Is Edinburgh good despite the recent rankings

I applied and got accepted to study Mathematics and Business (GN11) at Edinburgh. The school looks great and I'm sure I would like the Student life.

Does a school like St Andrews or Warwick stand much higher in maths that Edinburgh?

Reply 1

topiwopi

I dont know about Maths but in general I'd say Edinburgh and Warwick are very similar, St Andrews is probably slightly better regarded but that really depends on who you ask. Also league tables are relatively inaccurate, edinburgh tends to do badly on student satisfaction which brings it down as a whole. Its worth noting that it is currently 17th on the QS world rankings - considerably higher than warwick and st andrews

University of Edinburgh

Reply 2

TheGrammarGuru

Warwick is fantastic for Maths. Way above Edinburgh. Since this is the main subject you are considering, yes, it does stand higher.

Reply 3

Lorem Ipsum

Academically there would be little difference, but Edinburgh has a far better international reputation and is a better city than either Warwick or Coventry, so I know what I would do.

Reply 4

Okorange

Honestly, Edinburgh doesn't actually have that much of an international reputation, its quite similar compared to St Andrews and Warwick. I can speak from experience abroad that most people cannot properly pronounce Edinburgh let alone know that Edinburgh Uni is supposedly ranked highly. With that being said the way the world sees the UK would be Oxford and Cambridge followed by a massive drop and the rest of the UK top 10-15 all pretty close to each other.

Reply 5

Flk10

Bear in mind that Edinburgh is ranked 21st overall in the QS world rankings, far higher than Warwick or St.Andrews.

Reply 6

Xorteck

Original post by Flk10

Bear in mind that Edinburgh is ranked 21st overall in the QS world rankings, far higher than Warwick or St.Andrews.

Well i would necessarily trust those rankings as the clearly are biased towards American Universities....
I have done some research and come to the conclusion that, at least in the UK, there is a significant difference between a Math degree from Warwick and Edinburgh (Warwick being significantly better).

I'm almost certain I will be firming Warwick and placing Edinburgh as my insurance.

Reply 7

Okorange

Original post by Xorteck

Actually I would strongly argue that those rankings are biased towards UK unis. The vast majority of ground breaking research in the world still happens in the states as opposed to the UK.

Reply 8

Xorteck

Original post by Okorange

Actually I would strongly argue that those rankings are biased towards UK unis. The vast majority of ground breaking research in the world still happens in the states as opposed to the UK.

I think you're overestimating the correlation between research done and university rankings. Realistically the undergraduate experience of some high level British universities is at the same level as Ivy league schools. The rankings I posted above show that most of the schools ranked high outside of the US are generally older schools and thus schools with history ( and i guess more research). I would say that those rankings use age as a measure of prestige.

Reply 9

Okorange

Original post by Xorteck

Its hard to say but the Ivies have so much more funding per head than the UK does, in my opinion Ivy students get way more opportunities.

Reply 10

olafnn

Original post by Okorange

Sorry, but this argument is ridiculous. It's pronounciation of "Edinburgh" that is strange for people from abroad because it has no rational explanation (ok, like most of the names in English :wink:

). The suffix -burgh meaning in various European languages (including old English) just town, burg, in every language is pronouced similarly, like in Hamburg, Strasbourg etc. Why the suffix in Edinburgh should be pronouced like in Scarborough? Probably only British people know it. I bet you probably can't pronouce properly names of most European capitals in their native language - is this a proof that these cities are little known worldwide? I don't think so.