University of Reading

The Ranking of University of Reading

http://www.rdg.ac.uk/

The University of Reading is a university in the English town of Reading, Berkshire. Established in 1892, receiving its Royal Charter in 1926, the University has a long tradition of research, education and training at a local, national and international level. It was awarded the Queen's Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education in 1998, and again in 2005. It is one of the ten most research-intensive universities in the UK, as well as being considered one of the top 200 universities in the world.

History

The University owes its origins to the Schools of Art and Science established in Reading in 1860 and 1870. These became part of an extension college of Christ Church of the University of Oxford in 1892, which became known as University College, Reading.

The new college received its first treasury grant in 1901. Three years later it was given a site, in London Road, by the Palmer family of Huntley & Palmers fame. The same family's continued support enabled the opening of Wantage Hall in 1908 and the Research Institute in Dairying in 1912.

The college first applied for a Royal Charter in 1920 but was unsuccessful at that time. However a second petition, in 1925, was successful, and the charter was officially granted on March 17, 1926. With the charter, the University College became the University of Reading, the only new university to be created in England between the two world wars.

In 1947 the University purchased Whiteknights Park, which was to become its principal campus.In 1984 the University started a merger with Bulmershe College of Higher Education, which was completed in 1989.

In October 2006, the Senior Management Board proposed the closure of its Physics Department to future undergraduate application. This was ascribed to financial reasons and lack of alternative ideas and caused considerable controversy, not least a debate in Parliament over the closure which prompted heated discussion of higher education issues in general. On October 10 the Senate voted to close the Department of Physics, a move confirmed by the Council on November 20. Other departments closed in recent years include Music, Sociology, Geology, and Mechanical Engineering. The university council decided in March 2009 to close the School of Health and Social Care, a school whose courses have consistently been oversubscribed.

In January 2008, the University announced its merger with the Henley Management College to create the university's new Henley Business School, bringing together Henley College's expertise in MBAs with the University's existing Business School and ICMA Centre. The merger took formal effect on the 1st August 2008, with the new business school split across the university's existing Whiteknights Campus and its new Greenlands Campus that formerly housed Henley Management College.

Campuses

The University maintains over 1.6 square kilometres (395 acres) of grounds, in four distinct campuses:

• Whiteknights Campus, at 1.23 square kilometres (304 acres), is the largest and includes Whiteknights Lake, conservation meadows and woodlands as well as most of the University's departments.


• The smaller London Road Campus is the original University site and is closer to the town centre of Reading.


• The Bulmershe Court Campus in Woodley is the second biggest campus belonging to the University


• The Greenlands Campus, on the banks of the River Thames in Buckinghamshire.

Research and Business Development

In the Research Assessment Exercise in 2001, five departments were awarded the top rate of 5* – Archaeology, English, Italian, Meteorology and Psychology, and fifteen departments were awarded the rating of 5. In the wake of the 2008 RAE, the university saw a cut of £4m (19%) in its recurrent research funding, the largest cut among the 1994 Group of British universities.

The Department of Meteorology was awarded a Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education in 2005. Reading was the first university to win a Queen's Award for Export Achievement, in 1989.

Library

The Whiteknights Main Library holds catalogue of over 1.2 million books, as well as a range of electronic resources, videos and archives. All in 14,000 square metres of public space on five floors of resources, a maintenance floor, entrance plaza and the Knowledge Exchange. The secondary library on the University's Bulmershe Campus supports teaching courses and provides resources in education, health & social care, music and film & drama. There is also a library in the University's Meteorology department.

Achievements

Important achievements include:

• being the first British university to integrate an industrial Research and Development Group on its campus (1972)
• being the first university to win the Queen’s Award for Export Achievement (1989)
• twice receiving the Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher Education (1998 and 2006).

Research

The University of Reading is highly regarded, nationally and internationally, for the quality of its research and is committed to enhancing its position as a leading research University. To do this we will continue to produce excellent research, ensure that we have a sustainable funding base to pay for it, and provide the appropriate environment and necessary support to enable us to achieve our aims. Our research strategy sets out our vision and key aims in more detail.

Our research excellence extends across a broad range of disciplines in

• Environmental, Physical and Life Sciences
• Arts and Humanities
• Social Sciences
• Economics and Business

The University of Reading was ranked 194th in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.

University of Leicester

The Ranking of University of Leicester

www.le.ac.uk

The University of Leicester is a research led university based in Leicester, England, with approximately 20,000 registered students - about 13,000 of them full-time students and 7,000 part-time and/or distance learning. The main campus is a mile south of the city centre, adjacent to Victoria Park and Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth I College.

On 23 October 2008 the University was named University of the Year by the Times Higher Education at their annual awards celebration.

History

The University was founded as Leicestershire and Rutland College in 1918. The site for the University was donated by a local textile manufacturer, Thomas Fielding Johnson, in order to create a living memorial for those who lost their lives in World War I. This is reflected in the University's motto Ut Vitam Habeant — 'so that they may have life'. The central building, now known as the Fielding Johnson Building and housing the University's administration offices and Faculty of Law, dates from 1837 and was formerly the Leicestershire and Rutland Lunatic Asylum.

