Israeli Academia Faces Challenges Amidst Global Rankings and Funding Shifts
Translated & summarized from Calcalist by baba
Israeli universities are experiencing a decline in global rankings, with none in the top 100 of the Shanghai Ranking for the first time since 2020. While Tel Aviv University and the Technion show strength in entrepreneurial alumni rankings, overall internationalization and faculty-student ratios are concerns. The percentage of young Israelis with higher education has also stagnated, falling below the OECD average, and Israel faces potential exclusion from EU research grants.
The story in 6 lines · by baba
- No Israeli universities ranked in the top 100 of the prestigious Shanghai Ranking for the first time since 2020.
- Tel Aviv University and the Technion are recognized globally for entrepreneurial alumni and capital raising.
- The percentage of young Israelis with higher education has stagnated at 46%, below the OECD average.
- Israeli researchers received Ig Nobel Prizes for studies on bat flight and Teflon consumption.
- Israel faces potential exclusion from the European Union's Horizon research grants, with a drop in ERC grants.
- Academic internationalization and faculty-student ratios are identified as weaknesses for Israeli institutions.
Israeli researchers have garnered Ig Nobel Prizes for peculiar studies, including one by Prof. Barry Pinshow and Prof. Carmi Korine of Ben-Gurion University, who discovered that intoxicated bats fly slower and struggle with echolocation, explaining why bats avoid overripe fruit. Another Ig Nobel was awarded to Rotem Neftaliovitz, Daniel Neftaliovitz, and Frank Greenway for investigating whether ingesting Teflon could increase food volume and satiety without adding calories.
In global university rankings, Israel has seen a decline. For the first time since 2020, no Israeli universities are among the top 100 in the prestigious Shanghai Ranking, with the Technion falling out of the top 100 (now ranked 101-150), while the Weizmann Institute (71) and Hebrew University (89) maintained their positions. Israeli institutions also fare poorly in the UK's THE and QS rankings, with Tel Aviv University at 208th and Hebrew University at 218th in QS, and Tel Aviv at 209th and Hebrew University at 296th in THE. This decline is attributed to a weaker performance in internationalization, faculty-student ratios, and reputation surveys, areas where Israeli institutions are relatively weak due to language barriers, the security situation, and government underfunding of academia.
However, Tel Aviv University ranks ninth globally in a 2026 PitchBook ranking for US capital raising by entrepreneurial undergraduate alumni, with its graduates founding 918 companies and raising $47 billion in the last decade. The Technion is ranked twelfth. In subject rankings, the Hebrew University's communication department is 17th and the Technion's aerospace engineering is 19th in the Shanghai Ranking. Haifa University's public administration department surprisingly climbed to 28th globally.
Meanwhile, the proportion of young Israelis with higher education has stagnated at around 46% since 2015, falling below the OECD average, which rose to 49%. Israel is also at risk of exclusion from the EU's Horizon research grants, having seen a significant drop in ERC grants for both early-career and senior researchers, possibly due to a combination of scoring changes and an informal boycott of Israeli academia.
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