The University of Cape Town (UCT) has maintained its top position in Africa – just outside of the top 100 in the world – in the 2019 Quacquarelli-Symonds (QS) Graduate Employability Rankings.
UCT takes top position in Africa and is ranked in the 101-150 band for the second consecutive year.
UCT acting deputy vice chancellor for research and internationalisation Professor Michael Kyobe says: “The methodology of the QS survey relies heavily on a global survey of what academics and employers think of a particular university. QS Surveys also look at citations per faculty, staff-student ratio and the degree of internationalisation by the proportion of international students and faculty.
“Since UCT’s research impact is above the world average in many areas and because we have a very good proportion of international students, these indicators would tend to boost our scores.”
The QS Rankings provide a unique insight into institution’s employability performance.
Five indicators are used to measure performance with various weightings:
* Employer reputation (based on over 40 000 responses to the QS Employer Survey, which asks employers to identify the most competent and innovative graduates; 30%);
* Alumni outcomes (based on successful alumni on over 150 high-achiever lists measuring desirable outcomes in a particular walk of life; 25%);
* Employer-student connections (distinct companies that have been present at events on campus or have promoted themselves on university-related websites; 10%);
* Partnerships with employers (collaborative publications with global companies and work-placement related partnerships; 25%); and
* Graduate employment rate (the proportion of graduates in employment within one year of graduation, excluding those opting to pursue further study; 10%).
UCT achieves its best score of 97.2 out of the possible total of 100 for the “graduate employment rate” indicator and ranks 18th in the world. The next best score of 89.7 is achieved for “Alumni Outcomes” and ranks 36th in the world.