According to the Times Higher Education (THE) World Rankings 2025, it should come as no surprise that the world’s top five universities are Oxford, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard, Princeton and Cambridge. The UK’s Oxbridge and America’s Ivy League universities have topped the list for decades. For graduates, having a diploma from one of these institutions is like having a Gucci handbag and a step-up to the labour market.
THE World Rankings is based on 18 performance indicators including the learning environment (teaching), research environment (volume, income and reputation); research quality (citation impact, research strength, research excellence and research influence); international outlook (staff, students and research); and industry (income and patents).
In the annual ranking for next year, a total of 2,092 universities from 115 countries or regions are included. Thirty of these countries have at least one university in the top 200, and Anglo-Saxon institutions are not alone. In the top 200 Japan and India are also well represented, as well as Germany, China, Australia and the Netherlands.
However, in the 2025 ranking, some Dutch universities dropped down a few positions from the previous year. The Delft University of Technology ranked number 48 last year, but this year dropped to number 56, Wageningen University and Research slipped from 64 to 67. Eight other Dutch universities also fell, but only by a few spots.
The outcome of the report was not all bad. The University of Amsterdam moved up a few notches, from 61 to 58, and Leiden University from 77 to 73. Utrecht University was not included in the top 200, but that was not due to poor research and teaching skills. For the last two years, the university has refused to submit any data, as it does not believe in the usefulness of this kind of ranking. Utrecht University is no lightweight when it comes to academic education, research and vision. In 1636, in the same year it opened its doors, it welcomed also the first female student in the Netherlands, Anna Maria Schurman (1607-1678). Other well-known alumni include the physician and anatomist Reinier de Graaf (1641-1678), and more recently the best-selling author and TED Talk speaker Rutger Bregman (1988). The university, with more than 40,000 students, argues that it does not want to participate in THE World Rankings as it stresses scoring and competition, while the university would prefer to focus on collaboration and open science. Besides wishing to avoid the time-consuming process of gathering information for the ranking, the university also points out that the required information does not encompass the breadth of all the courses and disciplines the institution offers.
The University of Zurich shares the same stance. Founded in 1833, the Swiss university touts more than 25,000 students. After the last report in September 2023 was published with a ranking of number 80 in the world, it withdrew from THE World Ranking, arguing that the ranking creates false incentives, especially for international students and researchers, who believe the rankings are an accurate indication of where they should study or work.
However, since the current coalition government took office in July, Dutch universities are faced with far graver threats than dropping places in international rankings. In September the government announced plans to reduce government spending on education and research by more than one billion euros, which will be detrimental to the quality of Dutch universities. The CEOs of Dutch companies such as Adyen, Royal FrieslandCampina, VDL Groep and NXP already see the writing on the wall. They are calling on the government to invest in a productive and competitive economy, arguing that education and research are the backbone of an innovative and competitive economy, and that and investment in education is therefore crucial.
According to the October 2024 report by the European Patent Office (EPO), one of the key findings is that universities are responsible for more than 10% of European inventions, and in the Netherlands the Eindhoven and Delft Universities of Technology, as well as Utrecht University – world ranking or not – are crucial academic institutions, vital to the Dutch economy.
Written by Benjamin B. Roberts