Only 34 of the top 200 universities in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings are run by women
It is striking that still very few of the world’s top universities are led by women.
In fact, analysis of the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2018 reveals that just 34 of the top 200 institutions are currently led by women. This is a decrease from last year, when 36 of the top universities had female leaders.
However, the current number one institution (the University of Oxford) is led by political scientist Louise Richardson, while half the prestigious Ivy League institutions in the US; Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania, Cornell University and Brown University have female leaders.
The US, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK are some of the countries with high numbers of female-led institutions.
Below we take a look at the achievements of the female vice-chancellors of the top 10 universities and the journeys that brought them to where they are now.
1. University of Oxford: Louise Richardson
Louise Richardson has been vice-chancellor of the University of Oxford since January 2016. She was previously principal of the University of St Andrews for seven years – the first woman to occupy this position.
Richardson’s academic focus has been on international security with an emphasis on terrorist movements, and has taught the world-renowned Harvard undergraduate course in terrorist movements in international relations. She has received teaching awards from the American Political Science Association and from Pi Sigma Alpha for outstanding teaching in political science.
2. Harvard University: Drew Faust
Drew Faust is the first woman to serve as the president of Harvard University and the fifth woman to serve as president of an Ivy League Institution. During a press conference on campus, when she took up the role, she said that she hoped that her appointment could be a symbol of opening opportunities that would have been inconceivable even a generation ago. She continued by saying ”I’m not the woman president of Harvard, I’m the president of Harvard”.
One of her first initiatives as president was to significantly increase financial aid for students at the college. She has also worked to increase funding for scientific research and to revitalise arts programmes.
3. Imperial College London: Alice Gast
Alice Gast is originally from Houston, Texas, and completed her undergraduate degree chemical engineering at the University of Southern California and her postgraduate degree at Princeton University.
She was named president of Imperial College London in 2014 and has led the university for the past four years. Prior to this she was the president of Lehigh University in Pennsylvania.
In 2008, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers named Gast one of the top 100 “Modern Era” engineers in the USA in the “Leadership” category.
4. University of Pennsylvania: Amy Gutmann
Amy Gutmann has been president of the University of Pennsylvania since 2004. In 2016 it was announced that her contract will continue until 2022, which will make her the longest-serving president in the institution’s history.
She is an award-winning political theorist and the author of 16 books on politics, ethics, education and philosophy. Gutmann’s presidency centres around three core values; inclusion, innovation and impact. As part of adhering to these values, Gutmann has more than doubled the number of students from low-income, middle-income, and first-generation college families attending Penn, and opened the Penn Center for Innovation in 2014.
5. University of California, Berkeley: Carol Christ
Carol Christ is the first female chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, replacing Nicholas B. Dirks in July 2017. She was previously the executive vice-chancellor and provost of Berkeley between 1994 and 2000. She then became president of liberal arts institution Smith College, for more than a decade, before returning to Berkeley. She is a celebrated scholar of Victorian literature.
Since taking on the presidency role at Berkeley, she has worked to target sexual violence and sexual harassment on campus and create a long-term plan for housing students.
