Education About Asia: Online Archives

Web Gleanings: Major Universities in Asia

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For those who wish to study at a university in Asia, there are thousands of choices. To narrow the choices, it is helpful to consult with sites that rate the universities on a number of factors.

Below are several important evaluation sites:

A) Best Global Universities in Asia Source: US News and World Report

URL: http://tinyurl.com/jap4d6x

B) QS University Rankings: Asia 2015 Source: Top Universities

URL: http://tinyurl.com/j4tgchc

C) Asia University Rankings 2015 Source: Times Higher Education

URL: http://tinyurl.com/zpxhkfe

D) The Top Universities in the Asia-Pacific Region 2015 Source: Forbes

URL: http://tinyurl.com/jhxn4vf

E) Top 25 Universites in Asia of 2015 Source: Asian Rankings

URL: http://tinyurl.com/hm3v5cjPhotograph of the outer facade of the National University of Singapore.

F) 2015 Best Universities in Asia Source: Scholar Geek

URL: http://tinyurl.com/jqo77rv

G) Top Ten Universities in Asia 2015 Source: Entire Education

URL: http://tinyurl.com/jms5src

In looking at these seven sites, certain trends and patterns emerge:

• A total of 22 Asian universities were mentioned in the top ten lists of the seven sites.

• The universities listed most often in the top ten are:

—Listed by six sites: University of Tokyo, National University of Singapore, University of Hong Kong, Seoul National University

—Listed by five sites: Tsinghua University, Kyoto University

—Listed by four sites: Peking University, Nanyang Technical University

—The university listed most often as the No. 1 university in Asia is University of Tokyo

All twenty-two universities cited by the seven ranking services have websites written in English. Some are more extensive than others; some are more easily navigated; some are more attractive than others.

University of Tokyo

URL: http://tinyurl.com/hjxhvst

Screenshot of the international student website for the University of Tokyo.
The site for the University of Tokyo is replete with materials about the departments, the faculty, the campus locations, the research, the news, and the events at the university. Navigation to subsets of information is simple. There are several sets of tabs to choose from. For instance, near the top: Prospective Students, Current Students, and Alumni. The tabs occupying the main section of the homepage are About UTokyo, Academics, Why UTokyo?, and Research.

National University of Singapore

URL: http://www.nus.edu.sg/

The university is vast, and the resources on the site abound with information. The navigational experience is not ideal, with some of the information buried in unexpected places. The links are not clearly defined. “Education” takes you to links for sixteen faculties; each faculty has its own site with menus for yet another set of links.

The University of Hong Kong

URL: http://www.hku.hk/

Despite innumerable links and pages on the site, it can be confusing to go from one place to another. The homepage scrolls vertically and horizontally, and there are blinking links on several parts of the page. Some pages have visual links that move automatically; at times, there are several links moving simultaneously. It is sometimes difficult to return to a page of interest or recall where one saw it.

Seoul National University

URL: http://www.useoul.edu/

Screenshot of the website for the Seoul National University.

Access to most of the information on the site is provided through the links at the top of the page. There is a more enlarged listing of links at the bottom of the page. Often the links (like “Campus Tours”) will take you to pages outside the main homepage with no link available to return to the original homepage. Some links take you to pages written in Korean.

Tsinghua University

URL: http://tinyurl.com/jhymq5r

At the very top of the homepage are links to the essential information about Tsinghua University, including News, and Faculties and Research. The major portion of the page contains articles on the latest news and events. One nice feature that will help narrow a search for courses can be found in the admissions section: Under Curriculum is the link to “Undergraduate English Taught Courses.”

Kyoto University

URL: http://www.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en

The site is easy to navigate with drop-down menus under each major subject link. It is a detailed and informative site. Some of the English translations have minor errors, but they are not serious enough to affect the understanding of the message.

Peking University

URL: http://english.pku.edu.cn/

Screenshot of Peking University website.

The homepage for Peking University is dominated by articles about events and news about the university. In the upper right side of the page are links to all other pertinent information, such as Admission, Schools and Departments, and Academics and Research. In a few cases, clicking on one of these links leads to pages that do not have a return link to the university homepage.

Nanyang Technical University

URL: http://www.ntu.edu.sg/Pages/home.aspx

There is a lot of blinking and auto-scrolling on the homepage, making selections somewhat difficult at times. The crucial information about Admissions, and Academics and Research is located at the top of the main page in tabs with drop-down menus.

INDIA

Because no universities in India (the second-largest country in Asia by population) were ranked in the top ten by any ranking service looking at all of Asia, a separate search was conducted for the highest-ranked universities in India. The following five ranking sites were examined:

A) QS Top 10 Universities in India URL: http://tinyurl.com/p5z82wf

B) Top Universities in India 2015 URL: http://tinyurl.com/zdlbvzt

C) Top 100 Universities in India 2015 URL: http://tinyurl.com/zc26em3

D) Top 10 Universities in India URL: http://tinyurl.com/zn7bgnb

E) Best Global Universities in India URL: http://tinyurl.com/hfvdngq

Some of the findings based on the rankings of these five sites are:

• There were 22 universities ranked in the top 10 Indian universities.

• The university ranked No. 1 most often (by three of the five ranking sites): Indian Institute of Science Bangalore

• The universities listed most often in the top ten are:

—Listed by all five ranking sites: University of Delhi

—Listed by four sites: Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur

—Listed by three sites: Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research Bangalore

These are the English-language websites for the universities of India listed most often:

Indian Institute of Science Bangalore

URL: http://www.iisc.ernet.in/

University of Delhi

URL: http://www.du.ac.in/du/

Indian Institute of Technology Delhi

URL: http://www.iitd.ac.in/

Indian Institute of Technology Bombay

URL: http://www.iitb.ac.in/

Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur

URL: http://www.iitk.ac.in/

Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur

URL: http://www.iitkgp.ac.in/

Indian Institute of Technology Madras

URL: https://www.iitm.ac.in/

Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research Bangalore

URL: http://www.jncasr.ac.in/