Cardiff University comes top

Cardiff University has retained its top spot for the second consecutive year as the highest-ranking institution that offers optometry on the Complete University Guide listing.

The league table is complied annually and rated on a university’s entry standards, student satisfaction, research quality and graduate prospects. Rating particularly high in all four elements, students rated their satisfaction levels as 4.43 out of five, while research was given 3.42 out of four, the highest of all UK universities that offer optometry.

Other institutions that offer optometry to rank highly were Glasgow Caledonian University in second place and Aston University in third.

Professor and director of learning and teaching at Cardiff University, David Whitaker, told OT: “At Cardiff we’re delighted to hold on to the top spot again in the Complete University Guide 2018. This reflects the high quality of Cardiff students and the teaching they receive from our dedicated staff. The data demonstrate the overall strength of UK optometry education. It is easy to forget that UK Universities deliver an extremely high standard of undergraduate optometric training without receiving the clinical funding enjoyed by others such as medicine and dentistry.”

League tables can play a key part when prospect students are choosing a university. The Complete University Guide league table rankings are based on what the organisation describes as “a carefully formatted methodology using several criteria or ‘measures’.”