Students were first admitted to the college in 1921. In 1927, after it became University College, Leicester, students sat the examinations for external degrees of the University of London. In 1957 the college was granted its Royal Charter, and has since then had the status of a University with the right to award its own degrees. The University won the first ever series of University Challenge, in 1963.

Library

Christine and Paul Hatton were able to view examples from the rare books from the Hatton Topographical Library that their grandfather had donated to the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland College in 1920. This generous gift formed the nucleus of the University Library’s exceptional English local history collections.

• Local history collections (for the Centre for English Local History), including:
  Thomas Hatton (1876 – 1943)'s collection. Born in Manchester, he began work as a junior clerk in a corset factory in Market Harborough and later moved to Leicester to set up his own boot manufacturing business. He also had interests in crossword promotion, greyhound racing and boxing (and on one trip to America was photographed with Laurel and Hardy, with all three of them wearing the trademark bowler hat), but his forté however was book collecting. A discriminating collector who applied his professional knowledge as a boot manufacturer to his book collecting by pioneering the use of glazed goat skin as a binding material, over a period of ten years he gathered one of the finest private collections of topographical and local history books. When his interests moved from topographical to Dickensian material, he agreed to donate his nearly 2,000 local history books to what was then Leicester College.

• The library also holds a number of collections containing items written by several famous writers, these include:
  Joe Orton Collection. Joe Orton (1933-1967) was a Leicester-born playwright, the collection contains his manuscripts and correspondence.
  Laura Riding Letters. The collected correspondence of the American poet and critic Laura Riding (1901-1991).
  Sue Townsend Collection. The personal papers of Sue Townsend (born 1946). The collection contains Townsend's literary correspondence and notebooks detailing her works.
  Archives of the Institute for the Study of Terrorism (see Jillian Becker).

Academic achievements

Science

The University of Leicester is one of the 1994-Group research universities. The University has scientific research groups in the areas of astrophysics, biochemistry and genetics. The techniques used in Genetic fingerprinting were invented and developed at Leicester in 1984 by Sir Alec Jeffreys. It also houses Europe's biggest academic centre for space research, in which space probes have been built, most notably the Mars Lander Beagle 2, which was built in collaboration with the Open University. A Leicester built instrument has been operating in space every year since 1967. Leicester Physicists (led by Professor Ken Pounds) were critical in proving a fundamental law of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity - that black holes exist and are common in the universe. It is a founding partner of the £52 million National Space Centre. In total Leicester has the highest research income of any non Russell Group institution in the UK. The University of Leicester is one of a small number of Universities to have won the prestigious Queen's Anniversary Prize for Higher Education on more than one occasion: in 1994 for physics & astronomy and again in 2002 for genetics. The Guardian's 2008 University Guide, published in 2007, ranked Leicester 2nd in the UK for Physics and 8th for Mathematics.

Arts, humanities and social sciences

Literary connections include Kingsley Amis, who is believed to have partially based his Campus novel Lucky Jim on Leicester University. Amis is alleged to have been inspired to write the book when visiting his friend Phillip Larkin who was working at the university as a librarian at the time. Malcolm Bradbury also used Leicester as a basis for his satire on university life Eating People Is Wrong. More recently, novelist Adele Parks graduated from the university in the 1990s, and the university library now holds the writings of both Joe Orton and Sue Townsend.

The School of Historical Studies at Leicester is, with 35 full time members of staff, including 11 Professors at current, one of the largest of any university in the country. It is has made considerable scholarly achievements in many areas of history, notably Urban History, English Local History, American Studies and Holocaust Studies. The School houses both the East Midlands Oral History Archive (EMOHA) and the Media Archive for Central England (MACE) MACE.

The School of English is one of the UK’s leading providers of English at degree level. The Guardian's 2009 University Guide ranked Leicester 6th in the UK for English and 2nd for American Studies. The School comprises 25 members of staff, including 8 Professors, and is committed to offering the whole spectrum of English Studies from Contemporary Writing to Old English and language studies. It contains the distinguished Victorian Studies Centre, the first of its kind in the UK. Malcolm Bradbury is one of the Department's most famous alumni: he graduated with a First in English in 1953.

The School of Archaeology and Ancient History is likewise one of the UK's largest, and highest-ranked, departments in its two subjects. It was formed in 1990 from the former Departments of Archaeology and Classics, under the headship of Professor Graeme Barker (now Disney Professor at Cambridge). The current Head of School is Professor Colin Haselgrove. The current academic staff comprises 5 professors, 3 readers, 4 senior lecturers, and 12 lecturers. Of these staff members, 19 are archaeologists and 5 ancient historians, though several staff teach and research in both disciplines. In addition the School has an emeritus professor, 4 research fellows, and 9 honorary and associated members. The School was awarded a grade 5 in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise and a maximum score of 24 points in the Quality Assurance Agency's review of teaching in that year. The School has particular strengths in Mediterranean archaeology, ancient Greek and Roman history, and the archaeology of recent periods including Industrial Archaeology. In April 2008 the Centre for Historical Archaeology was opened. The School is also home to University of Leicester Archaeological Services (ULAS).

