Tsinghua and Peking Uni hit new high in world university rankings

Tsinghua University and Peking University have climbed to their highest positions on record in the QS World University Rankings compiled by the higher education analysts QS Quacquarelli Symonds.

Photo shows Tsinghua University and Peking University. [File Photo: IC]

The 16th edition of the rankings, which were released on Wednesday, show that Tsinghua University climbed one place up from last year to take the 16th spot, ahead of Yale University in 17th. Peking University rose eight places to be number 22 on the list.

China now has 12 of world's top 100 universities, with six on the mainland, five in Hong Kong, and one in Taiwan. A total of 66 academic institutions from China were included in the rankings.

The top three spots on the list are unchanged from last year. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology remains in the top spot, a position it has held for eight consecutive years, followed by Stanford in second place and Harvard in third.

Asia's top two universities are the National University of Singapore and its compatriot Nanyang Technological University, which share the 11th place in the rankings.

QS Quacquarelli Symonds noted that universities in the United States had their worst performance on record, with only 16 percent of its universities improving their rankings. Britain's universities also failed to shine, with its universities recording their third-worst performance ever. At 7th place, the University of Cambridge had its worst year on record in the rankings. But it's not all bad news for Britain – the University of Oxford rose to 4th place.

QS ranked 1,000 universities from 82 locations across the world, surveying 94,000 academics and analyzing 11.8 million research papers. Universities are assessed on their academic standing, graduate employability, student and staff ratio, research impact, and internationalization.