Five Canadian universities rank among top 20 in prestigious global ranking

If you’re in search of higher education, these Canadian universities that rank among the best in the world for achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals might be worth considering.

Times Higher Education released its list of the world’s leading universities in tackling the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), and five schools in Canada placed quite high among the ranking of 100 universities.

The University of Alberta took the highest spot, placing sixth globally and first overall in North America. It climbed one spot from its 2023 ranking.

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Following closely behind is Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. It took the eighth spot globally, unfortunately dropping down five spots from third place in the 2023 ranking.

The University of Victoria and Simon Fraser University (SFU) claimed the 13th and 17th spots, respectively. It seems SFU made some major strides in addressing the UN’s SDGs because it climbed all the way up into the top 20 from 86th place last year.

Lastly, the Université of Laval took the 19th spot, going down five spots from last year.

The universities you might expect to see on these global rankings, such as the University of British Columbia, the University of Toronto, and McGill, didn’t make the cut.

The ranking, which evaluated 2,152 universities from 125 regions, is the only one to judge universities’ contribution to all 17 of the SDGs and assesses their commitment to sustainability across four broad areas: research, stewardship, outreach and teaching.

For example, U of A ranked the highest in the following SDG categories, which contributed to its overall ranking:

• Life Below Water (2nd)
• Zero Hunger (4th)
• Life on Land (7th)
• Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure (9th)

Queen’s ranked highest under the Zero Hunger category, taking the top spot.

The University of Victoria’s highest ranking is 4th in the Sustainable Cities and Communities category.

SFU placed highly (3rd place) in both Sustainable Cities and Communities and Climate Action, and Laval’s best category is also Climate Action, taking 13th place.

With files from Allison Stephen