The Centre for Mass Communication Research, now part of the Department of Media and Communications, is one of the longest established academic centres at Leicester, engaging in pioneering research in the 1970s and 1980s and now specializing in Masters courses, as does the Department of Museum Studies, in terms of both campus-based and distance-learning Masters.

Law

Within the university structure, the Faculty of Law is the smallest Faculty, however, it has one of the biggest departments as the Department of Law. The Law School has strong formal relationships with top law schools in many other countries such as France, South Africa, Singapore and Australia. It also has a number of leading academics who provide consultation to a number of legal and governmental bodies such as Professor Erika Szyszczak, Professor Chris Clarkson and Professor Malcolm Shaw QC.

In July 2007, two undergraduate law students, namely Steven Meltzer and Michael Weinstein won the International Negotiation Competition in Singapore, which is only the second occasion that a team from England and Wales has won the competition. As a result of this win, the law school will be the hosts for the 2008 National Negotiation Competition, which is sponsored by the College of Law and CEDR.

The Faculty maintains links with many top law firms, including the Magic Circle firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, who offer a one year scholarship to a Leicester student studying for the dual Law and French degree. The Law School is very proud of its flourishing Student Law Society which plays a central role in the life of the student body. Many law graduates at the university go on to follow careers in the City as commercial solicitors or barristers and so law at the university remains a popular choice and is always over-subscribed.

According to the Times Online Good University Guide 2009, the Faculty of Law is ranked 8th, out of 87 institutions, making it one of the top law schools in the country.

Teaching

The University is also held in high regard for the quality of its teaching. 19 subject areas have been graded as "Excellent" by the Quality Assurance Agency — including 14 successive scores of 22 points or above stretching back to 1998, six of which were maximum scores. Leicester was ranked joint first amongst full-time mainstream English universities in the 2005, 2006 and 2007 National Student Survey for overall student satisfaction. Leicester is home to two prestigious national Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (in Genetics and Geographical Information Science) and plays an important role in a third (Physics). Over two thirds of subjects feature in the national top 10.

Engineering

The Department of Engineering has 33 academic staff (including 8 Professors) supported by 5 academic-related staff, about 20 research staff and 30 technical and clerical staff. Engineering is one of the largest departments at Leicester and has approximately 240 undergraduate students, 50 taught postgraduate students, and 50 postgraduate and postdoctoral researchers. The student/staff ratio is 10:1, which the Times Good Universities Guide describes as its "benchmark for excellence".

The Department is renowned for its research in the areas of Control and Instrumentation, Electrical and Electronic Power, Radio Systems, Mechanics of Materials, and Thermofluids and Environmental Engineering. The department achieved a rating of 5A in the latest HEFCE Research Assessment Exercise, putting it in the top tier of UK Engineering departments. Among those General Engineering departments that submitted the research records of more than 95% of their staff, only Cambridge and Oxford did better. Several research led appointments have been made in recent years, including a number of chairs, and this has resulted in research groups of international standing with strong leadership and a research base of highly talented staff.

In terms of teaching, the Department offers MEng and BEng degrees in Embedded Systems Engineering, Communications and Electronic Engineering, Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and General Engineering. Each course is accredited by the relevant professional institutions. The Department also offers MSc courses in Embedded Systems and Control, Information and Communication Engineering, Advanced Mechanical Engineering, and Advanced Electrical and Electronic Engineering. The Department is fully committed to teaching excellence and the quality of its provision was affirmed by the results of the 2005 and 2006 National Student Satisfaction Surveys. The Department came joint first (out of 44 universities) for their teaching in Electrical Engineering and joint second (out of 43 universities) in Mechanical Engineering. The overall satisfaction score for the Department of Engineering at the University of Leicester was 4.3.

The Department has an extensive range of industrial partners including: BAe Systems, Rolls Royce, Jaguar, Siemens, Corus, Mercedes-Benz. Many undergraduate and postgraduate projects are carried out in collaboration with industry. The employment record for new graduates is strong.

Faculties

The University is organised into six faculties.

• Faculty of Medicine and Biological Sciences
• Faculty of Arts
• Faculty of Law
• Faculty of Science
• Faculty of Social Sciences (expanded in 2004 to include the Faculty of Education)
• Faculty of Engineering

University of Leicester was ranked 177th in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.

Lancaster University

The Ranking of Lancaster University or The University of Lancaster

www.lancs.ac.uk

Lancaster University, officially The University of Lancaster, is a British university in Lancaster, Lancashire, England. The University has an annual income of £149 million, 2,250 staff and 17,415 students. In the last Research Assessment Exercise Lancaster was named the 7th best research institution in the United Kingdom. Along with the universities of Durham, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield and York, Lancaster forms the N8 Group of research universities. Lancaster was ranked 10th of 113 British universities in the 2008 Good University Guide.

