News & Views item - August 2007

 

 

Oxford's Chairman of Admissions Comments on Australian Universities. (August 13, 2007)

    For this week's Newsweek International chairman of the admissions committee at Oxford University and president of Corpus Christi College, Sir Tim Lankester, had a few comments regarding how he saw our higher education sector.

 

When asked by Newsweek's  Emily Flynn Vencat, "Are you worried about the growing competition from up and coming universities in countries such as Australia, China and India?" He answered, "If I worked for a middle-ranking British university, I would say: “Definitely, yes.” Asian universities are quite competitive in terms of quality. But, again, without wanting to sound complacent, I think we at Oxford offer the best. I would be surprised if, for example, Australian universities could compete with us for quality.

 

"... the top three or four of British Universities are very hard to beat in [emerging university countries like] Asia or Australia. I think our competition—meaning the top four: Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial and LSE— is only [in ]North America.