10 Times Higher Education8 February 2018
Rankings
Citation impact
helps China surge
ahead in latest
Asia rankings
Chinese universities have continued
to surge up the latest edition of the
Times Higher EducationAsia Uni-
versity Rankings, thanks to a strong
year-on-year improvement in the
quality of their research.
According to data underlying the
ranking, released on 7 February, the
overall average score of the coun-
try’s institutions has climbed by
more than 2.5 points since last year,
with about half this change a result
of the increased citation impact of
its scholarship.
At the same time, other major
research nations in the region have
either been unable to match such
improvements in research impact
or, in the case of South Korea and
Taiwan, have slipped back on this
measure, which forms almost a
third of the overall score.
The overall ranking – which uses
the same 13 performance indicators
as the main World University Rank-
ings but with slightly different
weightings to reflect the priorities
of Asian institutions – has again
been topped by the National Uni-
versity of Singapore.
China’s Tsinghua University has
taken second place, swapping posi-
tions with its Beijing rival Peking
University, which is third this year.
Three institutions from Hong Kong,
two from South Korea and one each
from Singapore and Japan completeAsia ranking 2018Asia ranking 2017Position in WorldUniversity Rankings 2018 Institution Country/region
1 1 =22 National University of Singapore Singapore
2 3 30 Tsinghua University China
3 2 =27 Peking University China
4 5 40 University of Hong Kong Hong Kong=5 6 44 Hong Kong University of Science and
TechnologyHong Kong=5 4 52 Nanyang Technological University Singapore
7 11 58 Chinese University of Hong Kong Hong Kong
8 7 46 University of Tokyo Japan
9 9 =74 Seoul National University South Korea10 8 =95 Korea Advanced Institute of Science and
Technology (KAIST)South KoreaSource:THEDataPointsthe rest of the top 10.
Overall, China has 63 institu-
tions in the slightly expanded 2018
ranking, up from 54 last year, and
a breakdown of its average scores
in each metric shows that as well as
citation impact, it has also made
significant ground on research
income and the reputation of its
universities.
Writing in theTHEAsia Univer-
sity Rankings supplement, Phil Baty,
editorial director for global rank-
ings, says that “two decades of
focused investment in excellence”
was “paying off” for the country.
“After tens of billions of dollars
invested under 1995’s Project 211
and 1998’s Project 985 to create
world-class universities in China,
yet more vast investment is secured
through 2017’s ‘Double First Class’
plan to lift China’s leading institu-
tions even higher,” he adds.
The country is still behind Japan,
which has 89 institutions in the
2018 ranking, in terms of represen-
tation, but the average score of
Japanese universities has remained
relatively static with only slight
improvements in most areas.
India, the third-most-represented
country in the list, with 42 institu-
tions, has also seen its average cit-
ation impact scores go up, although
not as strongly as China. Improve-
ments in its performance on metrics
covering income, research produc-
tivity and PhD awards also contrib-
uted to its overall score rising.
Other year-on-year country com-
parisons show contrasting trends.
Taiwan and South Korea are both
unusual in taking a hit on citation
impact but still achieving a solid
improvement overall, thanks to the
resources being pumped into higher
education. Hong Kong, which has
five of its six entries in the top 20,
improved across almost all areas.
Meanwhile, in western Asia, Tur-
key is interesting for managing a
positive outcome despite its repu-
tation scores taking a serious knock.
And Saudi Arabian universities had
a relatively high overall score
change driven by a large improve-
ment in research productivity,
despite falling back on some other
metrics.
Other countries with notable
overall score increases are Pakistan,
which has seen one of the biggest
improvements in average citation
impact score since last year, Israel,
where research income seems to
have been the main driver, and Iran,
which has benefited from better
research productivity and impact
results.
[email protected]Internationalisation
Expansion of UK
transnational
education
provision tails off
Expansion of UK universities’ trans-
national education activities has
dwindled dramatically after years
of strong growth.
Although the number of those
studying for UK awards overseas in
2016-17 was a new record high,
707,915, this was up by just 1 per
cent on 2015-16, according to a Uni-
versities UK International report,
The Scale of UK Higher Education
Transnational Education.
This compares with a 5.3 per
cent increase from 2014-15 to
2015-16, and rises of 4.3 per cent
and 6.7 per cent in the preceding
years, says the report, which is
based on Higher Education Statis-
tics Agency records.
In 2015-16, 44 per cent of UK
transnational education students
were learning via provision deliv-
ered collaboratively overseas. A
quarter (25 per cent) were studying
via an international partner organ-
isation, with one in five (20 per
cent) following distance or flexible
learning courses. International
branch campuses accounted for just
8 per cent of provision.
Raegan Hiles, head of outbound
mobilities programmes at UUKi,Asia University Rankings 2018 Top 10Slowdown“as countries’ HE systems
are maturing and their participation
rates are nearing 40 per cent, local
HE growth and TNE growth are bound
to decelerate”ALAMY