Lancaster is a collegiate university, with its main functions divided between three central faculties and nine colleges. In general, the faculties perform research and provide centralised lectures to students, while the colleges are responsible for the domestic arrangements and welfare of undergraduate students, graduate students, post-doctoral researchers and some University staff.

History

Following the Second World War the future of higher education became an important concern of the government as it tried to cope with the demands of an expanding population and the advent of a new technological age. Between 1958 and 1961, this balance was readdressed as 7 new plate glass universities were announced; one of these was the University of Lancaster.

The University was established by Royal Charter in 1964. The Charter stipulated that HRH Princess Alexandra of Kent be the first Chancellor. She was inaugurated in 1964. The ceremony also saw the granting of various honorary degrees to dignitaries including Prime Minister Harold Wilson. Princess Alexandra served the University as Chancellor until retiring in 2004: she was the longest serving Chancellor of any British university.

The University accepted its first students in October 1964 and there were initially 13 professors, 32 additional members of teaching and research staff, 8 library staff and 14 administrators on academic grades. The motto, "patet omnibus veritas", which means "truth lies open to all", was adopted by the new university. The first Science students were admitted in 1965.

The University was temporarily based in the city after its establishment. A lecture theatre and the University's first JCR were based in Centenary Church, a former congregational church, opposite the old factory premises of Waring & Gillow, which were used to accommodate the new students. Many new students were housed in Morecambe. The Grand Theatre was leased as a main lecture room and 112 and 114 within the St Leonard's area became teaching and recreational rooms. The library occupied the old workshops of Shrigley and Hunt on Castle Hill.

Campus

The purpose-built campus occupies Bailrigg, a 200-acre (0.312 sq mi; 0.809 km2) site donated by Lancaster City Council in 1963. The campus buildings are located on a hilltop, the lower slopes of which are landscaped parkland which includes the "Carter Lake" duckpond and the university playing fields. The site is located three miles (5 km) south of the city centre. The campus buildings are arranged around a central walkway known as "The Spine". The walkway runs from north to south and is covered for most of its length. The main architect was Gabriel Epstein of Shepeard and Epstein. In contrast to some of the other campus universities, Bailrigg was designed to integrate social, residential and teaching areas.

Research

At Lancaster University we pride ourselves in our ability to perform international quality research that is recognised by government, funding bodies, policy agencies and industry to be cutting-edge, innovative and relevant. Our top performance in successive research assessment exercises has placed us in the top ten universities in the UK and this is reflected in an increasing portfolio of regional, national and international research partnerships that advance core disciplinary knowledge and address key societal issues.

Library

The Ruskin Library houses archive material related to the poet, author and artist John Ruskin. It is open to the public, although only a small part of the collection is on public display at once. The building was constructed in 1997 by architect Richard MacCormac. The Whitehouse Collection housed in the Ruskin Library is the largest holding of books, manuscripts, photographs, drawings and watercolours by and related to John Ruskin in the world.

The University's Great Hall is situated at the far north end of the campus.

Faculties

The University is divided into three faculties:

The Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences consisting of the school of Law and the departments of Applied Social Science; Educational research; English and Creative Writing; European Languages and Cultures; History; Linguistics and English Language; Philosophy; Politics and International Relations; Religious Studies and Sociology, the Institutes for Cultural Research; for Health Research; for the Contemporary Arts (Art, Design, Music & Theatre Studies) and the Ruskin centre.

The Faculty of Science and Technology consisting of the departments of Biological Sciences; Communications Systems; Computing; Engineering; Environmental Sciences; Geography; Mathematics and Statistics; Natural Sciences; Physics; Psychology and the School of Health and Medicine.

The Faculty of Management is a single school faculty (Lancaster University Management School) consisting of the departments of Accounting and Finance; Economics; Management Learning and Leadership; Management Science; Marketing and Organisation, Work and Technology; the Institute for Entrepreneurship & Enterprise Development and the centres for e-Science; for Excellence in Leadership (CEL); for the Study of Technology & Organisation (CSTO); International Centre for Research in Accounting (ICRA); Lancaster Centre for Forecasting (LCF); Lancaster Centre for Strategic Management; Lancaster China Management Centre (LCMC); Lancaster Leadership Centre (LLC), Health Leadership Centre (HLC) and Centre for Performance-Led HR (CPHR).

The University of Lancaster or Lancaster University was ranked 170th in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.

University of Newcastle upon Tyne

The Ranking of University of Newcastle upon Tyne

www.ncl.ac.uk

Newcastle University is a major research-intensive university located in Newcastle upon Tyne in the north-east of England. It was established as a School of Medicine and Surgery in 1834 and became the University of Newcastle upon Tyne by an Act of Parliament in August 1963. Newcastle University is a member of the Russell Group, an association of leading research-intensive UK universities. The University has one of the largest EU research portfolios in the UK. The post-nominal letters of graduates commonly have N'cle attached to indicate the institution.

