In yet another sign of success for Malta’s foremost national tertiary education institution, the University of Malta has been ranked in the top 8.9% out of 20,000 universities worldwide.
This is according to the Centre for World University Rankings’ (CWUR) latest list, issued online on Monday 8 June. CWUR is a consulting organisation that provides policy advice, strategic insights and consulting services towards the improvement of educational and research outcomes.
The CWUR portal rankings do not rely on surveys and university data submissions; therefore, its indicators are purely objective. Each of the 20,000 universities were analysed and given an overall score out of 100 based on four key pillars:
1 – quality of education, measured by the number of the university’s alumni who have won major academic distinctions, accounting for 25% of the score;
2- alumni employment, measured by the number of alumni who have held top executive positions at the world’s largest companies, accounting for 25% of the score;
3 – quality of faculty/ies, measured by the number of faculty members who have won major academic distinctions, accounting for 10% of the score;
4 – research performance, measured by the total number of research projects by academia, the number of research articles appearing in top-tier journals; the number of articles appearing in top-tier journals, the number of articles appearing in highly-influential journals, and the number of highly-cited research articles, accounting for 40% of the score.
With an overall score of 66.7, the University of Malta scored highly especially in the Research Performance Rank – for which it ranked among the top 8.4% of universities worldwide.
UM Rector, Prof. Alfred J. Vella, said “this is another positive sign that the University is reaffirming its role as a changemaker in society, not just as a teaching institution, but, more prominently, as a research hub that promotes research-based inquiry.”
While also attributing the success to the brilliant minds of the academia and the staff employed by the University, Prof. Vella also said that the way the funding being received by various entities is being carefully utilised is also leading to increased investments in research facilities and, ultimately, the Maltese economy, which is a “much-needed cog in the regeneration of the Maltese economy post-COVID-19”.
Just last month, the Ministry for Education & Employment announced it made €600,000 from its recurrent budget available to the UM’s Research Fund Committee, and the 7th cycle of the TAKEOFF Seed Fund Awards (TOSFA) was launched in the presence of the Minister of the Economy, Investment and Small Businesses, allocating a further €100,000 to local researchers and entrepreneurs.