King's and Queens' keep Cambridge lead

KING'S and Queens' colleges continue to hold the top places in the Tompkins league table for finals results at Cambridge University, writes Judith Judd.

King's is top for the fifth year running and Queens' second for the second year. Robinson and Magdalene are bottom. Trinity Hall and Sidney Sussex significantly improved their performance, rising 11 places into the top six. Downing and St John's fell a similar number of places to the bottom half of the table.

College positions in the table, which is compiled for the Independent by Peter Tompkins, a London actuary, are calculated by awarding five points for a first-class degree, three for an upper second, two for a lower second and one for a third. Results are tabled as a percentage of the maximum points that a college might have scored if everyone had a first.

Mr Tompkins also supplies an alternative table based on the results of all exams in all years. In this list, Christ's comes first with Queens' second, Trinity Hall third and King's slips to 11th.

Results overall continue to improve. This year nearly 20 per cent of students were awarded firsts and fewer than 3 per cent thirds, compared with 18 per cent and 3.5 per cent last year.

King's has the highest percentage of firsts (31.1 per cent) followed by Peterhouse (26.5 per cent) and Trinity (26 per cent). Magdalene (9.5 per cent) and Emmanuel (11.6 per cent) have the lowest.

New Hall, one of the two remaining women's colleges, is third from the bottom and Newnham, the other, moves up from 22nd to 15th.

(Table omitted)