KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 15 — Kuala Lumpur is now ranked among the 50 best student cities in the world, according to the QS Best Student Cities rankings which was released today.
The capital climbed up 12 places to rank 41st in the 2017 rankings, with QS citing the “rapidly improving reputation” of the country’s higher education sector.
The 100 Best Student Cities rankings by QS Qucquarelli Symonds is released annually starting from 2012. The company is also behind the highly cited QS World University Rankings.
Each city must have at least two universities ranked in the QS World University Rankings in order to be evaluated in the list.
Malaysia has three universities in the rankings:Universiti Malaya (UM), International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM), and Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM).
UM is the top ranked Malaysian university, placing 133rd in the overall universities ranking.
KL’s improved ranking is contributed by it ranking the highest in terms of affordability among other student cities.
QS said that this was due to the combination of low living costs and low tuition fees.
It also placed 30th among all cities in the Student View category, where students are asked to rate their experience at the student cities.
KL’s lowest indicator score card is in the Desirability rank, where it only ranked 74th.
Neighbours Singapore rank 14th in the Student Cities list, while Thailand’s capital Bangkok, which made it to the list for the first time, now ranks 58h.
KL ranks just below Coventry in the United Kingdom and also Russia’s capital Moscow, which tied for 39th place.
It is, however, above Argentinian capital Buenos Aires, UK’s Nottingham, and also Adelaide in Australia.
Montreal in Canada, France’s capital Paris and UK’s capital London all make up the top three in the list respectively.
France’s Lille, Lima in Peru, and China’s Wuhan came in the last among the top 100.
