, US
15. Johns Hopkins, US
16. Australian National University, Australia
17. University of Tokyo, Japan
18. University of Hong Kong, HK
19. Stanford University, US
20. Cornell University, US
20. Carnegie Mellon University, US
Some of these positions are cause for disbelief. Four UK schools - the Imperial College? University College London? - in the top 10. I just don’t think Tokyo University ranks above Stanford, whose lowly position at #19 must be causing heart palpitations among those of its supporters who take this kind of thing seriously. As a Columbia student, however, I am pleased to see us in a neck-and-neck with McGill, a school I want to go to, one day, because I love Montreal.
