Talk:League table of world universities published: top three from USA

Strange to see this come out so soon after to the Times Higher Education Supplement rankings [1], yet show completely the opposite trends! Might try and work this in, to show the contrast. the wub "?!" 14:30, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

sure , have a go. But note the THES list has a different purpose, and includes things like staff student ratio. ARWU is very focused on research impact, Nobels, citation etc only, and is to measure teh gap between china and the best. The THES is I suppose to help people choose which university to study at? Billlion 17:27, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

I found an online version of "Academic ranking of world universities - methodologies and problems" which is very helpful. However, all the sources are Shanghai Jiao Tong University. There should be some comment whether anyone else considers these rankings useful or credible. --SVTCobra 23:42, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Well they are widely quoted, as well as their merit debated. For example they were cited in The Economist [2] 2005. And of course universities variously put out press releases to celebrate when they go up (eg [3]. The President of Manchester University Alan Gilbert eagerly awaits the results the results each year as he has set out to improve the university's position in this table as a major performace indicator. Other mention: the European Commission [4]. However I don't really think it needs all these references: the ranking is pretty well established in the academic sphere as something people take note of even if though they argue about the methodology. Interestingly though there is not much take-up from the press on the 2007 table being published yet, which was why I thought it would be nice to get it out on Wikinews quickly....Billlion 05:12, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

THES appears quite slanted towards British universities since 30% comes from internationalization of faculty & students and faculty/student ratio, two measures which obviously favor the British system. I doubt you'd include these two measure if you were not trying to either push multi-culturalism or maybe bolster British universities directly. fyi, American universities have fallen in internationalization for political reasons concerning student visa.

Conversely ARWU seems only interested in top preformance indicators like nobel prises and fields medals, this isn't very relevant to students, nor does it provide a broad research picture. I don't see much use for the ARWU rankings outside China's specific ambitions.

So :

1. If you wanted a "students success ranking" for undergraduates, maybe you should just resort the THES table acording to it's recruiters ranking.
2. If you want a broader metric, just discard the internationalization of faculty & students and faculty/student ratio from THES.

fyi, Among the top 5 or 6 on THES, the recruiters ranking is identical to ranking by citations per faculty. But this ends with Cal. Tech which scores 100% on citations but only 20% on recruiters. Cal. Tech is a unique & strong place but it's students have a terrible time adjusting to "life on the outside".

And don't forget that graduate students need specific subject area rankings.. plus a size measure for their department.. a generic indicator is meaningless. Nyarlathotep 13:03, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Should n't some of this move to "Opinions"?Billlion 15:20, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Category request

{{editprotected}} Following this discussion with user:Brian McNeil, would someone mind adding Category:University of Cambridge? Bencherlite (talk) 20:44, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Done Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 20:51, 5 December 2009 (UTC)