Times University World Rankings 2007

Dark_Injection said:
Mines not on there either but i know for my course it is second or third best in the country so im not bothered :)
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how can you say that though ?

the times last year said that teeside is number 1 for engineering , if youve eve looked round the engineering department you will be to differ.....

all the tables are just balls imo
 
I wasnt going off tables, i just know Bournemouth and maybe somewhere else are better for my Broadcasting course. Rather niche subject and you cant get to a much better place or i would have applied there lol. Simple as that.
 
The citations metric is a very odd one also. It is relatively low for manchester at "70" but being a postgrad student for under 2 months has taught me that the discipline the publications are made in massively effects how many citations it is likely to recieve, and perhaps more importantly, how many measurable citations are made. Different disciplines also publish in highly varied manners. Computer Science papers for example are rarely published in top rated journals such as Nature simply because they dont exist! This in turn means that when a points scheme is applied, CS departments are consistently lower than say Physics or Chemistry departments yet the truth of the matter is that the publications are simply of a different nature!

Similarly the citations rating system is different in the US than it is in the UK, thus the two systems shouldnt really be compared.

The UK research ratings body in the UK has recently finished its (very last in the current format) review of UK uni's research ratings. Very few came out with a 5* rating (though Manchester was one of them). In the future they are altering the system as at the moment universities actually work towards publishing in only the areas that they look for, rather than actually doing good research because its good research...

Its nice to see your institution at the top of the list, but lets face it I think we all know that while perhaps roughly indicative, those lists dont really reflect the real world.
 
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manic_man said:
Its nice to see your institution at the top of the list, but lets face it I think we all know that while perhaps roughly indicative, those lists dont really reflect the real world.
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I'm just guessing here, and not speaking from experience or anything, but surely they do at least to some extent?

if you were an employer looking at someone from one of the top 10 unis on that list, vs someone from a uni ranked 150 or something, wouldn't you go rather go for the top 10 guy? (all other factors being equal of course)
 
I fail to see how places like Southampton, Leeds, Glasgow and Nottingham rank lower than Bath on the UK tables, but higher than Bath on the World table?

And Surrey makes it on there (ranked 40 in UK), while Loughborough (ranked 12) isn't even on there.
 
Column Matrix said:
I fail to see how places like Southampton, Leeds, Glasgow and Nottingham rank lower than Bath on the UK tables, but higher than Bath on the World table?

And Surrey makes it on there (ranked 40 in UK), while Loughborough (ranked 12) isn't even on there.
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I'm guessing that that's to do with the criteria they use. Maybe its different for the two rankings?

there are a number of Indian universities which should definitely be on that list (Indian Institute for Technology for example or Indian Institute of Management) but aren't.
 
Sudden said:
I'm just guessing here, and not speaking from experience or anything, but surely they do at least to some extent?

if you were an employer looking at someone from one of the top 10 unis on that list, vs someone from a uni ranked 150 or something, wouldn't you go rather go for the top 10 guy? (all other factors being equal of course)
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Why? I go to Loughborough and study Electronic Engineering. I turned down offers from Edinburgh which is in the top 25, and UCL which is in the top 10. Infact the grade requirements for Loughborough were higher than Edinburgh and Loughborough doesn't even make this list.
 
Sudden said:
I'm just guessing here, and not speaking from experience or anything, but surely they do at least to some extent?

if you were an employer looking at someone from one of the top 10 unis on that list, vs someone from a uni ranked 150 or something, wouldn't you go rather go for the top 10 guy? (all other factors being equal of course)
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No your absolutely right, and thats probably why its the Times that bothers to do this stuff and not the Daily Mail (who would negatively mark unis for taking international students...)

From my perspective its unlikely i'll ever be going for a job interview of that type, whether its an R&D role or at another university i will always be examined on them merit of my own research. However if you are using your degree to get a more "normal" job type then absolutely attending Oxford, Cambridge or ICL will have more impact than "Woolston Ex Polytech for Catholic girls and badgers."

That still doesnt mean it tells us anything thats the genuine truth :)
 
I think with these ranking they should also factor in things like student experience.

I mean i study at Imperial and its great to see we're " number 5 " but in reality its differant. Right now its not great forstudents considering half the uni is being demolished/rebuilt, most of the library is closed or useless because of the nosie of workmen, the health centre is being moved so is basically out of service and then the electronics are being replaced in the basements so the lecture halls have got people banging away against the floors from beneath.

Okay rant over but the point is i think these ratings are mostly based on the later success of the students who attend them, i.e. research work produced by graduates irrspective of whether the research was done at said institute rather than the actual level of education.

I agree that that in general the top 25 are better than the next 25 etc. but trying to compare these places to each other individual is quite fruitless.

Ive seen other ranking systems which are more like hotel gradings i.e. a uni is said to be of 5* grade. Apart from that its hard to delve any further IMO.
 
hm its useful, but only useful as a general guide. id find a ranking by subject/area

for example, lancaster no. 27 inthe UK as a uni, one of only 2 5***** Business Schools in the UK...(that and london school of economics?) or it was wheni was there a few years ago.

Similarly with York University/Schulich school of bidness etc.
 
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