Chinese institutions do well in global employability rankings

According to the Global University Employability Rankings 2018, Chinese institutions have done well in producing workplace-ready graduates in Asia.

The annual rankings published by London-based Times Higher Education (THE) lists the top 150 institutions for employability, based on a survey of about 7,000 major employers around the world.

Mainland China retains seven institutions total in the annual ranking this year, led by Peking University in the 19^th place.

“China is still the top performer in Asia. Compared with 2011 it has seen the biggest improvement,” Simon Baker, data editor at THE, told Xinhua.

“China has seen a rapid rise in keeping with some other rankings. In research based rankings and world university rankings, China has just risen and risen, in the employability ranking in the last four years, a number of universities have stayed the same.”

However, it has not experienced the same surge, despite the improvement in rankings. This can be attributed to the increased preference for softer skills by employers, which Chinese institutions have not been emphasising on as much as hard skills.

“One aspect where China may not compete so well is in instilling soft skills for graduates. But it won’t be long, judging by places like Singapore’s performance, before this is addressed and Chinese universities rise further,” Baker said.

South Korea had six universities place in the top 150 this year, significantly up from only having one entry in 2011.

Hong Kong also performed well, with four institutions placing in the rankings, led by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology at the 16^th place.

Japan’s University of Tokyo was the top-ranked Asian entry in the global rankings, at number nine. The nation had three institutions in the top 100.

Following closely behind was the National University of Singapore at 10th place. Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University also reached the top 100, at #73.