Wayne State University ranks in the top 1.6% of universities worldwide — placing 327th out of nearly 21,000 institutions — according to the 2024 edition of the outcome-based Global 2000 list by the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR), the largest academic rankings of global universities. 

“This international recognition of Wayne State’s academic and scholarly research accomplishments is unmistakable evidence of our faculty’s expert leadership in their respective fields,” said President Kimberly Andrews Espy, Ph.D. “As an urban public research institution, we are proud that our outstanding faculty scholars make a significant impact first in our classrooms for our talented students and ultimately driving innovation with local to global benefit."

The CWUR ranks Wayne State 102nd in the United States. 

The CWUR’s rankings are unique in that objective indicators are used for all four indicators underlying the methodology of the ranking, with no reliance on impression surveys or university submissions. Sixty-two million outcome-based data points were used for this year’s rankings and 20,966 universities were ranked according to their academic performance. 

CWUR uses seven objective and robust outcome-based indicators grouped into four areas to rank the world’s universities: 

1. Education: based on the academic success of a university’s alumni, measured relative to the university's size (25%) 
2. Employability: based on the professional success of a university’s alumni, measured relative to the university's size (25%) 
3. Faculty: measured by the number of faculty members who have received top academic distinctions (10%) 
4. Research:
   1. Research output: measured by the total number of research articles (10%)
   2. High-quality publications: measured by the number of research articles appearing in top-tier journals (10%)
   3. Influence: measured by the number of research articles appearing in highly-influential journals (10%)
   4. Citations: measured by the number of highly-cited research articles (10%) 

"The data used to compile these rankings provide concrete evidence of the success of our outstanding faculty, but also the impact of a WSU education based on the success of our alumni," said Laurie Lauzon Clabo, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs. "The data provide more evidence of the world-class nature of a Wayne State education.”

By Katheryn Kutil