US News now ranks world universities.

Yet another global university ranking list. However, this one is from US News, this is their first ever world ranking:

US News World University Ranking.

 

Australian National U is ranked 72...

>_<

 

It's hard for me to believe that UCLA is #8 in the World. I'm just sayin' . . .

 

It may be particularly hard to believe, given that UCLA is only #23 in the US, according to the current USN&WR "National University" rankings.
Remember, this is the exact same publisher that is now ranking UCLA as #8 in the world.

You might ask: isn't this an obvious contradiction?
How can USN&WR claim that UCLA as #8 in the world, yet at the same time claim that UCLA as only #23 in the US ?

The answer is that the new global rankings and the traditional national rankings are based on different criteria.
The global rankings basically reflect research output and reputation.
The national rankings include other things, like undergraduate admissions selectivity.

UCLA is a big school that ranks very highly in terms of quality and quantity of research.
So it scores well in the global rankings -- well ahead of (for example) Princeton, which is a much smaller school.

On the other hand, Princeton is much tougher, in terms of undergraduate admissions, than UCLA is.
So Princeton easily tops UCLA in the national rankings.

So believe what you like. It depends on what you think makes a university great.

 

Hopkins is # 11. Woo Hoo!! :bigok::banana:

 

One school that really captures the difference in the two USN&WR rankings is Dartmouth.

National USN&WR ranking: #11
Global USN&R ranking: #242

Dartmouth is a small, elite school with a strong emphasis on undergraduate education, and extremely selective undergraduate admissions. So it does very well in the national rankings. On the other hand, it only has a small number of graduate students, and isn't generally known for research. So it tanks in the global rankings.

 

Another school that shows the difference, but in the opposite way, is the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF):

Global USN&R ranking: #22
National USN&WR ranking: Not even listed.

UCSF is a graduate-only institution focusing on biomedical education and research. It is one of the top schools worldwide for biomedical research, so it rates highly in the USN&WR global rankings. But it doesn't have any undergraduate programs, so it does not "fit" into the USN&WR national ranking system, which includes factors related to undergraduate selectivity.

So UCSF is one of USN&WR's top global universities -- yet as far as the USN&WR national university rankings are concerned, it doesn't even exist.

 

Other interesting things about the rankings.

LSE is ranked #328
Royal Holloway has no ranking at all.

 

It would be nice if they included a list of those schools (more than a few) that refuse to cooperate in supplying data for rankings.
And perhaps those that have already been caught falsifying the data they supply to USN&WR in order to improve their rankings.