Times Higher Education: Brics & Emerging Economies Rankings

Times Higher Education Publishes Its Second Annual Brics & Emerging Economies Rankings – the World’s Only Independent Ranking of Its Kind

• Eighteen countries are featured in the Times Higher Education BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings 2015
• 15 universities – from Chile, China, India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Russia and Turkey – have entered the tables for the first time
• China cements its dominance among the emerging economies, retaining the top two places and increasing its representation among the top-100 institutions to 27, up from 23 last year
• Taiwan has more representatives (19) than any other country except China, but it is losing ground as two institutions drop out of the list and National Taiwan University slips down to sixth place from fourth
• India increases its representation with 11 of the top-100 places, up from 10 last year and it has a new national leader
• A strong year for Turkey, which takes three top-10 places and eight top-100 spots (up from seven last year). Middle East Technical University takes third place in the list
• Russia sees a dramatic improvement in its performance, with seven top-100 entrants and fifth place for Moscow State University
• South Africa boasts five representatives on the prestigious list and the University of Cape Town takes fourth place overall
• Brazil’s University of São Paulo breaks into the top 10, but the country has only four top-100 institutions
• Top-50 places for Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, Mexico, Morocco, Poland and Thailand
• Hungary, Pakistan, Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates also make the list
• No places in the top-100 table for Egypt, Indonesia, Peru or the Philippines

SEE BELOW FOR THE FOLLOWING:
• QUOTES FROM PHIL BATY, EDITOR, TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION RANKINGS
• FULL TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION BRICS AND EMERGING ECONOMIES RANKINGS 2015
• COUNTRY REPRESENTATION IN WORLD TOP 100

Times Higher Education magazine today publishes its annual BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings 2015 – the world’s only independent ranking for universities in Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa (BRICS) and 17 other emerging economies.

These new annual tables are based on the same trusted and comprehensive range of 13 separate, rigorous performance indicators used to create the prestigious THE World University Rankings, covering all aspects of the modern university’s core missions (teaching, research, knowledge transfer and international outlook). But they have been specially recalibrated to better reflect the character and development priorities of universities in the emerging economies.

Some 22 countries classified as emerging economies by FTSE have been analysed: Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Hungary, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.

China has dramatically strengthened its position as the number one nation of the emerging economies, matching its growing economic dominance with rapidly improving universities increasingly able to challenge the established Western elite. China retains the top two positions (Peking University followed by Tsinghua University) in the rankings, and claims a total of 27 top-100 institutions, up from 23 last year. Fudan University follows Peking and Tsinghua, taking ninth place, while University of Science and Technology of China loses its top-10 position, moving into joint 11th place.

Taiwan is the next best represented country with 19 universities in the top-100 list, but this compares with 21 institutions last year. National Taiwan University has slipped from fourth place last year to sixth this year. Also in East Asia, Thailand has three top-100 institutions (down from five last year), while Malaysia has only one, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (down from two institutions last year). Although considered as part of the analysis, Indonesia and the Philippines do not make the top 100.

India has strengthened its overall representation in the list, with 11 top-100 universities compared with 10 last year – including new entrant (and new national number one) Indian Institute of Science in 25th place and the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in 37th place. This year, Pakistan can claim a top-100 place: National University of Sciences and Technology claims joint 95th place, as a first-time entrant.

Brazil’s flagship institution, the University of São Paulo, makes the top 10 this year – moving up one place from 11th. It is followed by the State University of Campinas (27th), the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (61st) and UNESP (slipping from 87th to 97th), giving Brazil four top-100 institutions.

Brazil’s South American peer, Colombia, has a single representative on the list, the University of the Andes, which falls from 17th to 28th position. Also in the Americas, Chile and Mexico have two top-100 universities each. Mexico’s National Autonomous University of Mexico moved up from 59th last year into the top 50, in 48th place.

Russia has seen a dramatic improvement in its standing – increasing its representatives in the top 100 from just two last year to seven this year, and seeing its number one university, Moscow State University, moving from 10th to 5th. St Petersburg State University also rose, from 67th to joint 64th, while Novosibirsk State University rocketed into the top 100 for the first time, taking 34th place. A methodological change to the rankings this year, reducing the requirement that institutions publish at least 200 research papers indexed by Thomson Reuters a year down to 100 papers, allowed three small specialist institutions in Russia to join the rankings, led by Moscow State Engineering Physics Institute (National Research Nuclear University) in 13th place.

Apart from Russia’s improvements, other parts of Eastern Europe lost ground: Poland has two top 100 institutions (down from four last year), led by the University of Warsaw (46th down from 23rd); the Czech Republic and Hungary have two each, both down from three each last year.

South Africa’s University of Cape Town slipped one place from third to fourth, while University of Witwatersrand (15th to 14th) and Stellenbosch University (21st to 17th) both moved up the table. Overall, South Africa has five top-100 universities, the same number as last year.

Turkey improved its position significantly. It now has eight universities in the list, up from seven, and the Middle East Technical University moved from ninth place to third – making it the highest ranked university in the developing world outside China.

The Middle East and North Africa region has mixed results. Egypt lost all three of its top-100 representatives (which were all in the 90s last year), but Morocco’s sole representative, University of Marrakech Cadi Ayyad, jumped from 83rd to 50th. The United Arab Emirates retained its two representatives, with its leading institution, United Arab Emirates University, moving up from 76th to joint 71st.

The Times Higher Education BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings are the latest addition to a portfolio that has established Times Higher Education as the world’s most respected provider of comparative university performance data.

The methodology of the 2015 BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings is slightly different from the methodology used in 2014. While the 2014 BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings used a methodology identical to the overall THE World University Rankings, the 2015 BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings have been adjusted to better reflect the characteristics and development needs of a university in the emerging economies. The overall World University Rankings require that institutions publish at least 200 research papers a year across the five-year publication period that is assessed before they can be included in the rankings, but to reflect the fact that developing institutions may not have research systems as mature as those of the developed world, this requirement has been reduced to 100 papers a year for this ranking. Accordingly, the weighting given for “research influence”, judged by publication citations, has been reduced in weight from 30 per cent in the world rankings, to 20 per cent. The weighting for “industry income – innovation” has been increased from 2.5 per cent to 10 per cent, while the weighting for “international outlook” has been increased from 7.5 per cent to 10 per cent.

Phil Baty, editor of the Times Higher Education Rankings, said:

“Last year, Times Higher Education was the first in the world to produce a specialist ranking of universities in the emerging economies and already the ranking has become an essential resource. As well as helping students get a clearer picture of their global study opportunities, the new ranking is an important tool for institutions to benchmark themselves against the tough international standards set by the flagship THE World University Rankings, and a serious resource for governments to help monitor the contribution their universities are making to their countries’ global competitiveness and economic growth.

“Strong universities can be fundamental to a country’s economic growth, and with China’s outstanding performance, the BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings provide a clear case study of what can be achieved with a comprehensive, coherent policy to develop world-class universities. The rankings also provide a stark warning of how much distance some developing economies must still travel before their universities can compete on the world stage – and how much they risk if they fall too far behind.”

THE TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION BRICS & EMERGING ECONOMIES RANKINGS 2015: FULL TABLES
Copyright Times Higher Education. www.thewur.com

THE TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION BRICS & EMERGING ECONOMIES RANKINGS 2015: STATE OF THE NATIONS – NUMBER OF REPRESENTATIVES FROM EACH COUNTRY IN THE TOP 100
Copyright Times Higher Education. www.thewur.com

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