Almost 70% of top Australian universities tumble in global ranking amid Trump-era attacks and international student cuts
The University of Melbourne, Australia's highest performer, dropped seven places to 19th in the QS World University Rankings, run by the global higher education specialist Quacquarelli Symonds, while the University of Sydney dropped from 18th in the world to 25th.
The University of New South Wales, the nation's second best performer, dropped from 19th to 20th.
The rankings, released on Thursday, drew from millions of academic papers and insights from 127,041 academics across 1,501 universities in 106 countries.
Overall, 25 of Australia's 36 ranked universities (69%) declined in this year's results and just seven moved up, amid the rise of competitors in the Asia-Pacific region.
It was the third biggest percentage drop in the world behind Austria (88%) and Russia (85%), at the same time as the US continued to perform the best among the traditional big four study destinations, which include Australia, the UK and Canada.
Angel Calderon, the director of strategic insights at RMIT and a member of the rankings advisory board, said recent federal government discussions on limiting the number of international students coupled with financial constraints had not helped universities.
'Over the past five years, we have seen the reputation of Australian universities gradually decreasing,' he said.
'Organisational restructuring, staff movements, operational deficits, and any kind of disruption are likely to influence institutional perceptions elsewhere.'
The categories rank universities based upon their reputation, teaching and learning, research impact, internationalisation and, since 2022, sustainability.
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Australia was particularly hard hit in its academic and employer reputation, with 20 and 30 universities declining in rank respectively in those categories. However, it continued to perform strongly in its citations per faculty and global engagement, including international faculty members.
Calderon said the poor performance came at the same time universities in Asian countries were 'rapidly improving' because of increased government or private sector investment in education and research.
Mainland China and India had particularly strong upward trends, with more than 40% of their universities rising in the rankings, while four of New Zealand's eight universities also improved compared with last year.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology retained the top position for the 14th consecutive year, followed by Imperial College London and Stanford University.
'The inconvenient truth is that reputation is an issue which continues to adversely impact Australian universities' performance in global rankings,' Calderon said.
'The relative decline in standing for both the academic and employer reputation measures has been in the making for several years. Here lies a key opportunity for the collective of Australian universities to ensure learners are better supported.
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'The results are a wake-up call to Australia … our universities must adapt by providing quality education to the communities they serve if they want to remain competitive, relevant, and boost national productivity.'
Despite the dire overall picture, Australia still ranked fifth globally for the proportion of universities ranked in the world's top 100, with 25% making the list, behind Hong Kong and Singapore (56% and 50% respectively).
Nine Australian universities were ranked in the top 100. But of those, five of the high performing Group of Eight (Go8) sandstones moved down.
The CEO of QS, Jessica Turner, said there were 'areas of concern' for Australia's higher education system, pointing to the reputation dip coupled with a government crackdown on international students.
Since 2023, the commonwealth has introduced a range of migration reforms to 'restore integrity' to the international education sector, including higher visa fees and English language requirements and slowed visa processing for some 'high risk' countries.
'International students have been drawn into a wider national debate in Australia around migration and housing, where they are sometimes perceived as contributing to systemic pressures,' she said.
'In what has been a turbulent year for Australian higher education, universities are calling for sustainable research funding models and greater policy certainty around international education.
'These are critical to safeguarding and strengthening one of Australia's greatest national assets, particularly as the country faces growing competition from across the APAC region.'
At least seven Australian universities have had research programs temporarily suspended by the Trump administration this year, while a dozen universities were sent a questionnaire asking to confirm whether they aligned with US government interests.
The chief executive of the Go8, Vicki Thomson, said the results came against a backdrop of global uncertainty and 'mixed messaging' from Australia's largest research partner, the US.
'This … threatens our very capacity to deliver on our mission of education and research,' she said.
'And yet despite these headwinds, Australia continues to punch above its weight … that we have two Go8 members ranked in the top 20 and six in the world's top 50, is an outstanding result and must not be taken for granted but rather leveraged in these contested times.'
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