Norrington Table

The Norrington Table is useful to prospective students in a sense, as it gives an indication of which colleges are likely to be the most pressurised academically. However, there are sometimes massive fluctuations in the table so it is certainly not reliable, and should only ever be used as an vague indicator.

I believe that the university was right to try and prevent its publication. For a start the raw data that it uses is questionable, and the system of awarding 5 points for a first I think skews the table unfairly against particular colleges which get a lot of 2:1s. A considerable minority of people request that their results are not published, so their data can't be used. Also, I think it generates a very unhealthy sense of competitiveness, and falsely suggests that some colleges are 'crap' when they are all excellent academically.

Well I think it's better to show the truth, that there are disparities between colleges, rather than lie to prospective applicants that all colleges are alike. There's a massive difference academically between Merton's 41 firsts and 12 at St Hilda's. Or one college getting 3 2.2s, and another 18.

Agreed that it should be used only as a vague indicator, and that a college 9th is not better than a college which is 10th. The flaw of a small number not publishing their results would shift a college by 2 rankings at most. But I think doing the 5-3-2-1 points system is fair; as fair as 3-1-0 for win-draw-lose in football.

But the fluctuations in the table almost certainly show that the discrepancies between colleges are not due to teaching standards etc, but simply due to that year's intake (although Merton do have something of a monopoly on that top-spot). Personally I think that, like applications-per-place ratios, the table has the capacity to severely mislead prospective applicants.

Well the table has last year's results too so you can see if there's any crazy anomalies (eg St Catz - from 4th to 16th to 3rd). Whilst there are a few yoyo colleges, a general pattern is established - Merton, St Johns, Balliol and Magdalen are academically the strongest, St Peter's, Corpus, St Hughs etc are "division 2" and Mansfield, LMH, Pembroke and St Hilda's are always in the bottom lot.

How do you know Cardwell? Why've I had PMs from 4 or 5 people asking if I know him ?!

Just random newbies, one called "Percy". What college are you at ?

Everyones knows what the weaker colleges are; LHM, Mansfield and Queen's are normally down in the botoom 10.

Woohoo! Queens is bottom 10!

you can get a First from any colege anyway.

Surely a student has a much better chance of getting a 1st if they're in a more academic/ambitious/stimulating environment, have tutors pushing them to get a 1st, a library with 200,000 rather than 40,000 books, being 1min walk from their academic department rather than halfway down Cowley, etc etc. Which explains why at one college about 40% get a 1st and at another about 10%, despite the candidates having identical A-Level grades upon arrival.

Hilda's actually got the second highest number of 2:1s in the whole table, but because of the weighting thing this is penalised rather than highlighted as a positive thing. Oh, and I don't think the football points thing is fair either. Yes, getting a first is an excellent achievement, but there is little difference between getting 70% and getting 69%.