Another global ranking?

In response to  suggestion by Hee Kim Poh of Nanyang Technological University, I have had a look at the Worldwide Professional University Rankings which appear to be linked to "Global World Communicator" and the "International Council of Scientists" and may be based in Latvia.

There is a methodology page but it does not include essential information. One indicator is "number of publications to number of academic staff" but there is nothing about how either of these are calculated or where the data comes from. There is a reference to a survey of members of the International Council of Scientists but nothing about the wording of the survey, date of survey, distribution of respondents or the response rate.

Anyway, here is the introduction to the methodology:

"The methodology of the professional ranking of universities is based on comparing universities and professional evaluation by level of proposed training programs (degrees), availability and completeness of information on activities of a university, its capacity and reputation on a national and international levels. Main task is to determine parameters and ratios needed to assess quality of the learning process and obtained specialist knowledge. Professional formalized ranking system based on a mathematical calculation of the relation of parameters of the learning process characterizing quality of education and learning environment. Professional evaluation criteria are developed and ranking is carried out by experts of the highest professional qualification in relevant fields - professors of universities, specialists of the highest level of education, who have enough experience in teaching and scientific activities. Professional rating of universities consists of three components.. "

The top five universities are 1. Caltech,  2. Harvard,  3. MIT,  4. Stanford,  5. ETH Zurich.

Without further information, I do not think that this ranking is worth further attention.









http://www.cicerobook.com/en/ranks

Rankings Calendar: QS BRICS University Rankings

The QS BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) university rankings will be announced on November 23 at the QS-APPLE conference in Taiwan.

China overtakes USA in supercomputing

The website TOP500 keeps track of the world's most powerful computers. Six months ago the USA had 169 supercomputers in the top 500 and China 160. Now China has 202 and the USA 143.

They are followed by Japan with 35, Germany 20, France 18 and the UK 15.

There are four supercomputers in India, four in the Middle East (all in Saudi Arabia), one in Latin America (Mexico), one in Africa (South Africa),