History

The University has its origins in the School of Medicine and Surgery which was established in Newcastle upon Tyne in October 1834, providing basic lectures and practical demonstrations to around 26 students. In June 1851, following a dispute amongst the teaching staff, the School was split into two rival institutions: the majority forming the Newcastle College of Medicine, with the others establishing themselves as the Newcastle upon Tyne College of Medicine and Practical Science. By 1852 the majority college was formally linked to the University of Durham and its teaching certificates were recognised by the University of London for graduation in medicine. The two colleges amalgamated in 1857 and renamed the University of Durham College of Medicine in 1870.

Attempts to realise a place for the teaching of sciences in the city were finally met with the foundation of the College of Physical Science in 1871. The college offered instruction in mathematics, physics, chemistry and geology to meet the growing needs of the mining industry, becoming the Durham College of Physical Science in 1883 and then renamed after William George Armstrong as Armstrong College in 1904. Both these separate and independent institutions later became part of the University of Durham, whose 1908 Act formally recognised that the University consisted of two Divisions, Durham and Newcastle, on two different sites. By 1908, the Newcastle Division was teaching a full range of subjects in the Faculties of Medicine, Arts, and Science, which also included agriculture and engineering.

Throughout the early 20th century, the medical and science colleges vastly outpaced the growth of their Durham counterparts and a Royal Commission in 1934 recommended the merger of the two colleges to form King's College, Durham. Growth of the Newcastle Division of the federal Durham University led to tensions within the structure and on 1 August 1963 an Act of Parliament separated the two, creating the University of Newcastle upon Tyne.

The University has also been actively involved with several of the region's museums for many years; the Hancock Museum - recently refurbished and re-opened in May 2009 - is one such example.

Academic Reputation

The university won the Sunday Times University of the Year award in 2000 and is ranked 9th best in the UK by the Webometrics Ranking of World Universities in 2007. The majority of undergraduate subjects were also ranked in the top 10 or top 20 in the Times Good University Guide 2008 and all of its subjects are awarded at least 20 points out of 24 by the Quality Assurance Agency. The University is also ranked highly for its research, and in the publication Research Fortnight Newcastle University was named as fifth best in the UK for its research carried out across departments in 2007. It was also been named the second friendliest university by the Friends Reunited website in 2006. The University Library is the only one in the UK to have been awarded the government's Charter Mark for excellent customer services five times in a row. The University has one of the best track records for graduate employment in the country, and the Careers Service has won seven prestigious national careers awards in recent years by the Institute of Career Guidance.

Library

Newcastle University Library consists of 3 main libraries:

The Robinson Library is the main campus library and has resources for all subjects except medicine and law.

The Walton Medical and Dental Library is in the Medical School and serves the needs of the Medical, Dental and Biomedical Sciences

The Law Library is located in the Law Schoool and provides extensive resources for all those engaged in learning and researching law.

Research

Newcastle University is among the top 20 higher education institutions in the UK in terms of research power, according to the influential professional publication, Research Fortnight.

This is based on the results of the Research Assessment Exercise 2008, which found that in over two thirds of subjects assessed, at least half of all research was placed in the top two categories of 4* (world leading) and 3* (internationally excellent).

The University also has one of the largest European Union research portfolios in the UK and has research links with many other countries. It is a member of the Russell Group, comprising 20 leading research institutions in the UK.

Faculties and Schools

Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

• School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape
• School of Arts and Cultures
• Newcastle University Business School
• Combined Studies Centre
• School of Education, Communication and Language Sciences
• School of English Literature, Language and Linguistics
• School of Geography, Politics and Sociology
• School of Historical Studies
• The Language Centre
• Newcastle Law School
• School of Modern Languages

Faculty of Medical Sciences

• Newcastle Biomedicine
• School of Biomedical Sciences
• School of Dental Sciences
• School of Medical Sciences Education Development
• Postgraduate Institute for Medicine and Dentistry
• School of Psychology

Faculty of Science, Agriculture and Engineering

• School of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development
• School of Biology
• School of Chemical Engineering and Advanced Materials
• School of Chemistry
• School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences
• School of Computing Science
• School of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering
• School of Marine Science and Technology
• School of Mathematics and Statistics
• School of Mechanical and Systems Engineering
  

University of Newcastle upon Tyne was ranked 162 in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.

Queen Mary University of London

The Ranking of Queen Mary, University of London

http://www.qmul.ac.uk

Queen Mary, University of London (known as Queen Mary and Westfield College until 2000, and still officially named as such in its charter) is a constituent college of the University of London. Queen Mary is one of the largest Colleges of the University of London and it offers degree programmes and research across 21 academic departments and institutes, within three sectors: Science and Engineering; Humanities, Social Sciences and Laws; and Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry.

