Will any university in the UK ever be comparable to Oxbridge?
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Original post by lotsofq
A large part of Oxbridge's success is due to the hype given to it by the media.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-22447965
The BBC decided to choose the title for this article to state Oxbridge top in seven key subjects, these being english language and literature, philosophy, modern languages, geography, maths, linguistics and history.
Imperial is top in Civil Engineering, IMO definately more of a "key" subject than all of the mentioned above apart from maths.
But I suppose you won't find too many Imperial grads working in the media so obviously nobody would "speak up" for them.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-22447965
The BBC decided to choose the title for this article to state Oxbridge top in seven key subjects, these being english language and literature, philosophy, modern languages, geography, maths, linguistics and history.
Imperial is top in Civil Engineering, IMO definately more of a "key" subject than all of the mentioned above apart from maths.
But I suppose you won't find too many Imperial grads working in the media so obviously nobody would "speak up" for them.
Its reputation in the UK is due to hype, but it maintains a brand that cannot be compared around the world. You could find people in Turkey, Yemen, Sri Lanka, Mongolia, Colombia who know Oxford and maybe Cambridge. Imperial is only known among professors, academics, hiring managers in science and technology and those who have ties to the UK.
I don't think this will change anytime soon lol.
(edited 10 years ago)
(Original post by Fullofsurprises)
I'm sure you're only kidding, but reading things like this still hurts, ever so slightly. It's saddening how muddled some people can be and that hurts.
There will never be any rivals to Oxbridge, as long as there are people like Fullofsurprises, who feels "hurt" when people suggest it MIGHT be possible to be as good or possibly even better than Oxbridge (and subsequently deleted her comment).
It's a catch 22 BECAUSE of the hype, the brand name is well-known.
Imperial's very well known in the Far East, especially in places like Hong Kong and Singapore, which explains why so many of its undergrads and postgrads are from there.
I'm sure you're only kidding, but reading things like this still hurts, ever so slightly. It's saddening how muddled some people can be and that hurts.
There will never be any rivals to Oxbridge, as long as there are people like Fullofsurprises, who feels "hurt" when people suggest it MIGHT be possible to be as good or possibly even better than Oxbridge (and subsequently deleted her comment).
Original post by ukmed108
Its reputation in the UK is due to hype, but it maintains a brand that cannot be compared around the world. You could find people in Turkey, Yemen, Sri Lanka, Mongolia, Colombia who know Oxford and maybe Cambridge. Imperial is only known among professors, academics, hiring managers in science and technology and those who have ties to the UK.
I don't think this will change anytime soon lol.
I don't think this will change anytime soon lol.
It's a catch 22 BECAUSE of the hype, the brand name is well-known.
Imperial's very well known in the Far East, especially in places like Hong Kong and Singapore, which explains why so many of its undergrads and postgrads are from there.
(edited 10 years ago)
Original post by John Stuart Mill
Would prefer a real university rather than a mechanical boring point and click one from the comfort of my house any day.
prepare to be left by the future academic wasteside
It's a catch 22 BECAUSE of the hype, the brand name is well-known.
That doesn't make it any less true though and it's not going to go away until Britain stops being so hung up on the class issue. So in other words, when hell freezes over.
Original post by DickDastardly
prepare to be left by the future academic wasteside
There are no words to respond to this level of stupidity...
Original post by Ignoble
There are no words to respond to this level of stupidity...
whether you like it or not, most universities will either conduct most if not all their learning through internet based systems, the ones remaining anyway, most universities will be replaced by online learning providers who run full credited degree courses
Original post by DickDastardly
whether you like it or not, most universities will either conduct most if not all their learning through internet based systems, the ones remaining anyway, most universities will be replaced by online learning providers who run full credited degree courses
It is a valid opinion, but not a forgone conclusion.
Who would have thought 10 years ago that the consequence of online music streaming would be Mick Jagger playing Glastonbury?
Original post by Incredimazing
In terms of reputation/prestige, etc., will any universities ever be on par with the famous Oxbridge? There seems to be such a gap between them with other top uni's such as UCL, LSE and Imperial - buy why?
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Oxbridge will always be the top two they've had about an 800/900 year headstart and the history etc and they will continue to be revered. That's not to say other universities in the UK can be prestigious but it would on their own terms etc as opposed to attempting to knock Oxbridge off their perch.
