二十一世紀美國研究型大學的研究競爭力：由高等教育分類與排名分析

Research Performance of American Research Universities in the 21st Century in Classification and Ranking

在一些國際大學評比中，美國大學的表現皆是最優異的。將擁有「世界一流大學」做為國力提升展現的許多開發中國家來說，其所採用的主要策略是將在各項國際評比中名列前茅的大學做為其模仿與合作的對象，尤其是以美國頂尖研究型大學做為學習的標竿。本研究主要目的即藉由探討與剖析：一、最新版美國2006年「卡內基基金會高等教育分類表」之「基礎分類」中所分類出96所「非常高研究力」研究型大學；二、89所佛羅里達中心「全美頂尖研究大學」；三、同時在前兩項之52所「美國大學協會」之研究型大學，與三項國際及一項美國國內大學排名結果之相關性。本研究有下述幾點發現：一、在美國成為一所研究型大學所需的經費資源是相當龐大的，但規模卻不可太大，在此方面，美國私立大學較公立大學具有更多優勢；二、影響美國最頂尖52所「美國大學協會」研究型大學之重要關鍵為教師素質，尤其是在國家研究院院士指標的表現。研究也發現，最頂尖研究型大學教師的卓越品質與四大全球排名的相關最為顯著。

Although the first research university in the United States was not developed until the early 20th century， with the massive amount of federal funding after World War II， American research universities developed rapidly and had their preeminence in the global higher education. American research universities ranked top on the national ranking well on the major global league tables.This research discussed and analyzed the correlation among four national and global ranking outcomes and research activities of three groups of research universities， including 96 universities with high research activities selected from the 2006 “Basic Classification of Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching”， 89 from The Center for Measuring University Performance， and 52 from in Association of American Universities.
There are two major findings in the research: 1. Most of the highly competitive research universities in U.S. have sufficient funding but with the controlled size， not exceeding a total enrollment of 15000 for a private university， 30000 for a public one. 2. Faculty resources， especially outstanding scholars， are highly correlated to the four kinds of ranking outcomes of the most prestigious research universities in Association of American Universities.