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All undergraduate and professional degree courses in the UK are subject to annual rankings via the Complete University Guide, The Times and the Sunday Times Good University Guide, and the Guardian University Guide, each compiling data from the universities and institutions themselves, national funding councils, the National Student Survey (NSS), the Higher Education Statistics Agency, and the Research Excellence Frameworks (REF), to objectively analyse and compare the different courses, each one weighting the data about the courses in different ways to focus in on different aspects of the courses, such as student satisfaction, student support, graduate prospects, research foundation, and so on and so forth. For one thing, this helps prospective students choose which courses to apply for and where to study.

Here at University of Glasgow and now as part of SCMH, we have with our Physiology & Sports Science course been achieving excellent ranking results already over a long period of time, but the last few years have been extraordinary, even by our standards. Last year, in the rankings for 2022, Physiology & Sports Science at Glasgow topped all 3 rankings; and this year, and just recently published, we topped in 2 (Times and Guardian) and came 3rd in the remaining one (Complete), but with a score of 99/100. Recently, just now in mid-September, The Times and the Guardian completed the rankings calendar, and both ranked Glasgow as #1, amidst a competition of about 80-90 other institutions that also offer a sports science degree. To add to it, both rankings place Glasgow at 100 points out of 100 achievable, but some 10 points above number 2, so while Glasgow is the only course that scores in the 90s and 100, places 2 to 8 score in the 80s and the rest even further below that. This tells us Glasgow not only tops a league that is very big, but, and to use a phrase from the sporting world, "by a mile."

Say Ole Kemi and Viki Penpraze, programme directors for Physiology & Sports Science: "Obviously we are very happy with the outcome of these rankings and the top places and high scores we achieve. Perhaps they don't change a whole lot of what we do and nor do we pay too much attention to them, but our job is to look after students in the best way we can, to equip them as well as we can for their futures, and to offer them meaningful and future-directed learning and training opportunities, so of course we appreciate this and the whole student experience being recognized." And: "We must stress that this reflects and is only made possible because everyone in the team contributes equally well and equally hard, so big thanks to everyone involved, from academics to technicians to the admin behind."

These results, they might open up some eyes of prospective students (and parents) in that they should look to Glasgow. Continues Ole: "My colleagues and I, we put in a lot of effort and thinking into how to make the course the best possible, we continually evaluate and adapt to changing trends and to what we think the students need, perhaps even before they know themselves, we bring in colleagues and people outside the university to speak to the students and offer their perspectives from 'the real world' of the sports and exercise sciences in the form of seminars and career talks and other initiatives, we provide research opportunities within our own on-going research agendas, and we offer placements, scholarships and internships that also send our students traveling around the world, or just around Glasgow for that matter, to work and gain first-hand experience with outside practitioners, scientists, employers, professional sports clubs, national organizations and agencies, other universities, colleges and research organizations, sports medicine clinics, and the like." The Physiology & Sports Science team also make a point of staying connected with students after they graduate and leave us. Again from Viki: "This is something we work hard with, to stay connected and in communication with students once they graduate and move into employment, and this benefits both current and former students in that it creates a networking resource of people at different stages of their careers, so the University of Glasgow sports science alumni actually end up helping each other."

The other SCMH undergraduate degrees Physiology, Human Biology and Pharmacology also all do really well in these rankings: Physiology together with Anatomy came #2 in the Times and #3 in the Guardian rankings, Human Biology #5 in the Times and #4 in the Guardian, and Pharmacology #3 in the Times and #7 in the Guardian. So while all degrees offered here in MVLS and across the University of Glasgow are really good, SCMH seems to have landed some exceptionally high-ranking degrees into its portfolio with the new MVLS restructure.

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First published: 24 October 2022