Even though the Ivies are sterotyped as the cream of the crop, people know they're not necessarily the eight best unis in the US. Stanford, Caltech, MIT, Berkeley and Chicago and Duke would argue otherwise. But the Ivies are still pretty good......except Dartmouth.
Original post by Gridiron-Gangster
Oxbridge will always be the top two they've had about an 800/900 year headstart and the history etc and they will continue to be revered. That's not to say other universities in the UK can be prestigious but it would on their own terms etc as opposed to attempting to knock Oxbridge off their perch.
Even though the Ivies are sterotyped as the cream of the crop, people know they're not necessarily the eight best unis in the US. Stanford, Caltech, MIT, Berkeley and Chicago and Duke would argue otherwise. But the Ivies are still pretty good......except Dartmouth.
Even though the Ivies are sterotyped as the cream of the crop, people know they're not necessarily the eight best unis in the US. Stanford, Caltech, MIT, Berkeley and Chicago and Duke would argue otherwise. But the Ivies are still pretty good......except Dartmouth.
What about when thousands of years pass? Surely the head start will become more irrelevant as time progresses? Ivies are good, but as others have said, it's about sport rather than academic rep.
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Original post by Incredimazing
What about when thousands of years pass? Surely the head start will become more irrelevant as time progresses? Ivies are good, but as others have said, it's about sport rather than academic rep.
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Oxbridge will still be there amongst the best assuming people still attend university at that time or just rely on computers to feed information into their brains. The best students want to attend the best universities and go onto great things. That doesn't mean it doesn't happen via other universities it's just the elite still have that stranglehold.
Original post by Gridiron-Gangster
Oxbridge will always be the top two they've had about an 800/900 year headstart and the history etc and they will continue to be revered. That's not to say other universities in the UK can be prestigious but it would on their own terms etc as opposed to attempting to knock Oxbridge off their perch.
Even though the Ivies are sterotyped as the cream of the crop, people know they're not necessarily the eight best unis in the US. Stanford, Caltech, MIT, Berkeley and Chicago and Duke would argue otherwise. But the Ivies are still pretty good......except Dartmouth.
Even though the Ivies are sterotyped as the cream of the crop, people know they're not necessarily the eight best unis in the US. Stanford, Caltech, MIT, Berkeley and Chicago and Duke would argue otherwise. But the Ivies are still pretty good......except Dartmouth.
How is dartmouth bad. Its a small university which is why its not highly ranked on the world rankings.
For undergrad its generally: Harvard=Yale=Princeton->Columbia->Brown->Penn->Dartmouth->Cornell
For medical schools its generally: Harvard, Penn, Yale, Columbia, Cornell, Brown, Dartmouth
Top medical schools non-Ivy: Johns Hopkins, Stanford, Mayo, UCSF, Duke
For law schools its: Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Penn, Cornell
Top law schools non-Ivy: Chicago, Stanford
For graduate business schools its: Harvard, Penn (Wharton), Columbia, Yale, Dartmouth, Cornell
Top business schools non-Ivy: Stanford, Berkeley, Chicago, Duke, Michigan
This is just my ranking, but i've noticed a lot of misconceptions about the "lower Ivies" from people who think they are similar to the middle of the Russell Group.
The US is a huge country with 5x the population of the UK. Students good enough to get into the top 20 in the UK are only good enough to get into the top 100 in the US.
Original post by ukmed108
How is dartmouth bad. Its a small university which is why its not highly ranked on the world rankings.
For undergrad its generally: Harvard=Yale=Princeton->Columbia->Brown->Penn->Dartmouth->Cornell
For medical schools its generally: Harvard, Penn, Yale, Columbia, Cornell, Brown, Dartmouth
Top medical schools non-Ivy: Johns Hopkins, Stanford, Mayo, UCSF, Duke
For law schools its: Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Penn, Cornell
Top law schools non-Ivy: Chicago, Stanford
For graduate business schools its: Harvard, Penn (Wharton), Columbia, Yale, Dartmouth, Cornell
Top business schools non-Ivy: Stanford, Berkeley, Chicago, Duke, Michigan
This is just my ranking, but i've noticed a lot of misconceptions about the "lower Ivies" from people who think they are similar to the middle of the Russell Group.
