St Andrews’ success in university league tables

The University of St Andrews is named among the UK’s top five universities and has maintained its highest ever ranking in the latest Times Good University Guide.

The new national league table published today (27 May 2010) ranks St Andrews as the leading university in Scotland and 4th in the UK.

It remains the highest place ever attained by a Scottish university in the Times table.

Oxford tops The Times Good University Guide 2011 league table for the ninth consecutive year and is followed by Cambridge, Imperial College, St Andrews and LSE.

Universities were rated on student satisfaction, quality of research, staff-student ratio, completion rates and spend per student on services and facilities.

The guide also looked at entry standards, the percentage of students gaining good honours and graduate prospects.

St Andrews has improved its overall score and ranks amongst the best in the UK for student satisfaction, research quality, completion rates and good honours results for students.

Principal and Vice-Chancellor Dr Louise Richardson said, “Last year St Andrews achieved the highest ranking ever by a Scottish university and to have maintained that position and our place amongst the top five UK universities in the face of such intense competition is a very gratifying reflection on the quality of our teaching and research.

“It is another measure of the dedication, engagement and commitment to excellence of everyone who works and studies at St Andrews and a signal of our desire to ensure Scotland continues to compete nationally and internationally at the highest levels of higher education.”

Individual subjects performed well in the Times rankings, with 20 of 24 subjects at St Andrews in the UK top 10.

Subjects rated among the top 5 in the UK are Anthropology, Geology, German, Middle East and African Studies, Physics and Astronomy, Philosophy, International Relations, Divinity, Chemistry, Classics, Geography, Art History and Maths.

A full version of the guide is published today at www.timesonline.co.uk.

In a separate survey also published today, St Andrews has been named one of the UK’s “cool” places to study. The Times Higher survey ranks St Andrews and the second most popular UK choice for prospective students with approximately 12 applications for every available place.