There are lots of university league tables out there; and the University of Edinburgh maintains an excellent page assessing these various leagues and rankings. For example, Times Higher Education (rankings), Newsweek (pdf), Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Wuhan University all produce annual tables of universities worldwide. Similarly, most of the UK newspapers produce tables of the UK’s universities (Guardian | Independent | Telegraph | Times). The Sunday Times annually produces just such a list but also has a parallel list of Irish universities. Two headlines from yesterday’s edition:

NUI Maynooth named Irish University of the Year

NUI Maynooth has been named the 2008 Irish University of the Year in The Sunday Times University Guide 2008, published with the newspaper on Sunday. Ireland’s smallest but fastest growing university saw off competition from University College Dublin which came second. The Co Kildare university won the award after rising to fourth place in the newspaper’s annual league table of Irish third-level institutions which is published this weekend. For the past four years NUI Maynooth has been ranked seventh in The Sunday Times university league table.

Maynooth has become the top institution in the republic for research income won per academic and has the best graduate employment record of any Irish university at almost 100 per cent. It is working with over 50 multinational companies on research projects. The Sunday Times University of the Year award is made on league table positions but also on the institution’s contribution on a local, national and international level. NUI Maynooth was judged to have an excellent record in all these areas. …

There’s more on this story under the similar headline: NUI Maynooth wins Irish Sunday Times University of the year. And NUIM’s nimble Communications Office already have this story on their website; update: a local community portal has also picked up on it. But, just to show that you can do anything with league tables:

Trinity College Dublin tops Sunday Times University league table

Trinity College Dublin tops the Sunday Times University league table for the sixth successive year, writes Colm Murphy.

Trinity’s success was due largely to it attracting the highest calibre of entrants academically, which the league table rewards above all else. But despite this, its students only got the republic’s third highest grades when graduating. University College Cork had the best graduate grades, with 71% getting a first or a 2:1 last year compared to Trinity’s 67%. But this was not sufficient for it to retain second place this year as the resurgent University College Dublin overtook it. …