The district's flagship business school, the University of Bradford School of Management, has appeared in the Financial Times's top 20 of European Schools.

The award-winning institution was beaten only by the London School of Economics and University of Durham Business School.

The FT's European Masters of Management list is based on a number of criteria including average salaries three years after graduating; value for money; career rankings of graduates; and the employment rate three months after graduating.

Bradford has the most international set of students of any European business school, with 92 per cent studying in a different country from that of their citizenship. The School attracts students and lecturers from every continent.

Bradford's degrees have strong international credibility. Many of their graduates have found jobs in different countries from where they studied, and the School achieved a particularly high careers ranking, based on job seniority of graduates against the size of their company.

Professor Arthur Francis, Dean of the School of Management, said: "This is tremendous news and a great credit to the excellence and practicality of the teaching at our School.

"We have an outstanding record of helping graduates to find top jobs - borne out by our high ranking in this area - and it is clear that the courses are relevant and useful to our graduates.

"We attract two types of people - those sent by their employers to increase their skills and help promising managers to move up the ranks. And individuals who want to boost their careers through a combination of getting better and more senior jobs and better pay. Clearly we are delivering for both employers and our students."

Mr Francis said: "We are one of Europe's leading business schools so we expected to do reasonably well.

"This really is testament to the talent and dedication of our staff. We have worked very hard to bring together an experienced and talented team of lecturers and this has shown in the FT evaluation.

"We attract some of the best students from around the world who go on to better and more senior jobs through working here.

"The FT rating is good news for us and good news for Bradford."

Prof Francis said some of the biggest names in business had studied at the School of Management including Kate Swann, currently chief executive of WH Smith.

About 250 students enter the school each academic year.

e-mail: dan.webber@bradford.newsquest.co.uk

  • See Our View