NNA – In a press release by the American University of Beirut, it said: “The QS World University Rankings for the year 2016/2017 issued on September 6, 2016 show progress on AUB’s overall ranking amongst universities worldwide with an increase of 40 positions or spots, making it the university with the most improvement amongst the top 250 ranking universities in the past year. With an overall score of 43.3, AUB ranks 228 amongst universities worldwide, jumping from last year’s score of 268.”
Release added: “The improvement in ranking is mainly due to an increase of 18 places in the Academic Reputation indicator (considered the centerpiece of the QS rankings and carrying a weighted score of 40% of the overall performance score) and 21 places in the Student-to-Faculty ratio (weighted at 20%) which evaluates the level of teaching quality through calculating the ratio between two datasets, full time equivalent students per full time equivalent faculty.”
“This significantly improved ranking is a clear testimony of the University’s continuous drive for sustaining excellence in teaching, research, and service, and for becoming a premier University not only in the region but worldwide,” Interim Provost Mohamed Harajli told us. “The AUB community, including students, faculty, staff, and alumni should feel proud of this remarkable achievement.”
Over 100,000 survey responses were collected by the think tank Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), considering 4,322 universities, with 916 evaluated in one of the most comprehensive and trusted global ranking processes, the only one independently scrutinized and International Ranking Expert Group (IREG) approved.’
AUB ranks in the top 100 worldwide on two indicators: Employer Reputation (10% of overall score), taking into consideration the reputation of the university amongst employers and the resulting employability of fresh graduates; and International faculty (5% of overall score), assessing success in attracting academics from other nations.
All the University’s figures and indices for the Citations per Faculty category are higher for the year 2016, although AUB’s ranking dropped for this category, indicating a rise in research figures across all universities. AUB increased its publishing from less than 500 to over 1,000 papers per year since 2015. AUB ranked 73rd in the world and first in the Arab world in employment reputation.
“This is a significant evidence of the high quality of the faculty that AUB has and the services that our institution provides to students, the great and relevant education that it offers to its students, and the high caliber of workforce and leaders that it produces and makes available to the local and regional economies and societies,” Director of AUB University Libraries, Dr. Lokman Meho told us.
“I am heartened to learn of the prestigious QS rankings and their affirmation of us as the finest institution of higher learning in Lebanon and among the top 3 in the Arab world,” President Fadlo R. Khuri told us.
“While these rankings by no means can reflect all of the tremendous impact and value that AUB provides for Lebanon, the Arab world, and the international community as a whole, they do serve as affirmation of our continued progress towards being unanimously acclaimed as one of the finest universities in the world.”