The US is a huge country with 5x the population of the UK. Students good enough to get into the top 20 in the UK are only good enough to get into the top 100 in the US.
For undergrad its generally: Harvard=Yale=Princeton->Columbia->Brown->Penn->Dartmouth->Cornell
For medical schools its generally: Harvard, Penn, Yale, Columbia, Cornell, Brown, Dartmouth
Top medical schools non-Ivy: Johns Hopkins, Stanford, Mayo, UCSF, Duke
For law schools its: Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Penn, Cornell
Top law schools non-Ivy: Chicago, Stanford
For graduate business schools its: Harvard, Penn (Wharton), Columbia, Yale, Dartmouth, Cornell
Top business schools non-Ivy: Stanford, Berkeley, Chicago, Duke, Michigan
This is just my ranking, but i've noticed a lot of misconceptions about the "lower Ivies" from people who think they are similar to the middle of the Russell Group.
The US is a huge country with 5x the population of the UK. Students good enough to get into the top 20 in the UK are only good enough to get into the top 100 in the US.
The latter statement is *******s seeing as I got offers from Columbia and UPenn for postgrad and tuned them down for Cambridge so I don't think I was only good enough for just top 100 universities.
Dartmouth is a good undergrad school but other than the med school and Tuck, it's terrible for postgrad and research output which is what determines a university's positon in the world rankings. If Dartmouth wasn't an Ivy then it would be an insignificant glorified liberal arts college.
Also I didn't compare Dartmouth to the middle RGs as you put it. Infact I detest this silly notion that the RGs are somehow the elite of the UK as with all due respect, Southampton, Queen Mary, QUB are hardly considered elite or uber prestigious. They have excellent medical schools, most UK schools are.
Original post by Gridiron-Gangster
The latter statement is *******s seeing as I got offers from Columbia and UPenn for postgrad and tuned them down for Cambridge so I don't think I was only good enough for just top 100 universities.
Dartmouth is a good undergrad school but other than the med school and Tuck, it's terrible for postgrad and research output which is what determines a university's positon in the world rankings. If Dartmouth wasn't an Ivy then it would be an insignificant glorified liberal arts college.
Also I didn't compare Dartmouth to the middle RGs as you put it. Infact I detest this silly notion that the RGs are somehow the elite of the UK as with all due respect, Southampton, Queen Mary, QUB are hardly considered elite or uber prestigious. They have excellent medical schools, most UK schools are.
Dartmouth is a good undergrad school but other than the med school and Tuck, it's terrible for postgrad and research output which is what determines a university's positon in the world rankings. If Dartmouth wasn't an Ivy then it would be an insignificant glorified liberal arts college.
Also I didn't compare Dartmouth to the middle RGs as you put it. Infact I detest this silly notion that the RGs are somehow the elite of the UK as with all due respect, Southampton, Queen Mary, QUB are hardly considered elite or uber prestigious. They have excellent medical schools, most UK schools are.
Well my statement included colleges as well, and to be fair Cambridge is the top 2 of 20 universities so would be roughly equivalent to the top 10 universities in the US and that also includes Penn and Columbia which are both top universities in the US.
A lot of people don't know these schools which are considered great in the US but are likely unknown for most people in the UK:
Emory, Tulane, Michigan, Ohio, Miami, UF, UT Austin, Texas A&M, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, UW, WashU, Virginia, Williams, Amherst, Middlebury, Swarthmore, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCSD, SUNY Downstate, Iowa, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, Georgetown, GWU, UNC Chapel Hill, UCF, Northwestern, BU, BC, Tufts, UCSF, UC Santa Barbara, Northeastern, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Denver, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Oregon, Minnesota, Indiana, USC.
These are all top 100 universities and are quite prestigious in the US. There are many many more i don't remember that are better (btw i didn't include names that are usually pretty well known like NYU, Chicago, Duke JHU, Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA)
(edited 10 years ago)
Original post by ukmed108
Well my statement included colleges as well, and to be fair Cambridge is the top 2 of 20 universities so would be roughly equivalent to the top 10 universities in the US and that also includes Penn and Columbia which are both top universities in the US.
