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Rating top UK universities vs US universities

Hi all,

I was wondering how do the top UK universities (Oxbridge, Imperial, LSE and UCL) compare against US universities in terms of reputation and prestige?

Please give your input in such a manner (for example):

Tier 1
UK: Oxford, Cambridge
US: Harvard, Yale, MIT, Stanford, Princeton

Tier 2
UK: Imperial, LSE
US: Columbia, UPenn, Uchicago, Duke, Caltech

Tier 3
UK: UCL
US: Cornell, Northwestern, Brown, Dartmouth, Johns Hopskin

As much as opinion as possible would be appreciated! Explantions for your ranking would be great too!

Thanks loads(:

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Reply 1
eugeneho
Hi all,

I was wondering how do the top UK universities (Oxbridge, Imperial, LSE and UCL) compare against US universities in terms of reputation and prestige?

Please give your input in such a manner (for example):

Tier 1
UK: Oxford, Cambridge
US: Harvard, Yale, MIT, Stanford, Princeton

Tier 2
UK: Imperial, LSE
US: Columbia, UPenn, Uchicago, Duke, Caltech

Tier 3
UK: UCL
US: Cornell, Northwestern, Brown, Dartmouth, Johns Hopskin

As much as opinion as possible would be appreciated! Explantions for your ranking would be great too!

Thanks loads(:


I think it is widely known that Harvard is not that great for undergraduates compared to Oxford.

Where I would say the difference comes in is graduate courses. Don't even bother with an MBA in this country if you have the money go to the US.
The prestige and reputation of at least the oxbridge pair is probably superior to those US unis listed (apart from harvard or yale) but the americans can surpase the UK unis in teaching quality as they can charge students considerably more for places in comparison to oxbridge who are legally bound to charge home students no more than £3290 per year. This extra money can be used to hire the best and brightest to teach at their institutions.
MIT = Imperial
Reply 4
Try this website. The top sixteen are all British or American universities.
Reply 5
My opinion is...

Tier 1
UK: Oxford, Cambridge
US: Harvard, Yale

Tier 2
UK: Imperial
US: MIT, Stanford, Princeton

Tier 3
UK: UCL, LSE
US: Columbia, UPenn, UChicago, Duke, Caltech, Cornell, Northwestern, Brown, Dartmouth, Johns Hopskin
Reply 6
JW92
Try this website. The top sixteen are all British or American universities.

Yeah I know. I want opinion from TSR pple (:
JW92
Try this website. The top sixteen are all British or American universities.

Nice to see UCL in before oxford, and imperial before princeton!
Reply 8
missbrowneyes
Nice to see UCL in before oxford, and imperial before princeton!

even though it ranks far below it in every subject? (UCL -> Oxford)
hellohello.
I think it is widely known that Harvard is not that great for undergraduates compared to Oxford.

Where I would say the difference comes in is graduate courses. Don't even bother with an MBA in this country if you have the money go to the US.


very very true. its rare to see any informed opinions on universities here at TSR.

you guys ever heard of Williams?

its equally hard to get into (and well respected) as harvard, stanford, yale, oxbridge, or wherever. though because its only classed as a liberal arts college, it doesn't get into the main ranking.



anyways, you can't distinguish between the top 10 or 15 universities properly. they are all "World class" you might say, but they just have different personalities to them.
JacobM
even though it ranks far below it in every subject? (UCL -> Oxford)


yup, highlighting how arbitrary the world/national rankings are. other than say, figuring out UCL is in a different to league to the university of surrey.

I forget the details, but UCL sometimes gets put above oxford because of the research UCL does towards environmentally green sciencey stuff.

if anyone remembers the details please say, because lots of people still need convincing of how arbitrary the rankings are.
I don't see how you could put Imperial ahead of LSE. In the subjects in which they specialise, I would put LSE on a par with Oxbridge.

In terms of career prospects once you're at one of the top ones, its going to be down to how good you are, when you're competing against others from top ones. I wouldn't say that if you went to UCL, that employers are going to see someone slightly inferior to you, who went to Oxford, and choose them because they went to Oxford and you went to UCL.

I'd liken it to the difference in a footballer having Man U or Arsenal on their CV.
SouthernFreerider
very very true. its rare to see any informed opinions on universities here at TSR.

you guys ever heard of Williams?

its equally hard to get into (and well respected) as harvard, stanford, yale, oxbridge, or wherever. though because its only classed as a liberal arts college, it doesn't get into the main ranking.



anyways, you can't distinguish between the top 10 or 15 universities properly. they are all "World class" you might say, but they just have different personalities to them.


Although I would love to do a Harvard MBA :smile:

I think if you asked everyone in the UK what the best US university was the majority would say Harvard despite others being better for many things.
Reply 13
hellohello.
Although I would love to do a Harvard MBA :smile:

I think if you asked everyone in the UK what the best US university was the majority would say Harvard despite others being better for many things.

yup harvard MBA is like the best thing ever! :smile:
Why is UCL so highly rated? :hmmm:
Reply 15
Purely from personal experience (I did a summer school at Georgetown a couple of years ago, so made friends with a bunch of American people who all went through the uni process over there) it seems that LSE is more widely known than Imperial in the US (generally, it's third behind Oxford and then Cambridge - all my friends had heard of it, and not many had heard of Imperial). But that's probably mostly because JFK went there.

Before anybody flames me, I'm just saying LSE is more widely known, I'm not trying to compare them both for teaching or whatever.
What about UC Berkeley? Surely it is one of the top universities in the US??
Reply 17
lcecil88
What about UC Berkeley? Surely it is one of the top universities in the US??


UC Berkeley should probably be in his tier two I'd say. Also Williams should be in tier one.
Williams, while offering a fantastic liberal arts education, does not possess the prestige that other Tier One colleges/universities do. I would say:

Tier 1
UK: Oxford, Cambridge, LSE
US: Harvard, Yale, MIT

Tier 2
UK: UCL, Imperial, Edinburgh
US: Columbia, Duke, Caltech, UC: Berkeley, Brown

Tier 3
UK: KCL, Warwick, York, St. Andrews, Durham, Manchester
US: Cornell, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Johns Hopskins, Georgetown

Hopefully no one kills me, since I am obviously going by what I have heard (prestige and reputation over actual quality). I don't think anyone here has been to more than 2 or 3 of these unis to study.
1) Oxbridge = Harvard/ Yale/ Princeton

2) LSE/Imperial = MIT/Caltech/Stanford

3) UCL = /Penn/Columbia/Cornell/Berkeley

4) Bristol/Warwick/Durham/Edinburgh/Nottingham/St Andrews/York = Brown/Dartmouth/Georgetown/Northwestern/Duke/Michigan/Johns Hopkins

5) Manchester/Sheffield/Birmingham/Kings/Southampton/Glasgow = Emory/Virginia/Washington at St Louis/UCLA/Amhurst/William and Mary

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