MIT ranks ninth among 604 universities from around the world included in the 2008 Times Higher Education-Quacquarelli Symonds World University Rankings released today.
In specific academic categories, the Institute ranks first in both "engineering and IT" and in "natural sciences." It is eighth in "life sciences and biomedicine," 10th in "social sciences," and 20th in "arts and humanities." Further, MIT ranked fifth overall according to survey responses from 6,354 academics, and sixth overall according to 2,339 employers.
In the overall university rankings, Harvard is the top university, followed by Yale and the University of Cambridge.
This year's rankings "reflect the increasing profile of technology-based universities, with many of the world's top universities in this area such as Caltech, MIT, ETH Zurich and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology improving their position," according to the Times Higher Education (THE) and Quacquarelli Symonds (QS). "As demand by international employers for more technology-literate graduates has grown, the importance of these universities has risen in the rankings." Last year MIT was ranked 10th overall.
The THE-QS rankings are now in their fifth year. For more information on the rankings and the methodology behind them, go to www.topuniversities.com.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on October 22, 2008 (download PDF).