A lot of people don't know these schools which are considered great in the US but are likely unknown for most people in the UK:
Emory, Tulane, Michigan, Ohio, Miami, UF, UT Austin, Texas A&M, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, UW, WashU, Virginia, Williams, Amherst, Middlebury, Swarthmore, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCSD, SUNY Downstate, Iowa, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, Georgetown, GWU, UNC Chapel Hill, UCF, Northwestern, BU, BC, Tufts, UCSF, UC Santa Barbara, Northeastern, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Denver, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Oregon, Minnesota, Indiana, USC.
These are all top 100 universities and are quite prestigious in the US. There are many many more i don't remember that are better (btw i didn't include names that are usually pretty well known like NYU, Chicago, Duke JHU, Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA)
A lot of people don't know these schools which are considered great in the US but are likely unknown for most people in the UK:
Emory, Tulane, Michigan, Ohio, Miami, UF, UT Austin, Texas A&M, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, UW, WashU, Virginia, Williams, Amherst, Middlebury, Swarthmore, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCSD, SUNY Downstate, Iowa, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, Georgetown, GWU, UNC Chapel Hill, UCF, Northwestern, BU, BC, Tufts, UCSF, UC Santa Barbara, Northeastern, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Denver, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Oregon, Minnesota, Indiana, USC.
These are all top 100 universities and are quite prestigious in the US. There are many many more i don't remember that are better (btw i didn't include names that are usually pretty well known like NYU, Chicago, Duke JHU, Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA)
Yeah but you suggested that a strong candidate for a UK top 20 wouldn't be good enough for a top US college which was silly....unless I misunderstood.
Reputation in the US seems to depend on so many different factors e.g. peer networks, endowment, national rankings, international rankings, sporting prowess, some are more famous within their state rather than beyond etc. The US being such a vast country means than only except for the very well off, they will probably end studying within the state rather than out of state or even abroad although with the exception of Oxbridge and LSE there are very institutions that I would leave the US for unless it was at somewhere decent. Much in the sense that had I not got into Oxbridge as my first choice I'd have gone to Columbia or UPenn or a university of similar calibre i.e. uprooting from the UK and spending the money to study abroad needs to be worth it. I don't think leaving the UK to go to say Rutgers would be worth declining LSE or Imperial. Maybe an Ivy.
Original post by ukmed108
Emory, Tulane, Michigan, Ohio, Miami, UF, UT Austin, Texas A&M, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, UW, WashU, Virginia, Williams, Amherst, Middlebury, Swarthmore, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCSD, SUNY Downstate, Iowa, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, Georgetown, GWU, UNC Chapel Hill, UCF, Northwestern, BU, BC, Tufts, UCSF, UC Santa Barbara, Northeastern, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Denver, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Oregon, Minnesota, Indiana, USC.
Emory, Tulane, Michigan, Ohio, Miami, UF, UT Austin, Texas A&M, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, UW, WashU, Virginia, Williams, Amherst, Middlebury, Swarthmore, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCSD, SUNY Downstate, Iowa, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, Georgetown, GWU, UNC Chapel Hill, UCF, Northwestern, BU, BC, Tufts, UCSF, UC Santa Barbara, Northeastern, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Denver, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Oregon, Minnesota, Indiana, USC.
The ones I highlighted I would say have a reputation beyond the US mainly due to the fact they appear in the world rankings amongst the top 100. UVA I know as a public ivy and because my cousin went there. I've heard of all of them to be fair.
My comments about Dartmouth were mainly due to the fact that it doesn't rank highly in any of the global rankings regardless of the size of its research output. Whilst it isn't necessarily the defining marker of a world class university Dartmouth has hardly produced any glittering alumni....the only two I can think of are Dr Seuss and C Everett Koop and I think it only has 3 Nobel Laureates to its name. But I do regard Dartmouth as a good college.....just not as good as the other Ivies or Oxbridge.....unless it's Tuck.
Again not a hard and fast rule but I'd expect a prestigious university such as Dartmouth to have made a greater impact on American and International culture.
Maybe my disdain for Dartmouth arises from meeting someone who claimed it was amongst the best universities in the world before I was quick to point out that wasn't the case.
But anyways there are a lot of good universities in America certainly a number I would consider on par with Oxbridge, LSE, Imperial and UCL......maybe Edinburgh.... and then a few specialist colleges like the LSHTM:
Top tier: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, UPenn, Chicago, Stanford, MIT, Caltech, Berkeley, Cornell, Johns Hopkins (for Medicine), possibly Duke, possibly Brown.
