The Georgia Institute of Technology has broken into the top 20 in higher education research and development spending for the first time in a decade. The ranking, based on an annual survey conducted by the National Science Foundation (NSF), reflects a year of innovations in healthcare, computing, and sustainability research " even amidst a global pandemic.
While overall higher education research spending slowed to 3.3% growth in fiscal year 2020, theGeorgia Tech research enterprise, which includes theGeorgia Tech Research Institute(GTRI), rose to 9.3% " or approximately $1,049 million in expenditures.
Georgia Tech placed among top R1 or research-intensive universities, such as Johns Hopkins University, which ranked No. 1 (with $3,110 million in expenditures), and Harvard University, which rounded out the top 10 (with $1,240million in expenditures). Georgia Tech was the only technological university to place in the top 20 and had the second highest year-to-year growth, behind Texas A&M University. A top 20 ranking is particularly significant, as Georgia Tech achieved it without a medical school. Nationally, medical schools account for a quarter of all research expenditures.