Rating top UK universities vs US universities

The last part is true, outside a handful rr top ten unis in the UK others are not recruited from.

But competition for entry into the UK systems is just as tough if not tougher than the US on a pure number game. For instance HYP are less thena ten percent but technically anyone cna apply coz they have no minimum entry standards and look at extra curricular activities! at oxbridge its only 1 in 5 but everyone there has 4 As predicited so there is a freshold and a cut of point as where at Harvard this would not happen. And at the LSE for their top programmes in econ and pol admissions is about 5 percent with three As so on a numbers game the US and the UK are just as hard, its just that the UK has minimun academic requirements and the US look 4 other things not just your grades

and that is the flaw with the UK system. i think basing admissions solely off predicted grades does nothing to cultivate a diverse and interesting student body. i have experienced both systems and the students at the US unis undoubtedly work harder. they have an enormous amount of assigned work while UK unis cultivate laziness by making an entire module mark based off one exam which everyone crams for.

they are no more intelligent per se (though they come across as such), but they come do across as higher caliber because they tend not to put drinking/going out ahead of their studies as much as UK students do.

That is true, but at the top 5 unis in the UK approximately 50% of students are from private schools and generally the top academic performers at private schools are very good at sports too, so there is a lot of diversity. You don't see the top unis getting beat by students from lower ranked unis in sports competitions, it is the other way around. So the application process does not actively look for sporting ability but the top unis do get the best sportsmen.

And to be honest, it is not physically possible to work much harder then best students at the top 5 in the UK, especially at Cambridge, Oxford and LSE due to the tutorial system (at the first two) and the amount of work/difficulty and (classes at the LSE). A lot of students, as they do in the USA, spend a lot of their time in running and participating in societies and obviously socialising and playing sports, you need to give them time for that.


I have to admit tho, I am surprised at the amount of clubbing and drinking you see at top 20 universities here, obviously encouraged by the end of year exam policy which I do disagree with, they should have mid-terms here like they do in America.

that is just it though. they still do work much harder. I am at UCL and I rarely if ever hear of people pulling all nighters to get work done, while in the states it is common to go a night without sleep to get everything done. they have to work harder because they have more to hand in

what course are you doing?

Cambridge= Harvard/Yale/Princeton/Stanford/MIT

Oxford= Columbia/UPenn/Brown/Dartmouth/Williams/Amherst

What do you think?

How in the world is Oxford equal only to schools like Pen, Brown, Dartmouth, let alone, Williams and Amherst???

There are 300 million people in the US, 1500 spots at Harvard, do the math. Whereas top high schools in the UK will send multiple people to Oxford or Cambridge each year.

300 million people aren't going to be applying to university, are they?