No Malaysian varsity in Times’ top 100 ranking

PETALING JAYA: No Malaysian university made it to the top 100 of the Times Higher Education Asia University Rankings 2015 this year.

The last time a local varsity made the cut was in 2013 when Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia was in joint 87th place with the American University of Beirut in Lebanon.

Times Higher Education Rankings editor Phil Baty said only four Malaysian universities took part this year but declined to name them.

Although the four universities did submit their data, the results did not allow them to be positioned in the top 100.

However, in a similar rankings list released on Tuesday, the QS University Rankings: Asia 2015 had five of Malaysia’s research universities in the top 100.

(The five are Universiti Malaya at 29th, Universiti Sains Malaysia (49th), Universiti Teknologi Malay­sia (61st), Universiti Putra Malaysia (66th) and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia at 56th this year and in 2014.)

Baty said more Malaysian varsities need to take part in the rankings in order to be recognised.

“Many of Malaysia’s universities deliberately withhold their data as they believe they will not perform well if they are ranked. However, this is simply not true.

“As the saying goes, ‘you have to be in it to win it’, and Malaysia’s universities simply are not,” he told The Star.

Baty said Asia is expected to be the next global higher education superpower, after Europe and North America.

The University of Tokyo tops the Times rankings followed by the National University of Singapore, the University of Hong Kong and Seoul National University.