Mock TEF: the best UK universities for student satisfaction

Carly Minsky

June 23 2016

The results of the 2017 TEF are now available

When you’re thinking about where to study, a very relevant question to ask is how happy you’ll be at different universities.

Although this is impossible to predict for an individual person, it is nonetheless useful to get a sense of how satisfied other students are with their experience at university.

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Student satisfaction is to be used as a measure of the quality of the teaching at universities in the UK under the government’s proposed teaching excellence framework (TEF), which will assess and monitor institutions’ teaching performance.

Times Higher Education has created a mock ranking of the TEF results, broken down by three key metrics the government proposes to use, including student satisfaction.

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Like student experience surveys more generally, the resulting student satisfaction mock TEF ranking indicates that prestige and student satisfaction do not necessarily go hand in hand.

According to both the raw scores and the results benchmarked to account for differences arising from varying student demographics (which we use in the table below), younger universities or those that are not quite so internationally well-known often provide a better student experience than older institutions, such as the majority of the prestigious Russell Group.

Many of the best universities for student satisfaction were founded in the 19th or 20th century as "people’s universities", to serve those who could not access more elite institutions.

University of Oxford college to provide working-class adults with a solid education.

Newcastle University ranks higher relative to expectations.

While the overall satisfaction levels at a university are not fully representative of satisfaction with teaching, they do indicate a better experience in general. The .

Mock TEF: UK universities ranked by student satisfaction

Sorted by benchmarked scores

Benchmarked Rank	University	Student satisfaction (distance from benchmark)	Student satisfaction (absolute score)
1	Keele University	8	95
2	University of Winchester	7	92
=3	University of Surrey	6	92
=3	University of Essex	6	92
=3	Loughborough University	6	91
=3	Coventry University	6	91
=3	Bath Spa University	6	90
=8	University of East Anglia	5	92
=8	Bangor University	5	91
=10	Swansea University	4	91
=10	Lancaster University	4	91
=10	Newcastle University	4	91
=10	Aston University	4	90
=10	Oxford Brookes University	4	90
=10	University of Dundee	4	90
=10	University of Portsmouth	4	89
=10	Heriot-Watt University	4	89
=10	Ulster University	4	89
=10	Liverpool Hope University	4	89
=20	University of Oxford	3	91
=20	University of Bath	3	90
=20	University of Leeds	3	90
=20	Cardiff University	3	90
=20	University of Sheffield	3	90
=20	University of Glasgow	3	90
=20	University of Kent	3	89
=20	Newman University	3	89
=20	University of Huddersfield	3	88
=20	University of Chichester	3	88
=20	Trent University	3	88
=20	University of Derby	3	88
=32	University of Cambridge	2	90
=32	Durham University	2	90
=32	University of Exeter	2	90
=32	University of Reading	2	89
=32	Royal Holloway, University of London	2	89
=32	Northumbria University	2	88
=32	York St John University	2	88
=32	St Mary's University, Twickenham	2	88
=32	University of Chester	2	88
=32	University of Worcester	2	87
=32	Plymouth University	2	87
=32	De Montfort University	2	86
=32	University Campus Suffolk	2	86
=32	University of the West of Scotland	2	86
=46	University of St Andrews	1	89
=46	University of Birmingham	1	88
=46	Queen's University Belfast	1	88
=46	Imperial College London	1	88
=46	University of York	1	88
=46	University of Southampton	1	88
=46	Queen Mary University of London	1	88
=46	City University London	1	87
=46	Canterbury Christ Church University	1	87
=46	University of Strathclyde	1	87
=46	University of Northampton	1	86
=46	Robert Gordon University	1	86
=46	University of Sunderland	1	86
=46	Teesside University	1	86
=46	Abertay University	1	86
=61	University of Sussex	0	87
=61	University of Warwick	0	87
=61	Soas, University of London	0	87
=61	University of Aberdeen	0	87
=61	University of Hull	0	86
=61	University of Stirling	0	86
=61	University of Lincoln	0	85
=61	Bishop Grosseteste University	0	85
=61	Trinity University	0	85
=61	Brunel University London	0	85
=61	Manchester Metropolitan University	0	85
=61	Sheffield Hallam University	0	85
=61	University of the West of England	0	85
=61	Edge Hill University	0	85
=61	Liverpool John Moores University	0	85
=61	Anglia Ruskin University	0	85
=61	Glasgow Caledonian University	0	85
=61	University of Central Lancashire	0	85
=61	Queen Margaret University	0	85
=80	University of Nottingham	-1	86
=80	University of Manchester	-1	86
=80	University of Bradford	-1	85
=80	University of Hertfordshire	-1	84
=80	Edinburgh Napier University	-1	84
=80	Middlesex University	-1	83
=80	Goldsmiths, University of London	-1	83
=80	Staffordshire University	-1	83
=80	Southampton Solent University	-1	82
=89	University of Leicester	-2	85
=89	University of Greenwich	-2	83
=89	University of Brighton	-2	83
=89	University of Gloucestershire	-2	83
=89	University of Roehampton	-2	83
=89	University of Salford	-2	83
=89	University of Bedfordshire	-2	83
=89	University of Bolton	-2	83
=89	Kingston University	-2	82
=98	University of Liverpool	-3	85
=98	University of Edinburgh	-3	84
=98	Aberystwyth University	-3	83
=98	Cardiff Metropolitan University	-3	83
=98	Buckinghamshire New University	-3	82
=98	London South Bank University	-3	82
=98	Leeds Beckett University	-3	82
=98	University of Wolverhampton	-3	82
=98	Birmingham City University	-3	81
=107	University of Bristol	-4	84
=107	University College London	-4	83
=109	University of Westminster	-5	80
=109	Glyndwr University	-5	80
=109	Bournemouth University	-5	79
=109	University of South Wales	-5	79
=109	University of Wales Trinity Saint David	-5	79
=109	London Metropolitan University	-5	79
=115	London School of Economics and Political Science	-6	81
=115	King's College London	-6	81
=115	University of West London	-6	79
=115	University of Cumbria	-6	78
=119	University of St Mark & St John	-7	78
=119	University of East London	-7	78

Mock TEF: the best UK universities for student satisfaction

See the top UK universities for student satisfaction, according to predictions for the teaching excellence framework

Carly Minsky

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The results of the 2017 TEF are now available

Step into your future: attend our events

More mock TEF predictions

Mock TEF: UK universities ranked by student satisfaction

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