The world of college admissions is ever-changing and for students with top university ambitions, it’s important to stay up-to-date on the latest developments. This week, a global employability ranking reveals which universities recruiters at top companies think are the best at preparing students for the workplace. Check back next week to see what’s new and noteworthy in university admissions!

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MIT and Caltech top list of universities offering best job prospects to graduates

Getting a job upon graduation is one of the most important aspects of university life. Times Higher Education released a ranking of universities producing the employable graduates. Companies around the world ranked 250 institutions in 44 countries in the Global University Employability Ranking 2022, designed by HR consultancy Emerging. Employers voted for institutions both in their own country and around the world, if they recruit internationally.

In some countries, graduate jobs are not easy to come by, but in European countries such as France, Switzerland and Germany, professional experience is built into degree programmes.

France, Germany and China are among the best represented countries in the employability ranking, along with the UK and the US. Singapore, Japan and the UK each have an institution in the top 10, with Japanese and Canadian universities also appearing high in the ranking.

MIT topped the list, followed by Caltech, Harvard, Cambridge and Stanford. All these universities maintained their rank from the previous year as well.

Oxford moved up from the eighth spot last year to the sixth in 2022; University of Tokyo dropped from the sixth to seventh; National University of Singapore and Princeton moved up a spot to eighth and ninth, respectively; and Yale dropped from seventh place last year to round out the top 10. 

While the top 10 list was dominated by American universities, the following 10 was made up of a number of international institutions. University of Toronto, Technical University of Munich, Peking University, ETH Zurich, Imperial College of London, CentraleSupelec in France, IE University in Spain and École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne made it to the top 20 along with Columbia and NYU.

Other top stories in admissions news this week:

1. Cornell Law School and the University of Chicago Law School will continue to participate in U.S. News & World Report’s rankings, despite many of their top-placed peers abandoning the listings out of concern they compromise tenets of the legal profession, Higher Ed Dive reported. Most schools in the top 15 spots on U.S. News & World Report’s list have said they will no longer provide data to the publication. Miles, the University of Chicago law dean, said institutions should encourage prospective students to critically evaluate the rankings on their own and ask what value the lists hold. 
2. WalletHub released its report on 2023′s best & worst college towns and cities in America. The report compared 415 U.S. cities across three categories: wallet friendliness, social environment, and academic and economic opportunities. Austin, TX, topped the list, followed by Ann Arbor, MI, Orland, Gainesville and Tampa, FL. Austin is also at the top of the list for fastest-growing metro areas for career starters. New York City, specifically the borough of Manhattan, was ranked the worst large college city.
3. Times Higher Education reports that for the first time in Australia, Flinders University is offering a concurrent PhD and MBA program to give innovative researchers candidates an opportunity to gain a doctorate and an accelerated Masters in Business Administration (MBA) qualification in as little as four years. Under an initiative to bridge the gap between Australia’s academic and commercial worlds, the new program aims to prepare a new class of “scientific managers and entrepreneurs ready to lead the workforce of the 21st century.”
4. Purdue University announced that it will resume requiring SAT and/or ACT test scores for admissions applications, beginning with students who apply for Fall 2024 admission beginning Aug. 1, 2023. Many universities adopted test-optional or test-blind policies post the Covid pandemic. For the last two years, Purdue has been test flexible and has recommended but not required the test scores, and nearly three-fourths of applicants have provided them. Purdue accepts SAT or ACT scores and has no preference on which test is taken.