2016 QS subject rankings show UVic academic leadership spans disciplines

UVic’s global leadership in five key academic fields, along with its comprehensive span of world-class programs across the university, were highlighted with the release of the 2016 QS World University Rankings by Subject on March 22. 

The five fields where UVic is ranked in the world’s top 200 are:

• Earth and marine sciences
• English language and literature
• Geography
• Law
• Philosophy  

Of those, earth and marine sciences and English language and literature were in the top 150. In addition, UVic programs in computer science, education, electrical engineering, environmental sciences, mathematics, and physics and astronomy placed in the top 300 for global subject leadership.

The QS rankings use a mix of academic and employer reputation surveys, a joint impact and productivity indicator (h-index) and citations to measure leadership in each field.

UVic’s performance across the disciplines continues to be very strong. QS scored the university for world-class performance in 35 of the 42 fields it considers. (Most of the rest—including dentistry, pharmacology and veterinary sciences—are fields in which UVic doesn’t have established programs.)

Rankings are regularly used by undergraduate and postgraduate students to help select degree courses, by academics to inform career decisions, by research teams to identify new collaborative partners and by university managers to benchmark their performance and set strategic priorities.