Italian universities get report cards

First comprehensive ranking confirms quality gap between north and south.

• Nicola Nosengo

17 July 2013

Italy’s universities have undergone their first comprehensive evaluation. Pictured are students at the University of Bologna, founded in 1088 ad and considered Europe’s oldest.

Silvia Morara/Corbis

Exam season is over for Italian universities, and the results are in. An ambitious evaluation exercise has ranked the country’s universities and research institutes according to the quality of their scientific output. The data will be used to award extra funds to the best-ranking centres. But some critics say that the report’s methodology is not reliable and may lead to distortions in budget allocation…

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