Times Higher Education has just published its updated World University Rankings for 2023, including arguably one of the most important list for all graduates — employability.
Unlike other university rankings, which are often criticised for placing too much emphasis on artificial factors (like research output in terms of citations or published papers, which are, let’s be honest, not always the most accurate indicator of the quality of education), the Global Employability University Ranking and Survey (GEURS) is based on a huge survey of global recruiters and managers — i.e. the very people hiring graduates on an annual basis (making it the only such ranking in the world).
A huge number of 98,014 responses were collected from employers around the world, regarding the top 250 universities in 45 countries.
The National University of Singapore (NUS) continues its march upward, jumping another position to eighth this year, from ninth in 2021 and just 17th in 2015 (which was widely celebrated at the time).
It means that NUS has outranked institutions such as Yale (which it collaborated with for a number of years), Princeton, Columbia University, University of California (Berkeley), London School of Economics, Imperial College London and many more — while approaching Oxford, Stanford and University of Tokyo, which are placed just ahead of it.
Soft and digital skills rise to the top
If you’re wondering what else can make you stand out to your employers, GEURS authors also track the six factors that are assigned levels of importance by the respondents, and present how they change over the years.
Academic performance takes the back seat, while graduate skills — i.e. proficiency in soft and digital skills of graduates, regardless of their degree — rose to the top during the pandemic.
It seems logical, given the necessity of working remotely, which limited opportunities for in-person training and placed greater emphasis on being able to jump into work with other people at a distance.
Though it’s not unlikely that priorities are going to evolve in the coming years, as we’re back to living like we used to before 2020.
Featured Image Credit: Mashable