Second tier: UCLA, Dartmouth, USC, Vanderbilt, UNC Chapel Hill, pretty much all of the UoCal institutions, UTexas Austin, Texas A&M, Georgetown, Penn State, Pittsburgh, UVA,
Original post by Gridiron-Gangster
The ones I highlighted I would say have a reputation beyond the US mainly due to the fact they appear in the world rankings amongst the top 100. UVA I know as a public ivy and because my cousin went there. I've heard of all of them to be fair.
I think most foreigners assume that there is decent university bearing the name of every state. I suspect most foreigners would not draw a distinction between the University of Pennsylvania and the University of North Dakota.
Original post by Gridiron-Gangster
Yeah but you suggested that a strong candidate for a UK top 20 wouldn't be good enough for a top US college which was silly....unless I misunderstood.
Reputation in the US seems to depend on so many different factors e.g. peer networks, endowment, national rankings, international rankings, sporting prowess, some are more famous within their state rather than beyond etc. The US being such a vast country means than only except for the very well off, they will probably end studying within the state rather than out of state or even abroad although with the exception of Oxbridge and LSE there are very institutions that I would leave the US for unless it was at somewhere decent. Much in the sense that had I not got into Oxbridge as my first choice I'd have gone to Columbia or UPenn or a university of similar calibre i.e. uprooting from the UK and spending the money to study abroad needs to be worth it. I don't think leaving the UK to go to say Rutgers would be worth declining LSE or Imperial. Maybe an Ivy.
Reputation in the US seems to depend on so many different factors e.g. peer networks, endowment, national rankings, international rankings, sporting prowess, some are more famous within their state rather than beyond etc. The US being such a vast country means than only except for the very well off, they will probably end studying within the state rather than out of state or even abroad although with the exception of Oxbridge and LSE there are very institutions that I would leave the US for unless it was at somewhere decent. Much in the sense that had I not got into Oxbridge as my first choice I'd have gone to Columbia or UPenn or a university of similar calibre i.e. uprooting from the UK and spending the money to study abroad needs to be worth it. I don't think leaving the UK to go to say Rutgers would be worth declining LSE or Imperial. Maybe an Ivy.
What i was trying to say which i probably didn't convey properly is that if lets say you got into a 10 ranked school in the UK your general US equivalent would be somewhere between 30-70 (avg 50) in the US rankings. If you got into a 1st or 2nd ranked uni in the UK you would be around a top 10 in the US. Thats all i was trying to say.
Maybe Dartmouth would be similar to a school like St Andrews in regards to institution size, lower research output, small town, medical and business schools but no law school. Idk, but Dartmouth does have some decent alum for its size, Hank Paulson and Timothy Geitner, two of the big financial crisis guys were from Dartmouth. Its certainly a lower ranked Ivy, but its pretty difficult to get in no doubt.
(edited 10 years ago)
Original post by ukmed108
Maybe Dartmouth would be similar to a school like St Andrews in regards to institution size, lower research output, small town, medical and business schools but no law school. Idk, but Dartmouth does have some decent alum for its size, Hank Paulson and Timothy Geitner, two of the big financial crisis guys were from Dartmouth. Its certainly a lower ranked Ivy, but its pretty difficult to get in no doubt.
Maybe Dartmouth would be similar to a school like St Andrews in regards to institution size, lower research output, small town, medical and business schools but no law school. Idk, but Dartmouth does have some decent alum for its size, Hank Paulson and Timothy Geitner, two of the big financial crisis guys were from Dartmouth. Its certainly a lower ranked Ivy, but its pretty difficult to get in no doubt.
Whereas St Andrews has no alumni of note, right?
Students from top US schools are queuing out the door for a chance at a JYA at St Andrews.
(edited 10 years ago)
Original post by ChemistBoy
Whereas St Andrews has no alumni of note, right?
Students from top US schools are queuing out the door for a chance at a JYA at St Andrews.
Students from top US schools are queuing out the door for a chance at a JYA at St Andrews.
Because there are only two countries in the world, US and UK.
The fact that students from other countries DO NOT queue up for St. Andrews doesn't count.
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