Page 100 - EW April 2025

Cover Story

EW-LAUNCHPAD RANKINGS 2025

BEST UNIVERSITIES

Traditional university rankings based on factors such as admissions
selectivity, faculty research citations and endowment corpus, are of minimal
utility for undergraduate education. Early this year EducationWorld tied up
with the US-based Launcpad Rankings LLC to rate and rank America's top
colleges/ universities providing best undergrad education

T WELVE YEARS AFTER EDUCATIONWORLD good for institutional reputation and selecting postgraduate

programmes but of limited value to students in search of
published its inaugural EW India Higher Edu-
cation Rankings rating and ranking the coun-
high quality undergraduate education. The USP of the EW-
try’s best colleges and universities, the EW
leges/universities under the parameters of teaching focus,
higher ed rankings have gone international. Launchpad rankings is that it evaluates America’s best col-
In a first for an Indian media publication, EW class size, experiential learning, economic mobility and re-
has tied up with the US-based Launchpad Rankings LLC tention parameters that matter most to undergrad students
to rate and rank America’s best colleges and universities. because they have the biggest impact on the quality of the
Why USA? Because it’s the #1 foreign study destination education experience they will receive.
choice of Indian students. In 2023-24, India surpassed The inaugural America’s Best Universities Rankings
China to become America’s prime source country for inter- 2025 are conducted and compiled by Launchpad Rankings
national students with 3.3 lakh ambitious youth emplaning LLC, a US-based education research company supported by
to US universities for higher education. renowned educators drawn from American higher educa-
Readers, parents, students and career counselors may tion and industry and led by a distinguished Steering Com-
justifiably query the need for EW rankings of America’s mittee. Raymond Ravaglia, former Dean and Director
best universities when internationally reput- of Stanford University Pre-Collegiate Stud-
ed agencies and publications including the Raymond Ravaglia ies, explains the need for the EW-Launchpad
London-based Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), Rankings: “Choosing a college/university is
Times Higher Education, US News & World a monumental decision. It will profoundly
Report, Forbes, among others have been shape the rest of the life of school-leavers.
publishing elaborate league tables ranking Parents prepared to invest heavily in their
the world’s best universities. children’s higher education want more than
The explanation is that assessing Amer- institutional reputation for their children.
ica’s best universities from the Indian per- They surely want to enroll them in a college
spective apart, QS, THE etc accord high or university — in America they are synony-
importance to parameters such as research, mous — where they are given personalised
faculty citations in refereed journals, inter- education in small-sized classes, provided
nationalism — assessment metrics that are experiential learning through mentoring and

100 EDUCATIONWORLD APRIL 2025