University ranking: Linz was able to improve

The University of Vienna improved by five places and is approaching the top 100 at 119th place. The three medical universities had to make significant losses in space, while the Vienna University of Technology (TU) and the University of Innsbruck moved forward. The reason for this could be changes in the methodology.

As the second best Austrian universities, the medical universities of Graz and Vienna landed in places 201-250 (from 201 onwards the ranking is in increments of 50, later in 100s and 200s) and thus each fell out of the top 200. Last year was the medical university Graz was still ranked in 168th place, the Medical University of Vienna in 194th place. With the Medical University of Innsbruck, the third medical university also lost places and this year was ranked between 251 and 300 (previous year: 201-250).

Things are also looking up for Linz

The TU Vienna was also classified in this area, but it moved up significantly (previous year: 401-500). The University of Innsbruck was also able to gain places, this time making it to places between 301 and 350 (previous year: 401-500). Things also went up for the University of Linz (401-500), the University of Graz and the TU Graz (both 501-600), each of which improved by one place category. The University of Klagenfurt, on the other hand, went down one category and, like the two Styrian universities, now finds itself in ranks 501-600. The rankings of the University of Salzburg (601-800) and the Montanuni Leoben (1001-1200) remained unchanged.

This does not really bring us any closer to the goal of the Austrian research strategy. This aims to have two Austrian universities in the top 100 by 2030 – although this seems more realistic than ever for the University of Vienna, it is a long way off for a second university.

First place in the “Times” ranking goes to the University of Oxford (Great Britain) for the eighth time in a row. Stanford University (USA) follows in second place and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA) in third place. The best continental European and German-speaking university is ETH Zurich (Switzerland), still in eleventh place, while the best German university is TU Munich, which, like last year, is in 30th place.

Methodology changed

The ranking methodology has changed slightly compared to previous years. Instead of 13, there are now 18 indicators from the areas of teaching (especially reputation survey, supervision ratios; weighting: 29.5 percent), research environment (especially reputation survey; weighting: 29 percent), research quality (especially citations; weighting: 30 percent) , internationalization (proportion of foreign students and scientists, international cooperation; weighting: 7.5 percent) and cooperation with industry (third-party funding, patents; weighting: four percent). This time, among other things, 134 million citations of scientific publications were analyzed and 68,000 scientists worldwide were surveyed.

This meant that teaching and the research environment were weighted somewhat less than before (previously 30 percent each). Conversely, the economic factor (third-party funding, patents) was rated slightly higher (previously 2.5 percent). 1,904 universities from 108 countries and regions were included in the ranking.

“Air upward”

When it comes to the individual indicators, Elmar Pichl, head of the higher education section in the Ministry of Education, sees “room for improvement” for Austrian universities, especially in the teaching area. The student-teacher ratio at local universities is comparatively poor, which in turn is likely to have an impact on the reputation survey, which is given a much higher weight. Conversely, most research indicators look quite good, Pichl told journalists.

As the best Austrian university, the University of Vienna scores (probably due to the numerous foreign students and scientists) especially in terms of internationality. There she would even come in 50th place.

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