The THE Reputation Rankings

Times Higher Education has produced its third reputation ranking based on a survey of researchers published in ISI indexed journals. The top ten are:

1.  Harvard
2.  MIT
3.  Cambridge
4.  Stanford
5.  UC Berkeley
6.  Oxford
7.  Princeton
8.  Tokyo
9.  UCLA
10. Yale

This does not look all that dissimilar to the academic survey indicator in the  2011 QS World University Rankings. The top ten there is as follows:

1.  Harvard
2.  Cambridge
3.  Oxford
4.  UC Berkeley
5.  Stanford
6.  MIT
7.  Tokyo
8.  UCLA
9. Princeton
10. Yale

Once we step outside the top ten there are some differences. The National University of Singapore is 23rd in these rankings but 11th in the QS academic survey, possibly because QS still has respondents on its list from the time when it used World scientific, a Singapore based publishing company.

The Middle East Technical University in Ankara is in the top 100 (In the QS academic survey it is not even in the top 300), sharing the 90-100 band with Ecole Polytechnique, Bristol and Rutgers. At first glance this seems surprising since its research output is exceeded by other universities in the Middle East. But the technical excellence of its University Ranking by Academic Performance suggests that its research might be of a high quality.

Law School Rankings

Anyone interested in the current arguments about American law school rankings might visit the blog of Lawyers against the Law School Scam.

University Ranking in Pakistan

University World News has an article on the ranking of Pakistani universities by the country's Higher Education Commission (HEC). According to Ameen Amjad Khan:

According to the Higher Education Commission (HEC) ranking, Islamabad’s Quaid-e-Azam University tops 136 public and private sector institutions, followed by the Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences, with Karachi’s Agha Khan University in third place.

Academics from the University of Karachi and the University of Peshawar have rejected the ranking, which does not place either institution in the top 10.

They have accused the HEC of tampering with the standard formula to favour some institutions and have demanded that their vice-chancellors formally convey their disapproval to HEC bosses.

Faculty members of Hyderabad’s Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences have even warned that they will take the matter to the court if the ranking is not revoked. They said in a statement on 29 February: “The HEC announced the rankings in haste and caused chaos in both public and private higher education institutions.”

It seems that the rankings were based on a modified of the QS World University Rankings. Among the modifications were the introduction of indicators based on the number of journals published and the number of grants from the HEC. 

International Patent Filing

The World International Property Organization has issued a report on the filing of patents. The top university is the University of California followed by MIT, University of Texas, Johns Hopkins and the Korea Institute of Advanced Technology.