Saturday, 17.08.2024, 03:02
In the current “Academic Ranking of World Universities”, which is compiled annually by Shanghai Jiaotong University, US universities are once again in the lead: eight of the ten best universities in the world according to the ranking are in the United States. Four Austrian universities made it into the top 500 this time, which is slightly less than in previous years. The best domestic university is the University of Vienna, which, like last year, is ranked 101-150.
The list of the best is traditionally led by the US universities Harvard, Stanford and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The best European university is once again the University of Cambridge (Great Britain) in 4th place, followed by Berkeley and – the second British university in the top 10 – Oxford in 6th place. The US university Princeton, the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Columbia and the University of Chicago also made it into the top 10. The best continental European university is once again the University of Paris-Saclay (12th place), followed by ETH Zurich (21st place). According to the ARWU ranking, the best German universities are the University of Munich (43), the Technical University (TU) of Munich (47) and the University of Heidelberg (50).
In Austria, this time, in addition to the University of Vienna, the Medical University of Vienna, the University of Innsbruck (both ranking group 201-300) and the Vienna University of Technology (301-400) were also listed among the top 500. Innsbruck has moved up a group of 100 (from 101st place onwards, the ranking is only in steps of 50, from 201st place onwards in steps of 100). In previous years, Austria was usually represented by six to seven universities in the top 500; in 2023, there were five.
The University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences (Boku) did not make it into the top 500 this time, and will be ranked 601-700 in 2024 (2023: 401-500). Otherwise, there were only a few changes: The Medical University of Graz moved up one ranking group and is now ranked 501-600 like the Medical University of Innsbruck, while the University of Graz moved down one group to 601-700. TU Graz, the University of Linz and the University of Salzburg are still in the 801-900 ranking group.
The Shanghai ranking is strongly research-oriented, and is primarily based on publicly available databases. 40 percent of the evaluation is based on the quality of the scientists at the respective institution (assessed by the number of Nobel Prize and Fields Medal winners working there and the number of highly cited researchers) and the research output (measured by publications in the magazines “Science” and “Nature” and citations). Ten percent of the evaluation is based on the quality of education (measured by the number of Nobel Prize and Fields Medal winners among graduates) and the productivity per researcher. Most recently, over 1,800 universities took part in the ranking.
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