Britons give California colleges the nod

California is the nerve center of world-class higher education in the U.S., according to a new survey from a British trade publication for academics.

Nine California campuses made the top 200 in rankings of world universities by London-based Times Higher Education and QS Quacquarelli Symonds, an independent research firm. That's twice as many as France managed countrywide, according to the study.

Among the high scorers were Caltech (No. 5), Stanford University (No. 17) and UCLA (No. 30). The survey was one in a plethora of college rankings from various organizations that only sometimes agree.

But could a touch of Anglo bias have been at work in the new rankings? Caltech professor R. Preston McAfee approved of his own institution's placement but was dubious of the 3-4 finish (behind Harvard and Yale) awarded to Oxford and Cambridge universities.

"None of the schools in the UK are better than Stanford or U of Chicago," he said in an e-mail. "I don't think Oxbridge makes the top 10 in the last 50 years."

McAfee also cast aside the survey's finding that UCLA outpolled UC Berkeley, which came in at No. 36.

"Oxford, Cambridge and the California universities all ranked very well for the same reasons -– they received high scores across all our categories," said Ann Mroz, editor of Times Higher Education magazine. 

"Berkeley is better than UCLA in most fields," McAfee said.

"Berkeley scored lower in our table because of its low staff-student ratio," Mroz responded.

The other highly ranked California campuses were UC San Diego (No. 58), UC Davis (No. 89), UC Santa Barbara (No. 98), USC (No. 102) and UC Irvine (No. 132).

Times Higher Education, which recently spun off from the Times of London newspaper, said the rankings were based on peer academic reviews, recruiter reviews, international faculty ratios, international student ratios, student faculty ratios and citations to published work by faculty.

-- Gale Holland

Comments

[Cal Godot]

Amazing. People from foreign countries can be admitted and afford the tuition at UCLA (or other Cali universities), while the majority of college-age Angelenos - you know, people whose families have paid the taxes that have supported the university for generations - are told to attend SMC (or another community college) for a few years and then maybe, just maybe, they'll allow you to attend UCLA (or some other California institution).

Further amazing: the Times finds this something to crow about. Another example of white privilege, I guess.

[Angel]

Hey Cal,

Bitter much?

Kids from L.A. do make it to UCLA. One of my son's friends last year, and he and a friend this year. Oddly enough, my son took one serious look and opted for a much smaller school. We're in San Fernando, so it's not so much about white privilege as is it about making sure kids are taking the right classes and getting solid grades. Oh, and NOT blaming other people for their failings. He'll consider UCLA again for grad school, but I wouldn't bet the house on it.

[jojo star]

national university of singapore NUS is not that good, it has a lot of money from the government but wasted, I saw supercomputers lying usused.

the best singaporean students are given scholarships by the singapore government and told to go study overseas (cambridge, harard top choices). NUS wont even hire their own Ph.D graduates!

other funy entries makes me thinkthey are going by name and trying to pick choices in may different places. why on earth would city college london do so good?

the best schools are the ones to companies recruit from, why on earth would the indian instittute of technologies fair so poorly when their students are snapped up and many founded top silicon valley companies.