Birzeit University retains its title as Palestine’s best university, while rises eleven places to hurtle the 50th spot in the QS Quacquarelli Symonds’s rankings this year.
The QS World University Rankings is an annual league table of the top universities in the world. This year’s rankings included 350 best universities — 50 more than the previous year.
Birzeit university continues to precede Palestinian universities and some Arabs based on key indicators: ratio of teachers to students, ratio of Doctorate degree holders to teaching staff, ratio of published articles by a member of the academic staff, ratio of citations per paper, ratio for international students and faculty who teach and study in the university, academic reputation and web impact.
The Dean of the Faculty of Graduate Studies Talal Shahwan said that Birzeit University did well in this year’s rankings because of their strong showing in scientific research, academic reputation, web impact and proportion of inbound exchange students.
“Our investment in academia, research, innovation and community outreach have undergone a dramatic transformation in the past year. The investment has allowed us to break new ground in the field of university performance metrics and analytical tools.”
Shahwan pointed out that the political challenges and Israeli restrictions on entry and residency on foreign academic have severely diminished opportunities for development of faculty, courses and research programs at Palestinian institutes of higher education including Birzeit, which is reflected in the rankings.
