NUS is 15th in the world
The latest Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) World University Rankings 2018 has placed NUS at 15th in the world, positioning it among the top one per cent of universities globally. The 2018 QS rankings also ranked NUS 11th in the world and top in Asia for Academic Reputation and Employer Reputation, areas which reflect the University’s strong focus on educating future-ready graduates.
Earlier today, the Reuters Top 75: Asia’s Most Innovative Universities 2017 list saw NUS maintaining its 11th placing in Asia, pointing to the University’s major emphasis on entrepreneurship and research translation.
NUS has moved up nine places in the QS World University Rankings since 2014, with the highest placement at 12th last year. This is the University’s third consecutive year within the global top 20.
Mr Ben Sowter, Research Director at QS, said, “Making the world’s top 20 is a fantastic achievement for any institution. Given the fierce competition from other leading universities, maintaining a top 20 position is truly remarkable and denotes not only the results of a relatively short-term investment, but the sustainable transformation of the very culture and fabric of the university.”
Commenting on the University’s performance in the latest QS rankings, NUS President Professor Tan Chorh Chuan said, “NUS has continued to vigorously pursue its strategy of building broad-based excellence across a comprehensive range of disciplines. This is because multidisciplinary strengths across many research domains are needed to tackle the large complex challenges that confront Singapore and the world, and to create novel solutions. We have therefore invested in areas such as the humanities and social sciences, law, public policy, and other disciplines, where citations per faculty may be low. While this could affect our rankings, we will persist in building comprehensive strengths as these are strategically important for our University to deliver distinctive value and to create a consequential long-term impact.”
In QS’ announcement of the latest rankings, it also noted that NUS’ reputational scores indicate it “still enjoys near-unparalleled renown in the Asia-Pacific region, and remains as globally-competitive as in previous years”. QS’ analysis of Scopus/Elsevier data — the world’s largest academic citations database — indicated that NUS achieves a higher overall research output and citations impact than its counterparts in Singapore. However, NUS has a larger faculty, resulting in a lower citations-per-faculty score.
Prof Tan remarked that “Going forward, NUS’ key areas of focus are on nurturing future-ready graduates, developing lifelong education, conducting world-class research and contributing to economic and societal advancement through research, translation, entrepreneurship and service.”
“We will continue to strive to create a positive impact on the communities we serve by bringing together the wide range of world class expertise in education and research in NUS,” he added.
