En el QS World University Rankings dado a conocer hoy, Chile lidera en dos aspectos fundamentales: tiene 4 de las 10 mejores universidades de la Región, por encima de Brasil, México y Argentina, y es el sistema nacional con más universidades (30) dentro de las 250 top en relación con la población del país. Además llama la atención la existencia de 13 universidades chilenas entre las 100 mejores; la mejora experimentada por un buen número de nuestras universidades respecto al año pasado y el peso de las universidades privadas, con y sin subsidio directo del Estado, entre las mejores 13 chilenas o 100 del continente. De las 25 universidades CRUCH, 22 califican entre las 250 “de la fama”; solo quedan fuera las dos universidades pedagógicas y la UTEM que aun no se recupera de su profunda crisis. 8 universidades privadas nuevas, sin subsidio directo del Estado, entran en el cuadro de honor.
¿Significa algo importante estar entre las 250 mejores del continente? Si, sinifica ocupar un lugar dentro del 7% superior de las alrededor de 3.900 universidades o instituciones equivalentes que existen en América Latina.
El ranking de las universidades chilenas es el siguiente (número indica posición dentro de la región latinoamericana):
2  PUC
4 UCH
9 UDEC
10 USACH
34 PUCV
36 UTFSM
41 UAUCH
62 UAI
64 UNAB
70 UTAL
82 UDP
92 UFRO
100 UANDES
103 UV
106 UCN
142 ULS
143 UAH
150 UA
151-160 UTAR
151-160 UBB
161-170 UDD
181-190 ULA
191-200 UCEN
191-200 UMAG
201-250 UNAP
UCRSH
UCSC
UCT
UCM
UATA
COMENTARIO SOBRE CHILE proprcionado por los organizadores de este ranking (que contiene varias afirmaciones equivocadas factualmente y otras equívocas, igualmente es interesante):
While Brazil has unmatched strength in depth, perhaps the most eye-catching progress has been made by Chile, which now claims four of the top ten spots, more than any other nation. Just months after spiraling tuition fees prompted student riots in Santiago, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (2) and Universidad de Chile (4) are joined in this year’s top ten by Universidad de Concepción (9) and Universidad de Santiago de Chile (10).
Whereas accessibility clearly remains a major issue, in terms of research performance Chile’s universities are among the best in the continent.Three Chilean universities make the top 15 for papers per faculty, led by  Universidad de Chile in 6th – the only country to break the Brazilian whitewash in this indicator. Pontifica also makes the top 10 for citations per paper, with Pontifica and Universidade de Chile making the top 20 for both citations per paper and papers per faculty, a feat matched by only one other university (UNIFESP).
Therefore, in termes of research quantity combined with impact, they can lay a credible claim to be Latin America’s foremost research institutions. As this year’s events show, research performance is only one aspect of a complex situation for Chilean universities, and these rankings also point to significant areas for improvement.There is no Chilean university in the top 50 for faculty/student ratio, and none in the top 30 for staff with a PhD.With Chilean students paying more than most for their education, this indicates that for all their research strength there is plenty of work to be done when it comes to providing a first-class learning environment.
If Chile’s heavily privatized universities have been helped up the table by the manner in which they have prioritized research, this year’s rankings suggest Argentina’s heavily state-subsidized university system has struggled to keep up with the pace of change elsewhere in the continent.
INTRODUCCION
Ben Sowter, Head of QS Intelligence Unit
The QS World University Rankings® were recently published for the eighth consecutive year, and have become the world’s most widely referenced source of comparative information on global universities. In 2011, the world rankings featured 712 universities – a record to date, but still only a fraction of the some 20,000 higher education institutions in the world as estimated at the recent UNESCO forum on global rankings.
Following the launch of the QS Asian University Rankings™ in 2009, 2011 has seen the launch of the QS World University Rankings® by Subject, and QS Stars – a new broad-based rating system – both designed to provide more comparative intelligence on a greater number of universities.
QS recognizes that while rankings have become an increasingly important influence on the decisions facing prospective international students, they have their limitations. A single methodology cannot be adequately used to compare all universities of all types in all regions. This year’s subject rankings aim to reveal global excellence in individual disciplines – much of which is overlooked by the generalist approach taken in the world rankings. This work will be extended further in future. QS Stars reveals excellence not only in the round but in each of eight key areas; and the regional rankings in Asia and now Latin America are designed to drill down deeper beneath the fabric of higher education in some of the fastest-moving regions of the world.
QS University Rankings – Latin America™ represent an achievement which eight years ago would have been unthinkable. In 2004, when all this began, Latin America was among the most challenging regions in the world from which to identify appropriate contacts and gather the necessary data. Today things are different. Universities in the region have been very welcoming and extremely cooperative in helping us compile these results and the team at QS has been augmented with the necessary language capabilities to communicate effectively in the region.
The methodology has been adapted to the needs of the region, following an extensive survey of academics and institution leaders in the region conducted early this year to ascertain the factors considered most indicative of institutional strength. The “Staff with PhD” indicator was cited as the most important indicator and has been included here for the first time in any QS evaluation.
Other concepts considered important in the survey included inclusion, student satisfaction, and the quality, number, and depth of relationships with universities outside the region. All of these feature in plans for the future and, in many cases, data has already begun to be collected.
A special acknowledgement must go to Cybermetrics Labs in Madrid, publishers of the well-known and extremely inclusive “Ranking Web of World Universities” (www.webometrics.info) whose data has been drawn upon to form 10% of these new rankings. While web metrics have not been taken into account before due to the heavy advantage offered to institutions operating principally in English, they form a very interesting component in a region where no country or institution has an innate advantage in this respect. The QS indicator has been compiled by dropping the “Scholar” component from the main Webometrics score (due to its overlap with our analysis of SciVerse Scopus) and up-scaling the other components to compensate. Much like other evaluations, these results will evolve in their early years as the institutions involved become familiar with the system and the data requested. But these inaugural results already reveal a fascinating picture of an increasingly important region on the higher education map.
Mas información en:
http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-rankings