The University of Chicago has held its spot as the eighth best university in the world, according to the 2012 U.S. News and World Report’s ranking of the top 400 schools globally.  The rankings, released today, were determined by the weighted sum of six indicators, including academic reputation, citations per faculty, faculty student ratio, employer reputation, proportion of international students, and proportion of international faculty.

U of C had the second highest score in the category of academic reputation—99.9 out of 100—which was the highest weighted indicator of the six. Our downfall, relatively speaking, came in the scores for proportion of international students and proportion of international faculty, 77.8 and 68.9, respectively. Both were over 20 points lower than most of the higher ranked schools.

Schools that ranked above the U of C, in order from first to seventh, were Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), University of Cambridge, Harvard University, University College London, University of Oxford, Imperial College London, and Yale University.