Egypt’s top 20 universities maintained their spot in the top 2k higher education establishments worldwide, according to the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR) recently released list for 2024. The country’s three leading universities — Cairo University, Ain Shams University, and Mansoura University — and many of the other Egyptian universities on the list all inched up in the tables from last year, which the Higher Education Minister Ayman Ashour took as a promising sign that universities’ policies and compliance with international standards is putting them in “a prominent position to complete with major international universities.”

It’s good to see Egyptian universities doing well, but what are global university rankings? What do they measure? And do they really matter? Enterprise spoke to industry insiders from the private sector and the government to find out why Egyptian universities’ movement up or down global rankings seem to gain such attention.

SOUND SMART: There are plenty of global university rankings out there and more by the year, but the big three are the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings , QS World University Rankings, and the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) — also known as the Shanghai Ranking.

Does a better ranked university mean a better education? Not necessarily: Every global ranking system measures different factors and gives each factor different weights — with research and not teaching often being the main factor. Rankings from THE place citations and research as the most important factor in their rating, together making up 60% of the final ranking. While for ARWU, 90% of the ranking is based upon the number of alumni receiving prestigious awards like Nobel Prizes and the research and citations attributed to the university. Research output, citations, and faculty awards make up 50% of CWUR’s rankings. The outlier is QS, who give a 20% importance to citations and research.

This leaves some universities — particularly privately owned ones — way down the list: In some international rankings, private Egyptian universities tend to lag behind their state-run counterparts because public universities tend to have a larger research output. Factors like teaching quality and student experience — especially for undergraduates — in which private Egyptian institutions pride themselves in, often have very little effect on their place in a ranking.

By the numbers: In the recently released ranking for 2024 from CWUR, only two privately owned institutions were part of the 20 Egyptian universities that made it onto the list of the world’s top 2k universities. Despite their reputation locally, the British University in Egypt came in fifteenth and the American University in Cairo came in nineteenth out of the Egyptian entries to the list.

Rankings may not be everything, but they’re something we can’t ignore: Rankings can help give universities prestige, boost their reputation, and help them get further accreditation, which improves their standing among international counterparts, CIRA Education CCO Alyaa Said told Enterprise. In terms of staffing and management, this prestige can help universities recruit better faculty members, secure funding from local and international partners, and attract research grants. While for current and former students, going to a better ranked university can open up more and better jobs. Rankings are also an important way to appeal to prospective students, particularly for those coming from abroad.

Pushing up local universities in global rankings is also an important part of the state’s education plans: The government is working towards having at least 28 Egyptian universities on the QS World University Rankings, up from a current 15 in the ranking’s 2024 list, by the end El Sisi’s third term in 2030.

It seems so far to be working: THE’s 2024 ranking added 12 new Egyptian universities to the list, bringing the number of local universities up to 38. Cairo University — which often leads as the country’s top university in global rankings — rose to 371st place in QS’ rankings for 2024, up from the 551-560 range. Zooming out, Egyptian universities are much more well represented now than they were a decade ago, with CWUR’s most recent ranking showing a 400% increase in the amount of ranked universities over only ten years and those on the list usually steadily climbing year-on-year.

Efforts to further improve ratings are underway: Ashour met with THE Regional Director Tristan Horlick last week to talk about how to improve Egyptian universities’ positions on global education rankings.

But there’s still a lot left to do: Education spending in general and scientific research spending in specific — though having seen increases over the past few years — is still below the required level to push Egyptian universities’ ranking on global education indices, another source from the Higher Education Ministry told us. “Spending on education, involving the private sector, attracting international universities, and linking curriculums with scientific research and job market needs will guarantee better performance in the coming years,” the source added.

Your top education story for the week: A new education council: The cabinet has greenlit a draft law to form the National Council for Education, Research, and Innovation that will outline and develop education policies.

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