Five unis join best in world for grads' prospects

Five universities from the Chinese mainland have been ranked among the world's top 50 universities for student employability.

The latest edition of Quacquarelli Symonds Graduate Employability Rankings listed China's Tsinghua University in 10th place, followed by Peking University in 23rd.

Tsinghua was the best performer in south Asia, ahead of Japan's University of Tokyo(14th) and the University of Hong Kong (20th).

Other Chinese mainland entrants in the top 50 include Fudan (27th), Zhejiang University (38th), and Shanghai Jiaotong University (46th).

In all, 37 Chinese universities were ranked within the world's top 500－five from the Chinese mainland, six from Taiwan, and six from Hong Kong.

The results show Chinese universities are providing global and national economies with skilled, high-achieving graduates.

"Chinese universities have excelled in producing talents that are increasingly globally competitive," said Zhang Yan, China director at QS Intelligence Unit. "In the future, with strength in different disciplines, Chinese universities should work more closely with employers in different parts of the world, in areas of research and development, employability and entrepreneurship."

Zhang said she believes it could help further enhance the global competitiveness of students, cultivating more future leaders for China and the world alike.

Quacquarelli Symonds, a global higher education analyst and career advice specialist, named Stanford in the United States as the world-leader, followed by the University of California, Los Angeles and Harvard University.

US universities take five of the top-10 places－and 31 top-100 places－while the UK universities of Cambridge (6th) and Oxford (8th) were ranked most highly by employers.

Each institution's score was compiled using five indicators- alumni outcome, employer student connections, employer reputation, partnerships with employers and graduate employment rate.

Hannele Niemi, professor of education at the University of Helsinki, commended the Chinese universities' progress.

"The investments that China has allocated to higher education have had an impact," Niemi said. "China has also decisively made high efforts for promoting international cooperation."

Out of 600 universities considered in this year's rankings, 500 of them are published, compared with 300 universities considered last year and 200 published.