On Sept 15, Quacquarelli Symonds Company released the roster of the world's top ranking universities.

The otherwise known as QS World University Rankings publishes yearly university rankings. The company assesses by rating institutions between one and five+ stars based on several criteria that constitute a world-class university, namely, research, teaching, employability, internationalization, facilities, online/distance learning, social responsibility, innovation, arts and culture, inclusiveness, and specialist criteria and an overall rating.

London remained to be highly competitive with four universities included in the top 50 list. Cambridge University, for instance, made it to the top 5 list and three others in the top 10. Oxford University slid down from 5th to 6th, University College London ranked at 7th and London's Imperial College slipped six places down from 2nd in 2014 to 8th this year.

London is the "education capital of the world... attracting the world's top talent and producing the next generation of great thinkers and leaders," Boris Johnson, the city's mayor, said.

Competing alongside with five on the list of top 10 are universities from the United States, Massachusetts Institute of Technology maintained its top 1 spot for four consecutive years already with Harvard University tailing behind in the second place. Stanford University, California Institute of Technology and University of Chicago are on the 3rd, 5th and 10th spots, respectively.

A new Institute garnering the 9th place on the list is ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology) from Switzerland.

Of the eight universities featured from New Zealand, only two made it to the top 200. However, in the employer reputation category, only the University of Auckland, sitting at 82nd place, was named.

In addition, ranking 346th in 2014, Massey University leaped nine places higher (at 337th) this year. Improvements in the academic reputation category and increase number of international students and staff augmented the university's position. Steve Maharey, the university's vice-chancellor, believes that "more investment is absolutely vital because universities around the world are reliant heavily on the amount of money they get to be able to lift their quality."

QS system primarily aims to give students "a wider picture of an institution's qualities... designed to reflect the nuanced mission of universities."