New Global Universities Ranking: Shock Results

US dominates new global ranking Exciting news that US News is producing a new global universities ranking. In an extraordinary related development another league table, the "World Series Ranking", seeks to trump this and has published a top 20 which bears a remarkable similarity to the US national top 20: 1 Princeton University 2 Harvard …

Ghana gets tough on Honoraries

In Ghana, the Accreditation Board is "mad" at honorary degree awards Ghana News reports that the country's Accreditation Board is "mad" at honorary degree awards by unqualified institutions: The conferment of honorary degrees is the prerogative of degree awarding institutions so mandated. Therefore accredited private tertiary institutions operating under the mentorship of chartered, degree-awarding universities …

THE World University Rankings 2014-15

The Times Higher Education World University Rankings are out The waiting is over and the final ranking of the season is now available from THE. All the details of the methodology and regional and subject variations are available on the THE rankings site. The claim is that they are "the most comprehensive and balanced comparisons …

New 2014/15 QS World University Rankings

The latest QS world league table is out Full details of the rankings can be found at the QS website. A summary of the world top 10 follows where we find MIT retaining the top spot for a third consecutive year but really not a lot to grab the headlines here: Global top ten 1 …

Dialogue through technology

Dorm Room Diplomacy   Intrigued to learn about the activities of an organisation called Dorm Room Diplomacy which gets groups of students together from around the world, via videoconferencing, to engage in dialogue aimed at promoting greater international understanding: Founded by students at the University of Pennsylvania in 2009, Dorm Room Diplomacy fosters intercultural dialogue …

2014 Academic Ranking of World Universities: Top 20 and UK placings

2014 ARWU University World Rankings: Top 20 and UK placings It feels like a strange time to publish a world ranking but ideal holiday reading for many. Anyway, as in previous years there is not a huge amount to get excited about as this is a league table where little changes. The full rankings have been published and …

International branch campuses: over-exposed?

 Are there too many branch campus headlines? Not quite. A recent piece in University World News suggested that there was just too much attention given to international branch campuses rather than other forms of international activity: International branch campuses receive a lot of attention for their motivations, successes and failures. In addition, some recent big-name …

Ranking systemically

The new U21 systems ranking Following on from last year's second league table, U21 has now published its 2014 Rankings report, which is intended to give an overview and ranking of higher education systems across the world. The full report gives much more information about the rankings but in summary: The widened definition of Connectivity …

Mobilising the humanities

Humanities - helping to meet global development challenges I was pleased to be present at the launch of this study which was conducted by Ipsos on behalf of the British Council. It was launched on 1st May at Going Global 2014, the British Council's annual conference for leaders in higher education which took place in …

Students behaving badly

Crimes and misdemeanours at university I was greatly taken by this list of fineable offences for 18th-century students at Harvard: Offense #19, "Cutting off the lead," seems to refer to the lead on the college building's roof. Lead was once used for roofing material (especially for more expensively-constructed buildings), and such buildings suffered from the …

24 hour study people

Food: all day and all of the night It's perhaps not that novel but Inside Higher Ed has a story about a small US college, Lynn University, which has introduced all-night dining to help, among other things, with more flexible class scheduling: Lynn made the adjustment in dining hours for a pretty simple and obvious …

The 2013 International Leadership Conference: Managing Global Universities

A report on the conference held at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China. Last November delegates from UK, Australia, Middle East, China, India gathered in the unique setting of the University of Nottingham Ningbo China to explore the challenges of managing universities in an era of globalization. The conference, supported by The Chronicle of Higher …

Disciplinary differences…

...and similarities. In an earlier blog post I noted the noted the importance of good discipline on campus. A sound disciplinary framework is important for sustaining a strong idea of community, ensuring students are able to get on with their studies without unwarranted distraction and for developing s sense of social responsibility across the student …

The damage caused by the athletics arms race

Uncontrolled expansion of athletics can cause real problems Interesting piece in Inside Higher Ed on a paper which looks at the academic damage of an expanding independent athletics program with a particular focus on Berkeley: When describing the approach that administrators at the University of California at Berkeley took to the university's sports program, John Cummins …

Sustainability charts: Latest UI GreenMetric World University Ranking

Now out : the new Green Metric World Ranking This world university league table first appeared in 2010 and was headed by the University of California, Berkeley. Two years ago the University of Nottingham led the field (down to second to Connecticut in last year's ranking). This year though Nottingham is back on top: The …