South African universities have emerged tops in Africa according to the the latest survey by QS World University Rankings.
The University of Cape Town took the lead position 171 in the rating that involved about 3,539 institutions.
The QS World University Rankings is an annual league table of the top universities in the world.
A total of 76,798 academics and 44,226 employers contributed to the rankings through the QS global survey and QS analysed 11.1 million research papers — indexed by Elsevier’s Scopus database.
QS Head of Research Ben Sowter said the latest results revealed more diversity than ever in the distribution of world-class universities at the highest levels.
The purpose of the rankings is to recognise universities and to provide a global comparison of their success against their notional mission of becoming or remaining world-class.
According to the compilation by the QS these are the top ten in Africa.
Best 10 in Africa
1. University of Cape Town
2. Stellenbosch University
3. University of Witwatersrand
4. The American University in Cairo
5. Cairo University
6. Rodhes University
7. University of Pretoria
8. University of KwaZulu-Natal
9. University of Johannesburg
10. Ain Shams University
The rankings are widely referenced by prospective and current students, university professionals and governments worldwide.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the USA was rated the world’s top university in 2015/16, followed by Harvard in second place, with Stanford and the University of Cambridge in joint third place.
The University of Nairobi is the only Kenyan institution of higher learning that made it to the top 900 universities in the world.
The university took position 701 out of 891 universities that were ranked this year, though the survey considered about 3,539 institutions.
However, Makerere University and University of Dar es Salaam emerged ahead of the University of Nairobi in the rankings.
The ratings are based on a number of factors, including evaluating each university’s strengths in research, teaching, academic reputation, staff to student ratio and the number of international staff and students.
