Durham v Lancaster - physics.

x

If you're planning on continuing with physics and going into research then Lancaster is probably better. A lot of the researchers here are internationally renowned in their field. Lancaster physics is at the top of the RAE tables (inb4 they didn't submit everything, as far as I can tell - they did)

Lancaster does not have the age or historical prestige of (for example) Durham, but it is certainly improving its act and has been consistently in the top ten of league tables for the last three years or so. If Lancaster maintains this standard then it might become better renowned in ten years time.

The university one attends as an undergraduate has no bearing on one's chances of going into research so, even if we accept Lancaster is better than Durham in physics (which isn't an easy case to make) then that doesn't mean Lancaster will give some advantage in terms of a PhD application.

Also, the guardian league table for physics listed Lancaster higher than Oxford for all categories bar entry requirements (which tell you little more than how well the department considers itself) and employment, which is actually fairly low for Oxford anyway.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/table/2012/may/22/university-guide-physics

It actually looks to me as though the Guardian have weighted their scores to ensure Oxford is on top.

Are you seriously trying to argue that Lancaster is better than Oxford for physics?

Not explicitly, I said that virtually every category in the Guardian league table is higher than for Oxford. And if you look at St Andrews a similar pattern appears. It looks to me as though the table is doctored to put Oxford at the top.

Not really. I think some people place far too much emphasis on student satisfaction and staff ratios just because they are categories on league tables. There are obviously other excellent universities in the UK besides Oxbridge, but for physics other universities just cannot compete, especially on an international scale. The only university that probably comes close to Oxford and Cambridge for physics is Imperial College London and even then I wouldn't say it is quite there.

Student satisfaction rankings are heavily flawed, in that almost all graduates only ever have one undergraduate experience, and so 4 years at Lancaster and 4 years at say, Bristol, just cannot be compared using the skewed opinions of graduates from each university.

I also think that student:staff ratios don't matter that much either. Oxford has a higher ratio than other universities but they still manage to maintain a brilliant and focused tutorial system.

I think more emphasis should be placed on employment prospects than other data, because at the end of the day universities are preparing students for the world of work. This is where some universities in the top 10 seem to lack. I'm also not really sure where the Guardian editors get their data from for this (are Leeds graduates really more employable than Oxford graduates? ). The post graduate applicant you mentioned doesn't really say much though. All good departments will have stand out students, but I'd that bet most of the PhD students at Oxford and Cambridge who studied in the UK for undergrad are from a select few universities. Most departments also have a similar proportion of students who go on to do PhDs when compared to Lancaster.

Oxford also has a much better international reputation, what with it being in the top 5 or 10 on most world league tables. Not only because of it's phenomenal history but because of it's international links and prospects. Quite simply, Oxford is a powerhouse for nobel prize laureates and famous scientists.

I might be inclined to agree if it weren't for the fact about 1/3 of lancaster physics graduates go into phds, and the MPhys project (which most students do) essentially IS physics research. A not inconsiderable number (I don't have any actual data, as I only found out recently) of MPhys students have their work published. So an undergraduate at lancaster is pretty as close to a phd in terms of what you'd be doing.

I think it was last year that a graduate from Lancaster applied for ten phds positions around the country, got interviews for all ten and got accepted to all ten, including Oxford. The general consensus appears to be that the traditional high fliers are now considering lancaster to be producing pretty damn good graduates.

Also, the guardian league table for physics listed Lancaster higher than Oxford for all categories bar entry requirements (which tell you little more than how well the department considers itself) and employment, which is actually fairly low for Oxford anyway.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/table/2012/may/22/university-guide-physics

It actually looks to me as though the Guardian have weighted their scores to ensure Oxford is on top.

Many people disregard league tables completely, but when nearly 15% of Durham students are not satisfied with the teaching at what is supposedly a world class university you have to wonder what is going on.

Though as I'm a lancaster student and you are seemingly a Durham student, it would be exceptionally difficult to persuade the other that we are right

The statistics for physics in general is about a third of students go on to do a PhD. It think it's just under in reality, but I would expect any research intensive (Russel/1994 group) uni to exceed that statistic slightly because of the nature of the students that go there, and the focus on research of the unis themselves. All MPhys courses in the country will have a large research project at the end of it, but it's nothing like PhD work ultimately in that it's similar in concept, but on a much much smaller scale. Basically, an MPhys project will be around 30 credits for an undergrad masters in most cases, postgrad masters will have bigger projects, maybe more in the region of 60 credits. Following the "1 credit = 10 hours work", that's 300 hours of work on the MPhys project, but a PhD is 4/5 years following the one research interest. MPhys projects are also generally relatively standard across the country, universities will offer some more in their stronger departments of course, but PhDs can be much more open ended. Publication of MPhys projects isn't uncommon anywhere to be honest, the purpose of doing an MPhys is pretty much to run your experiment(s) and write it up to a publishable standard, ready for PhD level and beyond.

I think league tables can be ignored with the confidence that they don't really tell you much, whatever view you take it as to the positioning of some unis, it ultimately deems them useless. You can look at the variations from year to year of specific institutions, data collection techniques etc...and it's easy to either say that they are so deeply flawed that the results are meaningless, or that there is so little difference between the vast majority of universities that the difference is negligible. If you were interested in one area of physics then you'd be better off looking at specific research groups at unis, for example university A may not produce as much world leading research as university B, putting university B higher in all the tables, but university A may well be one of the world leaders in (for example) astrophysics research, whereas university B is completely insignificant in it.

I have however, heard a lot about Durham physics students being unhappy with how it's run etc...someone I lived with last year knew someone there and he said he just felt like a number on a page. It is however, worth noting that while that data says that 15% of students are unhappy, the other 85% are happy with it, which is the vast majority. It's also worth noting that not all students respond to these things, and those that hated it are more likely to respond to it because they'll feel much more strongly about it. People are more likely to review stuff to complain about it than they are to praise it.

On the employment front, ultimately, if you perform well and try and get some work experience in holidays/in the department at uni etc...then you should be fine at either. The probability of you finding a job after uni is probably more down to things that you have more control over, like work experience, degree classification, flexibility on location etc...as opposed to the uni you went to.

Durham and Lancaster are both top unis for physics and there isn't much better in the country, and your experience at either will be what you make of it, not what other students have thought about it in the past. You make your own opportunities for employment, and the university helps you along the way, but ultimately, you have control over it, and going to one uni over the other won't guarantee you a job. I can understand comparisons in these areas between Oxbridge and a low ranking institution, because of the considerable difference between quality of research and such, but comparisons between two top institutions like Durham and Lancaster seem pretty pointless in terms of quality. The decision should really be made on the course specifically, because they will vary more. They'll offer different areas where you can specialize in later on, different research projects etc...different structures, different methods of teaching etc...and you need to see which you'd prefer most. These are very personal things, and so, while getting opinions is obviously important for gathering information and stuff, the personal preference will decide which is best.