page_title: University of St Andrews
section_title: Rankings and reputation
hierarchical_section_title: University of St Andrews / Academics / Rankings and reputation
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: St Andrews
context_page_description: The University of St Andrews is a public university in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland. It is the oldest of the four ancient universities of Scotland and, following Oxford and Cambridge universities, the third-oldest university in the United Kingdom and English-speaking world. St Andrews was founded in 1413 when the Avignon Antipope Benedict XIII issued a papal bull to a small founding group of Augustinian clergy.
  St Andrews is made up of a variety of institutions, comprising three colleges — United College, St Mary's College, and St Leonard's College, the last named being a non-statutory revival of St Leonard's as a post-graduate society. There are 18 academic schools organised into four faculties. The university occupies historic and modern buildings located throughout the town. The academic year is divided into two semesters, Martinmas and Candlemas. In term time, over one-third of the town's population are either staff members or students of the university.
context_section_description: In a ranking conducted by The Guardian, St Andrews is placed 5th in the UK for national reputation behind Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial & LSE. When size is taken into account, St Andrews ranks second in the world out of all small to medium-sized fully comprehensive universities (after Brown University) using metrics from the QS Intelligence Unit in 2015.
  The 2014 Research Excellence Framework ranked St Andrews 14th in the UK, and first in Scotland, amongst multi-faculty institutions for the research quality (GPA) of its output profile. St Andrews was ranked 9th overall in The Sunday Times 10-year (1998–2007) average ranking of British universities based on consistent league table performance, and is a member of the 'Sutton 13' of top ranked Universities in the UK.
  Nearly 86% of its graduates obtain a First Class or an Upper Second Class Honours degree. The ancient Scottish universities award Master of Arts degrees (except for science students who are awarded a Bachelor of Science degree) which are classified upon graduation, in contrast to Oxbridge where one becomes a Master of Arts after a certain number of years, and the rest of the UK, where graduates are awarded BAs. These can be awarded with honours; the majority of students graduate with honours.
  In 2017, St Andrews was named as the university with the joint second highest graduate employment rate of any UK university (along with Warwick), with 97.7 per cent of its graduates in work or further study three and a half years after graduation. St Andrews is placed 7th in the UK (1st in Scotland) for the employability of its graduates as chosen by recruiters from the UK's major companies with graduates expected to have the best graduate prospects and highest starting salaries in Scotland as ranked by The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2016 and 2017. According to data released by the Department for Education in 2018, St Andrews was rated as the 5th best university in the UK for boosting male graduate earnings with male graduates seeing a 24.5% increase in earnings compared to the average graduate, and the 9th best university for females, with female graduates seeing a 14.8% increase in earnings compared to the average graduate. An independent report conducted by Swedish investment firm, Skandia found that despite its small undergraduate body, St Andrews is the joint-5th best university in the UK for producing millionaires. A study by High Fliers confirmed this by reporting that the university also features in the top 5 of UK universities for producing self-made millionaires. According to a study by the Institute of Employment Research, St Andrews has produced more directors of FTSE 100 companies in proportion to its size than any other educational institution in Britain.
  In the 2019 Complete University Guide, 24 out of the 25 subjects offered by St Andrews rank within the top 10 nationally, making St Andrews one of only three multi-faculty universities (along with Cambridge and Oxford) in the UK to have over 95% of their subjects in the top 10. The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2017 revealed that 24 of the 26 subjects offered by St Andrews ranked within the top 6 nationally with 10 subjects placing within the top 3 including English, Management, Philosophy, International Relations, Italian, Physics and Astronomy and Classics and Ancient History. The Guardian University Guide 2019 ranked Biosciences, Computer Science, International Relations, Physics and Psychology first in the UK. Earth and Marine Sciences, Economics, English, Management, Mathematics, Philosophy and Theology placed within the top three nationally. In the 2015-16 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, St Andrews is ranked 46th in the world for Social Sciences, 50th in the world for Arts and Humanities and 74th in the world for Life Sciences. The 2014 CWTS Leiden rankings, which "aims to provide highly accurate measurements of the scientific impact of universities", placed St Andrews 39th in the world, ranking it 5th domestically. The philosophy department is ranked 6t
caption: View across St Salvator's Quad
exif: {"Image Make": "Panasonic", "Image Model": "DMC-FZ30", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS4 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2012:07:09 11:03:22", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 14, 0, 1, 0, 22, 0, ... ]", "Image ExifOffset": "440", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1066", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4493", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/200", "EXIF FNumber": "28/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "80", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2012:06:30 18:39:52", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2012:06:30 18:39:52", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "37/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3156", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2088", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "940", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "35", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal"}