Most unhappy students found at top schools

LONDON, Sept. 21 (UPI) -- The more prestigious the university, the unhappier the students, a British school rankings survey published Sunday indicates.

Such elite British universities as Bristol, Edinburgh, Imperial College London, the London School of Economics and Manchester placed poorly in The Sunday Times' guide when it came to student satisfaction, the newspaper said.

Some analysts said that may be because the elite schools place more emphasis on research than on undergraduate teaching.

"The key thing is the amount of personal attention students get," Alan Smithers, director of the center for education research at Buckingham University, told The Sunday Times. His school, a private institution, ranked first in the newspaper's satisfaction table.

"The model of the British university system is self-motivated students learning from the experts in their field," Smithers said. "That has been maintained at the top of the table where institutions are small, or offer a high staff-to-student ratio or a tutorial system."