Melbourne improves world university status
[ The University of Melbourne Voice Vol. 5, No. 7
12 October - 8 November 2009 ]
The University of Melbourne has jumped two places in the Times Higher Education (THE) 2009 World University Rankings, released late last week.
Melbourne has come in at No 36 in the THE’s Top 100 ranked universities, ahead of highly-respected international universities such as the University of California Berkeley, Trinity College Dublin, New York University and the London School of Economics.
The University again has all five discipline areas surveyed by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings appearing in the Top 30 in the world with its ranking for Life Sciences and Biomedicine jumping from No 23 last year to rank at No 13 in 2009.
Melbourne’s two biggest Melbourne Model faculties - Arts and Science – have performed outstandingly in the THE’s 2009 discipline rankings with Arts at No 17 and Science moving up to No 23 from 27 in 2008 and 33 in 2007 for Natural Science and at No 13 for Life Sciences.
The THE ranks Engineering and Information Technology at Melbourne at No 29 in 2009.
The University of Melbourne has also received excellent endorsements of its international research standing and the quality of its academic programs from its peers and the employers of its students.
The 2009 THE world rankings show that University of Melbourne graduates remain highly sought-after by global employers and the University is well-regarded by academic peers around the world. The University improved its ranking in both categories this year.
Melbourne is now ranked No 6 in the world - rising from No 9 in 2008 - by major global and national employers across both the public and private sectors, and No 20 - moving up from No 21 in 2008 - by its academic peers in a THE survey of around 9400 academics around the world. Academics cannot vote for their own university.
The THE also reports a student: staff ratio for Melbourne at 10.3:1
University of Melbourne Vice-Chancellor Professor Glyn Davis says that although many are critical of these rankings, the University’s strong performance this year is a pleasing recognition of the strength of its international standing in research and of its innovative teaching and curriculum reform, such as the Melbourne Model.
Professor Davis says it is a serious challenge for Australian universities to compete in these volatile rankings with better-resourced UK, US and Japanese universities.
“It’s therefore extremely welcome to see the University of Melbourne, and a number of other Australian universities, moving up a list where the universities at the top enjoy significantly better funding.
“Each year, these rankings show us just how critical good funding is to the international success of our universities. The Commonwealth Government’s promise of better funding beginning in 2012 will hopefully help to redress this issue.”
Dean of the University’s Faculty of Economics and Commerce, Professor Margaret Abernethy, says it is very pleasing to see that the University’s Social Sciences rank remains at No 19.
“This demonstrates the strength of the Faculty’s research in its disciplines and the research in other social sciences disciplines in the University. And it reflects the importance that the Faculty places on publishing research in hi-impact journals,” she says.
Professor Abernethy noted that the Faculty also works closely with industry groups to ensure all its programs – undergraduate and graduate – meet the needs of industry and government.
Dean of Arts, Professor Mark Considine, says it is indeed welcome to see Arts and Humanities and Social Sciences at Melbourne ranked in the Top 20 in the world.
“This result is extremely encouraging for the Faculty of Arts.
“In the past two years we have been successfully bedding down our New Generation Arts degree – which has proved to be the most popular in Australia – and this year launched our new Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences.
“This success is a tribute to the fine contributions of staff to the mission of the Faculty.”
The rankings which are published in the weekly Times Higher Education in the United Kingdom are carried out by Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), a global career and education network. They are derived from calculations based on data gathered from the following indicators -
• Academic peer review
• Employer review
• International academic staff ratio
• International student ratio
• Student: academic staff ratio
• Citations per academic staff member (citation data supplied by Scopus)
Last month, the University of Melbourne was placed No 1 in Australia in the important – though little-known outside academia – Higher Education Evaluation and Accreditation Council of Taiwan (HEEACT)’s Performance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities.
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