Durban — The Durban University of Technology (DUT) was ranked in the top 5 of all universities in South Africa in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings.
Ahead of DUT were the University of Cape Town, Stellenbosch University, the University of the Witwatersrand and the University of KwaZulu-Natal, respectively.
DUT was honoured to feature in the global rankings.
The ranking means DUT remains the number one university of technology in the country. DUT was ranked in the top one-third among 1 799 universities in 104 countries.
DUT’s research, innovation and engagement acting deputy vice-chancellor, Professor Keolebogile Motaung, said: “It’s a happy moment to celebrate DUT’s success and achievement. Thanks to the leadership and support of our vice-chancellor and principal Professor Thandwa Mthembu. In all of these, the university has performed above excellence and needs to continue growing from this baseline and participate in the Times Higher Education Impact Rankings.
“As part of its research and innovation focus within Envision2030, DUT actively encourages researchers to consider the commercial opportunities that may arise from their research activities. This is real teamwork. Well done DUT and congratulations.”
Reacting to the news, teaching and learning acting deputy vice-chancellor, Suren Singh, said: “The teaching and learning environment at DUT has steadily gained traction, with staff having PhDs gradually approaching 40%. The university has made massive investments into infrastructure with respect to state-of-the-art equipment for teaching and learning, and research as well.
“We continue to create innovative curricula and introduced and transformed 169 undergraduate curricula and 13 postgraduate curricula over the past eight years. Our collaborative online international learning (COIL) programmes are second to none in South Africa and we strive to attain one COIL per programme within the next two years. We have engaged in multiple interventions to ensure student success across all faculties through Siyaphumelela activities and DHET-funded initiatives as well.”
DUT said that Times Higher Education announced that during the 2023 rankings process, they had analysed over 121 million citations from more than 15.5 million research publications and included survey responses from 40 000 scholars globally. They collected over 680 000 data points, which provided evidence for the world rankings.
DUT added that it celebrates this latest global ranking with the entire university community, and is grateful to the staff, students, alumni and partners who are living the values and principles as enshrined in the Envision2030 strategy.
On Wednesday, Times Higher Education released the results of The World University Rankings 2023.
“A record number of 1 799 universities from 104 countries and regions are included in the World Rankings this year – 137 more than last year – making it the largest edition in the 19-year history of the rankings. The UK’s University of Oxford (1st) retains the top spot for the seventh consecutive year,” Times Higher Education said.
“The Times Higher Education World University Rankings provide a rigorous overview of a university’s quality, drawing on an analysis of 15.5 million research publications and 121 million citations to those publications, plus over 40 000 responses to an annual academic reputation survey and hundreds of thousands of additional data points covering a university’s teaching environment, international outlook and industry links. Institutions are measured across 13 separate performance metrics, providing the most comprehensive picture of excellence among world-class research universities.”
Daily News