[Elliot-M]

I am applying for an EEE degree and have offers from: Manchester, Bristol, Sheffield, Warwick, and Nottingham.

At the moment my top two are Manchester and Bristol. Manchester have offered AAB, with the chance to move onto the MEng course within the first 2 years. Bristol have a standard offer of AAA.

Could anyone shed any light on the differences between the two and whether there really is a varying quality of degree?

I've visited both, however there was not enough time to look at student social areas in either of them.

[SiddlyWiddly]

Hi Elliot,

If you're looking at a EEE degree at Bristol and Manchester, I would suggest you to have a look at the Guardian University rankings. You would notice that Manchester is ranked #2, whereas Bristol is at #15.

You would also find out that the student satisfaction, teaching, and feedback scores for Manchester are better than those for Bristol. Also, the EEE department at Manchester is recognised worldwide as one of the best, given that it has a High Voltage Lab that is absolutely world class. Also, I'd like to add that internationally, University of Manchester has a better reputation than Bristol, and this is due to a lot of reasons, one of them could be the popularity of the football clubs. :P

Again, another factor that would come into play is whether you like Manchester area more or Bristol, because in the end, it's you that has to endure 4 years of University life there. The social scene at Manchester is definitely good, I'm not very sure about Bristol though. You could look on TSR for the same and I think I've seen a few threads for Nightlife in Bristol.

Hope you find this useful.

[tooosh]

(Original post by SiddlyWiddly)
Hi Elliot,

If you're looking at a EEE degree at Bristol and Manchester, I would suggest you to have a look at the Guardian University rankings. You would notice that Manchester is ranked #2, whereas Bristol is at #15.

You would also find out that the student satisfaction, teaching, and feedback scores for Manchester are better than those for Bristol. Also, the EEE department at Manchester is recognised worldwide as one of the best, given that it has a High Voltage Lab that is absolutely world class. Also, I'd like to add that internationally, University of Manchester has a better reputation than Bristol, and this is due to a lot of reasons, one of them could be the popularity of the football clubs. :P

Again, another factor that would come into play is whether you like Manchester area more or Bristol, because in the end, it's you that has to endure 4 years of University life there. The social scene at Manchester is definitely good, I'm not very sure about Bristol though. You could look on TSR for the same and I think I've seen a few threads for Nightlife in Bristol.

Hope you find this useful.

How can you possibly suggest looking at the Guardian league tables; that pile of crap?! Everything else you said was right though. I didn't neg you.

Bristol has top but very expensive nightlife.

[SiddlyWiddly]

(Original post by tooosh)
How can you possibly suggest looking at the Guardian league tables; that pile of crap?! Everything else you said was right though. I didn't neg you.

Bristol has top but very expensive nightlife.

Well there's no other basis on which you can rate a University, unless you have first hand experience of the student life in each respective one. I wasn't just referring to the Guardian rankings, I mentioned international reputation too. I found the ratings for every section in the Guardian rankings helpful on choosing a University, which is why I suggested having a look at the same.

Haha I wouldn't know, haven't been to Bristol ever before. But I hope our posts end up being of some use to the OP!


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[tooosh]

(Original post by SiddlyWiddly)
Well there's no other basis on which you can rate a University, unless you have first hand experience of the student life in each respective one. I wasn't just referring to the Guardian rankings, I mentioned international reputation too. I found the ratings for every section in the Guardian rankings helpful on choosing a University, which is why I suggested having a look at the same.

Haha I wouldn't know, haven't been to Bristol ever before. But I hope our posts end up being of some use to the OP!


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My point was not that rankings aren't useful but that the Guardian ones aren't good. Times are generally the best, if you don't have access (since it's subscription based) then it should be the Complete University Guide.

[SiddlyWiddly]

(Original post by tooosh)
My point was not that rankings aren't useful but that the Guardian ones aren't good. Times are generally the best, if you don't have access (since it's subscription based) then it should be the Complete University Guide.

What makes you say Guardian isn't good? Have you looked into the methodology of ranking in Complete University Guide, or Times for that matter? There's a massive bias that is possible in the Times rankings because the scores are based on the number of times an institution is cited by the people taking the survey as being "the best" in their field of expertise. Whereas for the Complete University Guide and Guardian League Table, HESA (Higher Education Statistics Agency) gives the data. So it's more reliable.




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[tooosh]

(Original post by SiddlyWiddly)
What makes you say Guardian isn't good? Have you looked into the methodology of ranking in Complete University Guide, or Times for that matter? There's a massive bias that is possible in the Times rankings because the scores are based on the number of times an institution is cited by the people taking the survey as being "the best" in their field of expertise. Whereas for the Complete University Guide and Guardian League Table, HESA (Higher Education Statistics Agency) gives the data. So it's more reliable.

Year on year the Guardian table fluctuates massively and there are obvious anomalies everywhere. I plead ignorance to that part of their methodologies but every year the CUG and Times give rankings that correlate closest with department strength. I don't have access to the Times table at this minute, but for example in EEE, the obvious anomaly in the Guardian is Imperial being 13th. Some of the rest generally don't make sense either, probably because of their weighting on student satisfaction.

[SiddlyWiddly]

(Original post by tooosh)
Year on year the Guardian table fluctuates massively and there are obvious anomalies everywhere. I plead ignorance to that part of their methodologies but every year the CUG and Times give rankings that correlate closest with department strength. I don't have access to the Times table at this minute, but for example in EEE, the obvious anomaly in the Guardian is Imperial being 13th. Some of the rest generally don't make sense either, probably because of their weighting on student satisfaction.

I understand your point there, and I do agree that the rankings given by CUG and Times are consistent. But like I mentioned in my first post, I was comparing the rankings on Guardian Table because the scores for student satisfaction, teaching, feedback, etc. are very reliable, and my intention was not to just compare solely on the basis of Guardian rankings which is why I added the international reputation part.

Yeah that's a real surprise, I would expect Imperial to be in the top 5 for EEE. But then again, in the overall league table, it's pretty funny how the entire order changes. Manchester is somewhere 30th I believe!

Either way, no point in analysing this anymore because I understand your point, and I hope you can overlook the clarity I couldn't provide in my first post.


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