The College is a leading research-focused university, which was highly ranked in the official 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, placed 11th (The Guardian) and 13th (The Times Higher) nationally, out of 132 higher education institutions submitted. It has a strong international reputation, with 24 per cent of students coming from over 100 countries. Queen Mary incorporates several leading international research units such as the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, the Interdisciplinary Research Centre in Biomedical Materials, as well as many centres for medical and dental teaching and research.In particular the College is very highly reputed for English, Geography, Law, Linguistics and Medicine and Dentistry. Queen Mary has an annual turnover of £220 million, research income worth £43 million, and generates employment and output worth over £600 million to the UK economy each year.

The College is known for student employability: The Sunday Times ranked it second highest in the UK for graduate starting salaries after the London School of Economics. A new learning resource centre with 24-hour access opened in 2003, and a new student village with 2,000 en-suite rooms followed in 2004. More residences and an arts quarter, containing research facilities, a conference centre, drama studio and teaching space, were completed in 2006. In September 2008 a £6-million health and fitness centre was also opened on the College’s Mile End campus. A £15-million Humanities building is due to open in spring 2010 and a biosciences innovation centre is already under construction, next door to the £44-million award-winning Blizard Building — a striking new part of Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry's campus in Whitechapel.

Research

In the UK Research Assessment Exercise results published in December 2008 Queen Mary was ranked 11th, according to an analysis by The Guardian newspaper, and 13th according to The Times Higher Education Supplement, out of the 132 institutions submitted for the exercise. The Times Higher commented "the biggest star among the research-intensive institutions was Queen Mary, University of London, which went from 48th in 2001 to 13th in the 2008 Times Higher Education table, up 35 places."

Queen Mary is ranked third for research amongst University of London multi-faculty colleges.

Queen Mary was ranked 99th in The Times Higher Education Supplement rankings of higher education institutions worldwide in 2004, The Times Higher Education Supplement's peer review-based separate table for the top 100 international Universities in Arts and Humanities subjects included Queen Mary in joint 21st place in the world, alongside University College London. The Shanghai Jiao Tong University's 2007 Academic Ranking of World Universities placed it 57 - 80 in Europe and 151 - 201 globally, putting it level with LSE, Durham and St. Andrews. The 2007 CHE-ExcellenceRanking, examining the academic performance of graduate programs in natural sciences, placed Queen Mary in the European top group for biology and physics. In addition, The Guardian Newspaper's League Tables placed Queen Mary 12th in the UK in 2005; it was placed 42nd by The Times; and 28th in 2006. Queen Mary has also been ranked the sixth best UK university for student employability — with the second highest UK graduate starting salary.

Academic strengths

In the 2008 official Research Assessment Exercise, according to the Times Higher Education rankings, Queen Mary was placed in the top five nationally, including:

• Linguistics (ranked 1st)
• Geography (ranked 1st equal with Bristol)
• Drama, dance and performing arts (ranked 1st for Drama, but 2nd equal in the unit of assessment with the department ahead of Queen Mary not being entered for Drama)
• Dentistry (ranked 2nd)
• English Language and Literature (ranked 2nd)
• Epidemiology and public health (ranked 3rd)
• Pre-clinical and human biological sciences (ranked 4th)
• Health Services Research (ranked 4th)
• Cancer studies (ranked 5th equal).

Queen Mary was also placed in the highest quartile in:

• Law
• Iberian Languages
• History
• Computer Science
• Economics and Econometrics
• Other hospital-based clinical subjects
  

In addition, Queen Mary has recorded substantial achievements in a number of other competitive subjects, including

• Russian
• French
• Materials
• Politics
• Pure Maths, and
• Electronic Engineering

Business and Management, a new department not entered in the 2001 RAE, has equalled the Cass Business School at City University, London in the Times Higher Education RAE rankings, coming within the top half of business schools.

University of London

Although the size and diversity of Queen Mary gives it all the characteristics and facilities of a university in its own right, it is also part of the federal University of London, a wide-ranging body comprising some 40 academic institutions and 120,000 students. Together, these make it the largest and most diverse university in the country. It also means that, although Queen Mary is a self-governing institution, our students are able to take advantage of the wide and varied educational and social facilities of the University of London. These include the Senate House library, which contains more than 1.4 million volumes, and the University of London Union (ULU), which is amongst the most active and lively in the country.

Departments and schools

• Humanities, Social Sciences and Law
• Medicine and Dentistry
• Science and Engineering
• Non-academic Departments

Queen Mary, University of London was ranked 160th in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.

University of Aberdeen

The Ranking of University of Aberdeen

www.abdn.ac.uk

The University of Aberdeen is Scotland's third oldest and the fifth oldest in the UK. Aberdeen is an international university built on serving one of the most dynamic regions of Europe. With over 13,000 students, and over 3000 staff, we are at the forefront of teaching and research in medicine, the humanities and sciences.

Picturesque and historic Old Aberdeen - home of Elphinstone's original foundation - is now the main university site, only one mile from the city centre. The 15th century remains very much alive in King's College, offering a sense of history in the daily life of a university now focused on the needs of the new millennium.

History

Founded in 1495 by William Elphinstone, Bishop of Aberdeen and Chancellor of Scotland, The University of Aberdeen is Scotland's third oldest and the UK's fifth oldest University.

