North-West University: NWU ranked among top local universities in South Africa

The North-West University (NWU) remains among the top local universities as is evident in the latest World University Rankings by Times Higher Education (THE).

According to the THE, the NWU is among the top six universities in South-Africa. The ranking agency released the rankings for their 2023 cycle on 12 October. It places the NWU in the 601 to 800 category.

Compared to last year, the NWU improved with respect to industry income, which entails knowledge transfer and international outlook, including the proportion of international students and staff. It also improved with respect to international collaboration.

The World University Rankings, which are considered to be the largest and most diverse, evaluated 1 799 universities across 104 countries and regions. This is the fourth year that the NWU has participated in these rankings.

“I have no doubt that our research and teaching and learning strategies and programmes place us in a good position to compete with the best universities in the world, hence we are consistently highly rated and ranked internationally,” says Dr Bismark Tyobeka, principal and vice-chancellor.

He says rankings are good benchmarks for comparing the impact and relevance of the NWU with that of other universities, locally and abroad.

Performance indicators determine place in rankings

The THE World University Rankings evaluate research-intensive universities across all their core missions, which include teaching, research, citations, international outlook and industry income (knowledge transfer).

According to the THE, it uses 13 carefully calibrated performance indicators to provide the most comprehensive and balanced comparisons that are trusted by students, academics, university leaders, industry and governments. The 13 performance indicators are grouped in five areas: citations (30%), research (30%), teaching (30%), international outlook (7,5%) and industry income (2,5%).