Out of 800 universities, Times Higher Education ranked UF as No. 120 this year in its World University Rankings list.
Each year, the organization announces the top 100 universities it considers to be the best. Rankings are based on four areas: teaching, research, international outlook and knowledge transfer.
Although UF missed the top 100 by 20 spots, the university’s ranking increased by six spots since last year.
Florida State University was the second Florida university to come in, placing at No. 213.
The increase in UF’s ranking is in large part due to the rise of research.
According to Joe Kays, the director of research communications at UF, research rose about 300 percent over the past 20 years.
“We’ve really made a commitment to grow our research enterprise,” he said, “because we’re so interdisciplinary, someone in medicine can easily partner with someone in agriculture and so forth.”
Kays said UF received $706.8 million in research awards for the fiscal year of 2015, which has gone up from the $519 million the university received 10 years ago.
UF health science senior Maggie Holzworth has done research in the division of nephrology, the study of kidneys, for almost a year now.
The 20-year-old said her favorite part about research is applying what she’s learned in classes to real life situations.
“Since I want to pursue primary care medicine, the ability to do research at school is an amazing opportunity,” Holzworth said. “I know that I’m getting the best education in the state.”
Kays said performing well in rankings is nice, but that it’s not what drives the university.
“Each individual scientist is driven by his or her own curiosity and area of expertise,” he said. “We’re focused on doing the best research we can in the areas we have the greatest strengths.”
