World university rankings: take with a large pinch of salt

Abstract

Equating the unequal is misleading, and this happens consistently in comparing rankings from different university ranking systems, as the NUT saga shows. This article illustrates the problem by analyzing the 2011 rankings of the top 100 universities in the AWUR, QSWUR and THEWUR ranking results. It also discusses the reasons why the rankings offered by the three systems are grossly inconsistent. A proper reading of the rankings is suggested.

Keywords:

• university ranking
• university excellence
• indicators
• data quality
• spurious precision