Few universities can rival St Andrews. This 600-year-old institution offers students everything they could want and a lot more besides. Not only does it provide an abundance of history and tradition along with a first-class modern education taught by academics at the top of their field, it does so in a beautiful location on the east coast of Scotland.

St Andrews has finished fifth in our league table this year, achieving the highest-ever ranking for a Scottish institution and becoming at the same time the highest-placed multi-faculty university behind Oxbridge.

In so doing, it secures our award of Sunday Times Scottish University of the Year for the second time in three years, beating The Robert Gordon University, the runner-up. St Andrews last won the accolade in 2006 and was also our UK University of the Year in 2002 and runner-up last year.

When Dr Brian Lang retires as principal and vice-chancellor later this year, he will do so with the satisfaction that he leaves St Andrews ranked the fifth best university in Britain.

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The university also gets outstanding results for student satisfaction, coming sixth overall in the national student survey, using a rigorous Sunday Times analysis of the results. Among multi-faculty institutions only Cambridge, Loughborough and Exeter finish ahead of it.

“We are very, very pleased,” says Lang, who compares Scotland’s first and the UK’s third oldest university to a Morgan sports car. “It looks very old-fashioned on the outside but when you lift the bonnet it is high-tech,” he says. “It is not very comfortable. It rattles, but it gets you there, and it gets you there in some style.”

The discomfort he talks about has nothing to do with the state of any of the buildings. Indeed, Lang has spent more than £100m upgrading the estate during his eight-year tenure, including new student accommodation with en-suite facilities. He is talking about the academic rigour that draws the very brightest from across the UK and around the world and requires them to focus seriously on their studies.

“People have to work hard,” he says. “It is a challenge. It is not all parties and nightclubs.” In fact there are no nightclubs, although St Andrews apparently has more pubs per square foot than anywhere else in Britain.

“We have a real concern to make sure students have a worthwhile and memorable time here,” adds Lang.

With a projected dropout rate of just 5.5%, well below funding council expectations, the university appears to be achieving this aim.

St Andrews is one of Europe’s most research-intensive seats of learning — more than a quarter of its turnover of £125m comes from research grants and contracts. It is the top-rated university in Scotland for research and teaching quality, and is consistently ranked among the UK top 10.

Lang expects it to maintain its track record when the latest research assessments are published in December.

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