Australia’s most respected university named
Academics around the globe have voted the University of Melbourne as Australia’s best university – and number 41 in the world.
The other Australian universities to make the Times Higher Education World Reputations Rankings were Australian National University (ANU) and the University of Sydney, both placed in the 51-60 decile, the University of Queensland (81-90 decile), and Monash (91-100 decile).
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Both Melbourne’s and ANU’s global reputations were worse than their actual performance. The other university ranking put out by Times Higher Education, which canvasses performance rather than reputation, puts Melbourne at number 33 and ANU at number 45.
Sydney, however, appears to enjoy a better reputation than it deserves, with its performance-based ranking at number 60.
Harvard in the United States retained its apparently permanent position as the most revered university in the world, even though its performance hasn’t placed it in first position since 2011.
Second and third place were taken by UK rivals Oxford and Cambridge, with Cambridge getting the edge once again.
The US and UK massively dominate the list. Other than Oxford and Cambridge, the top 10 was entirely made up of US universities, while the top 50 only contained 16 universities that weren’t either in the UK or the US.
Just 12 of the top 50 were in non-English speaking countries, reflecting the competitive advantage English-speaking nations have when trying to build a strong tertiary education sector.
The top 10
1. Harvard University, United States
2. University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
3. University of Oxford, United Kingdom
4. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States
5. Stanford University, United States
6. University of California, Berkeley, United States
7. Princeton University, United States
8. Yale University, United States
9. California Institute of Technology, United States
10. Columbia University, United States
