The Finances of World-Class Universities 2006-2016 Alex Usher CGHE LONDON, UK 13 September 2018

Four Questions: What is the comparative financial position of world-class universities around the world? Are World-Class Universities doing better than they were ten years ago? Are World-Class Universities being treated differently from the rest of the higher education system? What effects have funding changes had on scientific output at World-Class Universities?

Definitions and caveats WCUs = ARWU top-200 universities. Why expenditures? Smoother than income. Why per-student? Data more easily accessible Caveat 1: Methods of counting students differ across countries. Mainly affects anglophone countries. UK/Australia look high. Caveat 2: Boundaries of university expenditures differs. E.g. hospitals, businesses, residences, sports teams, etc. Caveat 3: Definition of expenditures differs (a bit). Caveat 4: Year ends differ

The Data 174 ARWU-200 institutions provide data on both finances and student numbers for either 2015 or 2016. (missing: Saudi Arabia, France, South Korea, Russia, some Chinese and Belgian Universities, various others) 166 institutions have data going back to 2006 (missing: rest of China) Data is taken either from national sources (US, Canada, UK, Australia, Switzerland) or institutional yearbooks (elsewhere)

World-Class Universities, $/student 2015 -16

Six Categories of Institutions Category Size (USD) Institutions Super-rich/super-specialized (7) $500K plus UCSF, Icahn, CalTech, Rockefeller Rich (35) $100-500K Most US Privates, UMich, UVa, Cambridge, Tokyo Well-off (38) $50-100K Most US Publics, Most major Asian unis Middle-class (35) $35-50K UBC, ANU, TU Munich Stretched (39) $20-35K Mostly European Us, Toronto, Melbourne, Technion Over-stretched (16) Sub-$20K Nearly all European

Avg $/student among ARWU-200 institutions, by country

World-Class Universities, $/student 2015-16

2015-2016 real per-student expenditures at world-class universities, (2006=100)

Change in real per-student expenditures at world-class universities, by country, 2006-16

UK Universities

US Private Universities

US Public Universities

Swedish Universities

Japanese Universities

Canada

Australian Universities

German Universities

Swiss Universities

Dutch universities

Measuring Effect of Increased Funding on Publication Output Output measured simply by publications. Comparing Leiden- indexed publications 2006-2009 to 2012-2015 Large increase in number of indexed publications (44% across all ARWU-200 institutions; 15.7% increase in per-student funding across all ARWU-200 institutions between Question: do above-average funding increases lead to above- average increases in scientific output

No Short-Term Relation Between $ and Output

No Short-term relationship between $ and Impact, either

Caveat: China Obvious missing piece is China Both expenditures and publications rose very quickly in early years of century. Unfortunately detailed institutional data is not available before 2013 (introduction of law on budget transparency)

China since 2013

Take-aways WCUs are diverse in their funding levels. Top 50 dominated by institutions with USD $50,000 and more, but below that much more diversity Per-student expenditures of WCUs are generally rising: 15.7% in real terms over last decade WCUs expenditures usually increasing faster than non-WCUs, but gap not that large except in Germany and Switzerland No observable relationship in short-term between per-student spending and relative scientific output.