William Elphinstone established King's College to train doctors, teachers and clergy for the communities of northern Scotland, and lawyers and administrators to serve the Scottish Crown. Much of the King's College still remains today, as do the proud traditions, which the Bishop began.

Throughout the 20 th century, particularly since the 1950s, Aberdeen consistently increased student recruitment, which is now in excess of 10,000. In the last 10 years, picturesque and historic Old Aberdeen, home of Bishop Elphinstone's original foundation, has again become the main university site.

The University has also invested heavily in medical research, where time and again University staff have demonstrated their skills as world leaders in their field. The custom-built Institute of Medical Sciences, completed in 2002, was designed to provide state-of-the-art facilities for medical researchers and their students.

In 1999, the University launched its ambitious fund-raising campaign, The Sixth Century Campaign, to mark the start of the University's sixth century of existence. With the support of HRH The Prince of Wales as Campaign Patron, our aim is to raise £150 million by 2010.

The fact that the University has become what it is owes much to the determination and vision of a very few individuals, including a distinguished list of scholars who in their own unique ways, helped to shape the University into the world-class institute we have today.

This is only the briefest glimpse into the history of the University of Aberdeen. A far more detailed account can be found in the publication Crown and Gown, written by Jennifer Carter and Colin McLaren and published by Aberdeen University Press. This publication was the main source for this page and permission for use of the material is gratefully acknowledged. Crown and Gown can be purchased at most good book shops - price £6.95.

Library

The Library and Historic Collections are at the heart of teaching, learning and research at the University of Aberdeen. Our holdings extend to more than a million items gathered over five centuries of the University's existence and belonging to collections which are important both nationally and internationally.

Library Services are located in Queen Mother Library, Taylor Library and Special Libraries and Archives in Old Aberdeen, in the Medical Library at the Foresterhill campus and in the Reid Library at the Rowett Research Institute. We welcome to the libraries students and staff from within the University, those from other educational institutions, businesses and the general public.

Our Library is multi-faceted containing not only print resources within the buildings, but also a whole virtual library comprising in excess of 300,000 full-text electronic books, more than 10,000 full-text electronic journal titles and hundreds of electronic databases.

Research

Aberdeen is a university with a long and distinguished research pedigree - ideas that have taken root here have gone on to shape the world.

The following pages showcase our full research portfolio and demonstrate that the pursuit of intellectual excellence has always been at the core of academic life in Aberdeen.

Fast Facts

• The University of Aberdeen was founded in 1495 and is the third oldest University in Scotland
• Teaching is split into 3 Colleges, The College of Life Sciences & Medicine, The College of Physical Sciences, and The College of Arts and Social Sciences
• Over 13,900 students
• 46% men, 54% women
• 19% mature undergraduates
• 120 nationalities
• 4 Nobel Prizes have been awarded for work carried out or begun at Aberdeen
• High quality teaching with over 89% subjects rated Excellent / Highly Satisfactory
• Within 6 months 97% of graduates enter directly into work, further study or training
• 85% of academic staff are research active
• Over 590 first degree programmes
• Over 110 taught Masters programmes
• Over 150 sports clubs and societies
• Study abroad options worldwide
• Libraries with over 1,050,000 volumes
• £240 million investment on infrastructure and facilities over the next ten years
  

Academic Colleges and Schools

Academic disciplines within the University of Aberdeen are organised via a college structure. Other indices are available, including alphabetical departmental listings.

• College of Arts and Social Sciences
• College web site
• School of Divinity, History and Philosophy
• School of Education
• School of Language & Literature
• School of Law
• School of Social Science
• University of Aberdeen Business School
• Graduate School
• College of Life Sciences and Medicine
• College web site
• Rowett Institute of Nutrition and Health
• School of Biological Sciences
• School of Medical Sciences
• School of Medicine and Dentistry
• School of Psychology
• Graduate School
• College of Physical Sciences
• College web site
• School of Engineering
• School of Natural & Computing Sciences
• School of Geosciences
• Graduate School
  

University of Aberdeen was ranked 153 in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.

University of Bath

The Ranking of University of Bath

www.bath.ac.uk

The University of Bath is a campus university located in Bath, England. It received its Royal Charter in 1966. The University has established a strong reputation in teaching and research, being consistently placed as one of the top elite universities in the national university league tables. With 20 out of its 26 subjects being ranked within top 10 in the UK, Bath is placed the 6th in the table of Who's in Top Ten of Their Subjects from the Complete University Guide published by the Independent in April 2009. In addition the Guardian University Guide 2010 placed Bath 9th nationally. Furthermore, in the latest Research Assessment Exercise released in December 2008, two thirds of Bath's individual subject submissions are ranked in the top ten nationally, including over a third in the top five.

