City University of Hong Kong (CityU) aspires to excel in research and education, which will have an impact on all of society, including the lives of the next generation.
Recent achievements in global rankings show a big step forward in CityU’s performance in research, internationalisation, reputation and programmes. CityU now ranks 52nd in the world, 21st in Asia and the 5th among Top 50 universities under 50 years of age according to the QS Rankings for 2019 and 2020.
In addition, CityU is ranked 5th in the world’s best university aged 50 years or under, 15th among all universities in Asia, and 110th in the world according to the Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2018 and 2019.
In terms of more specific subject rankings, CityU has also performed very well. CityU is ranked 10th in the world and 1st in Hong Kong in Engineering, and 57th in the world and 1st in Hong Kong in Economics and Business, according to the Best Global Universities 2016 by US News and World Report.
CityU is the first university in Hong Kong to receive the QS 5-Star Plus Award. The 5-Star Plus Award recognises the University as an elite destination for the very best students and faculty worldwide, and acknowledges CityU’s research excellence, quality in teaching, globalisation experience for students, and capacity for nurturing student talent.
CityU, as a young and energetic University, performs exceptionally well in terms of research performance.
In the 2014-2015 General Research Fund (GRF) and Early Career Scheme (ECS) annual bidding exercise organised by the Research Grants Council under the University Grants Committee (UGC), CityU’s overall number of awards placed 3rd amongst all the local institutions. For the ECS, CityU won the largest number of grants amongst all local institutions, for the third consecutive year, since the introduction of the scheme in 2012-2013. For GRF proposals, CityU was again in the top three in terms of number of grants and amount of funding in the Business Panel, the Engineering Panel and the Humanities and Social Sciences Panel.
The results of the most current Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) 2014, published on 27 January 2015 by the UGC, affirmed CityU’s excellence in world-class research and position CityU firmly in the leading group of universities in the region.
RAE 2014, conducted by the UGC, assesses the quality of the research conducted at UGC-funded institutions. For each disciplinary area, three distinct elements of assessment covering research output, externally competitive peer-reviewed research grants and esteem measures are used to produce an overall quality profile. International benchmarks are used in the assessment to identify, and encourage, areas of excellence.
The results indicate that 44% of CityU’s research is rated in the top-notch categories as either world-leading (“4 star”) or internationally excellent (“3 star”), locating CityU firmly in the top four UGC-funded universities in terms of overall performance in Hong Kong.
CityU has performed particularly well in several disciplinary areas, including building technology, chemical engineering, civil engineering, communications and media studies, materials science, mathematics and statistics, which are all ranked at the top among all the UGC institutions in terms of the percentage of research rated in the top-notch categories ("4 star" or "3 star"). In addition, CityU is ranked 2nd in the areas of mechanical engineering, physics and astronomy, as well as in the biology and physical sciences panels.
RAE 2014 results are particularly important not only as an indicator of quality but also as a key factor in determining a sizeable, and increasing portion of the UGC recurrent Block Grant to be allocated to institutions.
This amazing set of results is yet further testimony to the strengths and quality of our research enterprise. This equates to some 300 of our academic faculty being.
