Tilburg University

Tilburg University is a public research university specializing in the social and behavioral sciences, economics, law, business sciences, theology and humanities, located in Tilburg in the southern part of the Netherlands.

Tilburg University has a student population of about 12,000 students, about 10 percent of whom are international students. This percentage has steadily increased over the past years. Tilburg University offers both Dutch-and English-taught programs. In 2014, 39 of the total 67 (19 bachelor and 48 master programs) were English-taught. Tilburg University awards approximately 70 PhDs per year.

The institution has gained a reputation in both research and education. In the field of economics, the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration ranked #1 in Europe for the second consecutive time in 2007 according to the Journal of the European Economic Association with regard to publications in top journals. In 2007, the Executive MBA program at the university's TIAS School for Business and Society ranked #11 in the world according to the Financial Times. In the field of law, Tilburg University was ranked #1 in the Netherlands for the last three years according to Elsevier Magazine.[3] Furthermore, the School of Social and Behavioral Sciences offers a unique two-year master program in Medical Psychology (in Dutch), in which students are trained as scientist practitioners in the medical setting.

• Tilburg School of Economics and Management

• Tilburg School of Humanities

• Tilburg School of Social and Behavioral Sciences

• Tilburg Law School

• Tilburg School of Catholic Theology

Tilburg University was founded in 1927, as the Roomsch Katholieke Handelshoogeschool (Roman Catholic University of Commerce), being located in the southern, Catholic part of The Netherlands, visible in its second change of name in 1938: Katholieke Economische Hogeschool (Catholic Economic University). In 1963 the university was once again renamed, as Katholieke Hogeschool Tilburg (Catholic University Tilburg), followed by a name change to Katholieke Universiteit Brabant (Catholic University Brabant). Although in its present name Tilburg University, the word Catholic was dropped, the university is still regarded as a Catholic university.

What the rankings tell us

International rankings compare universities on such subjects as research, teaching, students, international outlook, and reputation in teaching and research. A university scores points for every subject. The scores are weighed and added up. The university with the highest score tops the list. Overall rankings show scores about a university as a whole.

Subject rankings

There are also subject rankings, whereby universities are ranked on the basis of a particular discipline, for example, psychology. The following subject rankings are relevant for Tilburg University:

• Economics, Business & Law
• Social sciences
• Arts & Cognitive sciences

Collaboration and national rankings

In addition, there is a collaboration ranking that assess a university’s performance in the area of collaboration, for instance, between the university and organizations in the region. The central question is to what extent a university connects with society at a scientific level.

There are also national rankings, such as the Keuzegids Hoger Onderwijs and the Keuzegids Masters. They mainly compare the degree programs. The Elsevier ranking assesses the positions of the Dutch research universities and universities of applied sciences in both teaching and research.

Tilburg University’s characteristics

Tilburg University is a relatively small university specializing in the Social Sciences and Arts & Humanities. In the overall rankings, the large non-technical universities with a broad spectrum of disciplines score better than the smaller universities. One reason for this is the methods used to determine researchers’ citation scores. The subject rankings in Economics & Business, Social Sciences, and Arts & Cognitive Sciences better reflect Tilburg University’s position.

Nice to know

Tilburg University belongs according the three best known overall university rankings to the best 0.1% (Times HE, top 200) until 0.2% (ARWU/Sjanghai and QS both top 400) of 170,000 universities worldwide". All rankings organizations do their calculations in different ways, so the results come out differently as well. One ranking emphasizes scientific research published in English, another assesses student satisfaction on the teaching and the university’s reputation. Read more about the comments on and context of the rankings on the site of the Association of Universities in the Netherlands, VSNU (in Dutch).