University of Cyprus among world's top 200 unis by next decade

The University of Cyprus could be placed among the world's top 200 universities by the next decade, UCy Rector Constantinos Christofides has said.

The UCY could be among the world's top 200 universities within the next five of ten years, Christofides told a press conference, calling on the state to increase funding towards the university.

Christofides referred to the ''Shanghai list,'' the Academic Ranking of World Universities, noting that while in 2007 the UCY ranked below the 5.000th position among 27.000 universities from all over world, it climbed to the 540th position in 2012, owing to the employment of Cypriot Nobel laureate Christopher Pissarides and the University's research programmes.

He also called on the state to resolve all pending issues with regard to the opening of the Faculty of Medicine, which would enable the university to acquire more grants in the framework of the Horizon 2020 programme for research and innovation. He reiterated that the Faculty of Medicine is scheduled to receive its first 40 students by September 2013.

Christofides said that in a time of financial crisis the state should invest in research, innovation, development and entrepreneurship.

''In a time of crisis modern states invest in education, in youth, they invest in their universities,'' Christofides said calling on the state to double if possible the budgets of the state universities.

The UCY Rector noted that investments in the University should be concluded as soon as possible so that it could participate in competitions for grants from the huge EU funding budget envisaged in the framework programme 'Horizon 2020' for research and innovation.

He pointed out that the UCY has received four research grants from the European Research Council (ERC) among which the ''ERC advanced grant'', considered as the highest distinction among European grants, awarded to University's Centre of Intelligent Systems and Networks (KIOS).