UP remains top Philippine university, according to QS

MANILA, Philippines — The University of the Philippines remains the top university in the country, according to the latest QS World University Rankings, after its ranking improved to 367th this year from 374th in 2016. 

UP, which got an overall score of 32.9, is the only Philippine university that improved its ranking after the placements of Ateneo De Manila University, De La Salle University and the University of Santo Tomas slid.

“UP Diliman is not only the home of diverse colleges, offering 94 graduate and undergraduate courses, it also runs several centers of research, many of which have been declared by the Commission on Higher Education as National Centers of Excellence,” QS said on its website.

It added: “UP Diliman affirmed its own commitment to modernizing its facilities and services. Many of the libraries are already computerized and are providing automated services. It has also identified specific growth areas, foremost of which are in engineering education, interdisciplinary programs such as Material Science, Technology Management and Archaeological Studies and International Studies.”

ADMU ranked second to UP among local universities although its ranking slipped to 551-600 from 501-550 last year.

DLSU is still within the 701-750 range, the same as its ranking the previous year.

UST’s ranking also fell from 701-750 to 801-1000. However, UST is the only university among the four from the Philippines on the list to have obtained four QS Stars.

“QS Stars is a rating system which allows students to get a wider picture of an institution’s qualities, looking at everything from the employability of graduates, to sports facilities and community engagement. It is designed to reflect the nuanced mission of universities, and the needs of students who may be interested in things other than those to which traditional rankings are necessarily limited,” QS said.

American and British universities continue to dominate QS rankings as they got nine out of top 10 slots. Only the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology was able to break the dominance of universities from these two countries.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is the best university for this year, according to QS.

“Rated 5+ QS stars, it’s achieved the maximum score across all categories, including research, employability, teaching, facilities, internationalization, innovation, specialist criteria and inclusiveness,” according to QS.

It was followed by Stanford University (US), Harvard University (US), California Institute of Technology (US), University of Cambridge (UK), University of Oxford (UK), University College London (UK), Imperial College London (UK), University of Chicago (US) and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (Switzerland).