History

Despite being granted university status only forty years ago, the University of Bath can trace its roots to a technical school established in Bristol 100 years earlier, the Bristol Trade School of 1856. In 1885 the school became part of the Society of Merchant Venturers and was renamed the Merchant Venturers' Technical College, an institution founded as a school in 1595. Meanwhile, in the neighbouring city of Bath, a pharmaceutical school, the Bath School of Pharmacy, was founded in 1907. This became part of the Technical College in 1929.

In 1949, the college came under the control of the Bristol Education Authority and was renamed the Bristol College of Technology, which was subsequently changed again, in 1960, to the Bristol College of Science and Technology when it became one of ten technical colleges under the umbrella of the Ministry of Education. The college was mainly housed in the former Muller's Orphanage at Ashley Down, Bristol, which still houses part of the City of Bristol College whilst the remainder has been converted into residential housing.

In 1963, the government completed an inquiry into the state of higher education in the United Kingdom. This was known as the Robbins Committee report. It was this report that paved the way for the college (along with a number of other institutions) to assume university status.

Although the grounds of Kingsweston House were briefly considered, the City of Bristol was unable to offer the growing college a suitable site. Following discussions between the College Principal and the Director of Education in Bath, an agreement was reached to provide the college with a new home in Claverton Down, Bath, on a greenfield site overlooking the city of Bath.

Construction of a purpose-built campus in Bath began in 1964, with the first building, now known as 1 South, completed in 1965, and the Royal Charter was granted in 1966. Over the subsequent decade, new buildings were added as the campus took shape. A campus in Oakfield, Swindon, was opened in 2000.

In November 1966, the first degree ceremony was held at the Assembly Rooms in Bath. Discoveries from city records reveal that there were plans in the 19th Century to build a college of the University of Oxford on the very same site, which would have resulted in a university of a very different character. Such plans, however, did not come to fruition.

Campus

The university's main campus is located on Claverton Down, two kilometres from Bath. The campus is compact; it is possible to walk from one end to the other in fifteen minutes.

Research and Expertise

The University of Bath is recognised for research excellence across a range of disciplines in science, engineering, social sciences and the humanities. The results of RAE 2008 confirm the University's position as one of the UK's best research universities with 60% of submitted activity judged to be world-leading or internationally excellent.

Current research covers a wide range of areas from developing new drugs to tackle cancer and diabetes to studying poverty, inequality and the quality of life in developing countries.

Academic reputation

The University of Bath is one of the UK's leading universities.

We are a vibrant and innovative academic community. Our research has worldwide impact and our high quality teaching equips our graduates to become future leaders and innovators in their chosen fields.

Our small, friendly campus overlooks the beautiful UNESCO World Heritage City of Bath.

We value working collaboratively with others and have a global network of contacts in business, the professions, the public sector, and the voluntary sector.

We were ranked ninth in The Independent Complete University Guide, April 2009 and The Guardian University Guide, 2010.

Academics and Courses

The university's major academic strengths have been the physical sciences, mathematics, engineering and technology. Today, the university is also strong in management, humanities and the social sciences. Courses place a strong emphasis on vocational education; the university recommends students to take a one-year industry placement in the penultimate year of the course, although it there is no formal recognition of these placements on students' final degree certificates.

According to the latest government assessments, Bath has 15 subjects rated "excellent" (the highest on the scale). These are: Pharmacy & Pharmacology; Business & Management (AMBA accredited); Architecture & Civil Engineering; Economics; Computer Science; Electronic & Electrical Engineering; Mechanical Engineering (IMechE accredited); Mathematics, Statistics and Operational research; Education; Molecular Biosciences; Biosciences; Physics and Astronomy; Politics; Hospitality, Leisure, Recreation, Sport and Tourism; Social Policy and Administration.

According to the Complete University Guide published by The Independent, Bath has 23 out of 26 subjects being placed within top 10 in the UK. In addition, Bath's biosciences, physics, mathematics and statistics all achieve maximum points (24/24) in the latest Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA).

Admissions and students

Admissions generally require top grades at A-Level with seven applications for each place, the number of applications rising by 16 per cent in 2007.

The university has grown rapidly, particularly in the last few years. As of December 2006, 11,965 students were studying at the university; of whom 8,985 (75%) were undergraduates (full-time and part-time) and 2,980 (25%) were postgraduates.

Over 25% of students are international students (those with non-British domicile), reflecting the university's strong international reputation, with the largest number coming from China (including Hong Kong), Germany and Greece.

Faculties, Departments and Schools

• Architecture and Civil Engineering
• Biology and Biochemistry
• Chemical Engineering
• Chemistry
• Computer Science
• Division for Lifelong Learning
• Economics and International Development
• Education
• Electronic and Electrical Engineering
• Engineering and Design, Faculty of
• European Studies and Modern Languages
• Health, School for
• Humanities and Social Sciences, Faculty of
• Management, School of
• Mathematical Sciences
• Mechanical Engineering
• Natural Sciences
• Pharmacy and Pharmacology
• Physics
• Psychology
• Science, Faculty of
• Social and Policy Sciences
  

University of Bath was ranked 152 in the 2008 THES-QS World University Ranking.