Golden triangle (universities)

The golden triangle is an unofficial grouping of elite research universities located in the cities of Cambridge, London and Oxford in the southeast of England. The triangle is occasionally referred to as the Loxbridge triangle, a portmanteau of London and Oxbridge.
The corners of the triangle are formed by the University of Cambridge, the University of Oxford, and various universities in London. These are typically Imperial College London, University College London, King's College London, and the London School of Economics (although some sources omit either or both of King's College London and the London School of Economics). Occasionally, other universities in London will also be included, such as the London Business School and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Members.
Golden triangle universities possess some of the largest UK university financial endowments; endowment sizes range from UCL's £139 million (2019) to Cambridge's £6.44 billion (including colleges) Further, each university receives millions of pounds in research fundings and other grants from the UK government, criticised by leaders of some other universities as disproportionate and not in the best interests of the country as a whole. In 2013/14, universities in Oxford, Cambridge and London received 46% of research funding in the UK, up from 42.6% a decade earlier.
International students.
Data published by Google in 2015 showed that the top 5 non-US universities searched for by US students were all in the golden triangle: Oxford, Cambridge, King's College London, UCL and the LSE; Imperial College London was seventh (behind Edinburgh). Among UK providers with more than 10,000 students, the LSE had the highest proportion of non-UK students in 2018/19 at 67.5%, followed by Imperial at 52.7%, UCL in fourth (after University of the Arts London) at 47.7% and King's in 8th (after St Andrews, SOAS and Edinburgh) at 37.7%. Totals as of 2018/19 for non-UK students broken down by level of study are:
Rankings.
World.
Golden triangle universities generally do well on international rankings, which strongly reflect research performance. The LSE has, however, expressed concerns about a bias in rankings against smaller institutions and in favour of universities with large science, technology, engineering and mathematics programmes. Some global rankings, such as those produced by Times Higher Education (THE) and Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), correct for the sizes of institutions in calculating their results but others, such as the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), make no such adjustment.
National.
The Golden Triangle universities generally do well on British university league tables, with Cambridge and Oxford consistently in the top three, and Imperial and LSE ranked in the top ten by all compilers. UCL, however, misses out on a top ten place in the Guardian University Guide, while
King's College London fails to make the top ten in any of the major rankings.
Research income.
The institutions typically considered members of the triangle have among the highest research incomes of all British universities and collaborate closely through initiatives such as the G5, Global Medical Cluster (GMEC), MedCity, and SES. With the exception of the LSE, significant fractions of their research income come from clinical medicine, varying from 38.2% (Cambridge) to 58.9% (King's College London), compared to an average across the UK of 33.7%. Overall, 48.1% of the research income of the six institutions (48.8% excluding the LSE) comes from clinical medicine research. Overall, 31.9% of all research income of UK universities in 2018/19 went to one of the golden triangle institutions.
The balance of funding between the 'golden triangle' and the rest of the UK has been questioned, and was specifically included in the terms of reference for an enquiry in 2018 by the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee. According to defenders of the level of funding going to the golden triangle institutions, "The apparent concentration of research in the golden triangle is little more than a reflection of the distribution of people in the UK". Analysis of grant proposals to Research Councils UK between 2012–13 and 2016–17 has shown that golden triangle institutions do not have unusually high success rates (two are actually below the expected range), but that the northern universities of Durham, Lancaster and York do.
Graduate earning power.
Research in 2017 by the Institute for Fiscal Studies also indicates graduates from the LSE, Oxford and Imperial earn, on average, over £40,000 per year 5 years after graduation, making them the highest earners 5 years after graduation amongst British university graduates.