The top ten places are dominated by UK and US universities, with four UK establishments featured. Although claims that the new regulations and changes to the fees system may have an impact on 2012 results have already began circulating. Ben Sowter, Head of Research at QS told the BBC that he believed that is was “inevitable” that financial pressures would impact UK universities rankings in the future years, due to staffing, research productivity and the result of UK students looking to go overseas for their education.

The top ten institutions are as follows:

1 – University of Cambridge – UK (100.0)

2- Harvard University – US (99.3)

3 – Massachusetts Institute of Technology – US (99.2)

4 – Yale University – US (98.8)

5 – University of Oxford – US (98.8)

6 – Imperial College London – UK (97.6)

7 – University College London – UK (97.3)

8 – University of Chicago – US (96.1)

9 – University of Pennsylvania – US (95.7)

10 – Columbia University – US (95.3)

For a full list please click here.

Amongst those featured in the top 100 were eight Australian institutions, with Australian National University ranking an impressive 26^th and the University of Melbourne not far behind at 31^st.

East Asia has seen a distinct increase in their rankings with universities from Japan and Singapore leading the way as the University of Tokyo ranked 25^th , the National University of Singapore at 28^th and Kyoto University reaching 32^nd.

Amidst the lower rankings, it has emerged that a number of universities from Latin America and the Middle East making an appearance on the list.

The University’s Korea Australasia Research Centre will lead six other institutions in developing the initiative, which has been awarded almost half a million dollars.

 UNSW has one of the largest Korean studies programmes in the country.

The project Towards the Establishment of a Centre of Excellence for Korean Language and Studies Education and Research is part of the Australian Federal Government’s aim to increase the number of Australians studying Asian languages and culture.

“I would like to see more students become interested in undertaking post-beginners level Korean language courses in schools and universities,” says the leader of the project Dr Gi-Hyun Shin, from the School of Languages and Linguistics in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

“I would also like to see more students at schools become systematically exposed to Korean affairs, become intellectually interested in Korea and undertake a Korean Studies major when they get to universities,” he says.

The project includes a series of workshops and an analysis of current teaching materials. 

The partners are Seoul National University, Curtin University of Australia, Australian National University, Asia-Pacific Association for Computer-Assisted Language Learning, Korean Language Teachers Association and Korean Studies Association of Australasia.

This was one of seven projects sharing in $2.75 million to boost Asian languages and cultures, announced by the Federal Government.