University College Dublin has dropped from 173rd to 181st in the latest QS World University Rankings for 2023. The ranking drop is the first fall for UCD in 4 years.
Having reached a record low position in 2019 of 193rd place, UCD had steadily risen 20 places between 2019 and 2022. Many other Irish universities saw a drop in rankings for 2023 except for DCU and also Trinity College which returned to the top 100 ranked universities worldwide after dropping out in 2019.
The QS World University Rankings are determined by a universities score across a wide range of ranking criteria all based out of 100. UCD scored high in the areas of international faculty ratio and international research network with scores of 98.7 and 87.6 respectively.
However, other areas received a poor ranking such as citations per faculty, employer reputation and academic reputation all receiving 43, 46.8 and 48.7 respectively. Most notably, UCD scored a very low 22.5 score on faculty student ratio, a criteria that almost all Irish universities scored poorly on.
Trinity College’s 98th placed ranking was described by Trinity Provost Linda Doyle as “great news for Ireland’s global reputation”.
“Rankings have shortcomings in how they measure all that is happening in a university, but they are watched closely internationally. It is hugely important for Trinity and for Ireland that we are in the top-100.” She added that “further Government funding to tackle our staff-student ratio is key to ensuring we remain in the top 100.”
Elsewhere, NUIG fell 12 places to 270th and UCC dropped out of the top 300. University of Limerick and Maynooth University also saw their rankings drop while DCU climbed from 490th to 471th.
Conor Paterson – Co-Editor
