Climbing global ranks: Valencian universities celebrate Shanghai success

All public universities in the Valencian Community, except for the Miguel Hernández University of Elche (UMH), have been included in the general university ranking of Shanghai 2024.

The ranking includes 36 Spanish university institutions among the thousand best in the world.

The UMH falls off the prestigious list just when it is involved in a legal dispute against the University of Alicante (UA), which is in the Shanghai ranking, for medical studies because they do not want the faculty at the UA.

Second Best

In this ranking, the University of Valencia is ranked as the second best in the country out of the 36 included in the classification, only behind the University of Barcelona (UB), which once again leads the Spanish table.

The Polytechnic University of Valencia, with a campus in Alcoy, is between 401 and 500.

The University of Alicante managed to place itself among the best 600 in the world in 2023, but now it is ranked between 601 and 700.

The Jaume I of Castellón remains in these same positions but the UMH, which was included in 2022, now does not appear among the thousand best in the world.

World Ranking

The Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), better known as the Shanghai classification, has been published since 2003 and is updated every year.

The list analyzes six indicators: the number of students who have won a Nobel Prize or the Fields Medal (10 per cent), professors with a Nobel Prize or Fields (20 per cent); citations of researchers (20 per cent); articles in Nature and Science (20 per cent), academic performance per capita (10 per cent) and works in the Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Science Citation Index (20 per cent).

Continental Europe

In continental Europe, the top positions are led by the Paris-Saclay University (12), which rises three places and remains the best, followed by the Federal Polytechnic School of Zurich.

Among the Asian universities, Tsinghua (22) remains the leader and Melbourne in Oceania.

Mainland China continues to have a strong presence in the rankings, with 203 institutions in the Top 1000, surpassing the United States’ 183.

Top Spot

However, the United States maintains its leading position in the Top 100, with 38 institutions compared to 13 in mainland China and eight in the United Kingdom.

For several years now, China’s strong growth has been pushing Western universities back in position.