Does Bristol deserve its reputation?

Bristol is often considered to come right after Oxford and Cambridge, but whilst looking at university rankings (for instance the guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/table/2009/may/12/university-league-table ) Bristol comes 29th.
So do you think Bristol deserves its reputation or would you place it on the same level as other red brick unis such as Leeds? (I'm talking mainly academically).

Thanks

Reply 1

xXx_pUnK_pOp_pRiNcEsS_xXx

6

thepoodle

Bristol is often considered to come right after Oxford and Cambridge

I've not heard anyone say this.

Reply 2

dichr0ic

i think it's better than leeds. i'd say it deserves its rep

it's my firm choice

Reply 3

Carl Sagan

10

Good uni, backed hard

Reply 4

clo89

depends what league table your looking at it, its 16th in the independent and 10th in the times

Reply 5

Maturity

14

What university actually does come after oxbridge in general can't really say LSE or Imperial as they are too specific with thier courses as is Warwick. I would say Durham or Bristol that kind of area.
Boxbridge/Doxbridge.

Reply 6

dichr0ic

Boxbridge sounds cool

defo not Doxbridge

Reply 7

xmarilynx

18

You need to be careful with league tables, as they all use different criteria. Bristol's rated quite low in the Guardian because of its "% satisfied with feedback" score. The average entry tariff is high (so clearly it only admits a high calibre of student) and the table deems Bristol's graduate prospects (the most important factor IMO) to be equal to Oxford's. Plus Bristol's in the top 10 according to The Times, and that's the only one anyone really takes any notice of :yy:

Reply 8

jaderocks

5

Bristol often comes lowe then it deserves (well I think) in league tables due to student satisfaction. If you look at all the other criterea then Bristol is normally very highly rated, but then student satisfaction drags it down.
This is probably due to our rubbish student union. A lot of other unis I have visited have really thriving unions whilst ours is dead most of the time. But, personally, I don't think this really matters as we're a city university anyways, so town is closer to some people then the union!
Anyways, I love Bristol and think it definitely deserves it's reputation. Its one of the most popular unis for employers to if you want a job, Bristol is the place to be!

Reply 9

thepoodle

OP

Thanks for replies everyone, when I went to the open day last year I was told bristol was considered third best by headteachers thoughout the country (but they stayed silent on the league table scores).

Reply 10

xmarilynx

18

jaderocks

Bristol often comes lowe then it deserves (well I think) in league tables due to student satisfaction. If you look at all the other criterea then Bristol is normally very highly rated, but then student satisfaction drags it down.
This is probably due to our rubbish student union. A lot of other unis I have visited have really thriving unions whilst ours is dead most of the time. But, personally, I don't think this really matters as we're a city university anyways, so town is closer to some people then the union!
Anyways, I love Bristol and think it definitely deserves it's reputation. Its one of the most popular unis for employers to if you want a job, Bristol is the place to be!

Apparently the student satisfaction rating are all a fix. I read on another thread that St Andrew's told their students to rate them highly to give them a league table boost, and apparently Cambridge boycotted the rating one year because low rated unis were encouraging their students to lie to get a better rating for the uni.

And yeah, the graduate prospects are a lot higher than the unis nearby it in the league table - The Times rates them the same as Oxford's! :eek:

Reply 11

Shuei

8

I have never heard this too. Usually its LSE/imperial, UCL etc after Oxbridge.

Reply 12

Shuei

8

Original post by Maturity

What university actually does come after oxbridge in general can't really say LSE or Imperial as they are too specific with thier courses as is Warwick. I would say Durham or Bristol that kind of area.
Boxbridge/Doxbridge.

Non sense. Because LSE and Imperial are "too specific with their courses", whatever that means, it does not make it worse than Bristol.

Yes they have selective and limited courses, but in terms of local and global reputation, they are up there just after Oxbridge. Go to a country and ask people do you know Bristol University. There will be those who know it but many won't. Lse and Imperial? Academically world leading and are very prestigious. Imperial and LSE's courses are globally prestigious - and have produced so many world leading alumnis compared to Bristol. If you want to exclude the two, because they are specialist institutions which only do either social or natural sciences, after Oxbridge it will be UCL.
I wouldn't put Durham and Bristol together either. I would think that Durham is slightly more reputative than Bristol. Bristol is known for giving friendly and low contextual offers to state schools. If someone needs AAA and their predicted grade are AAB or ABB, Bristol considers the application. However, imperial and LSE would reject it straight away.

Boxbridge? Doxbridge ? Hahahaha. That is overestimating Bristol University a lot. It is a very good university and reputative. But I wouldn't say prestigious...

But with no doubt, among the russel groups it is way above the average. I would personally say that it is within top 10 local reputation and top 15 global reputation out of UK universities

Reply 13

random_matt

20

11 years old folks.

Reply 14

Shuei

8

Original post by xmarilynx

You need to be careful with league tables, as they all use different criteria. Bristol's rated quite low in the Guardian because of its "% satisfied with feedback" score. The average entry tariff is high (so clearly it only admits a high calibre of student) and the table deems Bristol's graduate prospects (the most important factor IMO) to be equal to Oxford's. Plus Bristol's in the top 10 according to The Times, and that's the only one anyone really takes any notice of :yy:

I would actually advise to avoid looking at the local leaugue tables. They include things like student satisfaction, feedback satisfaction, average tariff points, student staff ratio etc. And that was the reason why St Andrews beat Oxbridge in local league table and why university of Loughborough (idk how to spell) is standing with high up russel grouosnlike Bristol that is clearly better. Looking at the global ranking such as QS rank is more accurate as it only takes into the account how much knowledge it provides to the world, university's general prestige, global reputation and employability.

Reply 15

Shuei

8

Original post by thepoodle

Thanks for replies everyone, when I went to the open day last year I was told bristol was considered third best by headteachers thoughout the country (but they stayed silent on the league table scores).

I don't think so. There comes LSE, Imperial and UCL after in my opinion. But with no doubt Bristol is one of the good russel universities ^^

Does Bristol deserve its reputation?

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