h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It is a college of the University of London. All the colleges of the Univerity of London are essentially independent. However, a university is a degree awarding body, -and as non of the London colleges can award degrees independently of the University of London, then I don't think you are right in saying that Imperial is a university in all but name. Imperial and all the other London colleges are colleges, just like they say they are.

Are there any degree-awarding bodies (i.e. Universities/colleges) at all in Greater London that are not part of the University of London?

This has happened in Wales where the University of Glamorgan is a separate body to the colleges of Cardiff, Swansea, Bangor, et al., who are virtually independentand referred to as universities but in fact award degrees under the umbrella of the University of Wales.

Is Glamorgan what used to be called the Polytechnic of Wales?
The former polys will be able to award their own degrees and there are several of those in London.
Phil who has a bilingual degree certificate from the University of Wales.

There are several non University of London, universities in the Greater London area, South Bank University, Middlesex University, University of North London, University of East London, Guildhall University, etc.

I think this list represents the colleges of the University of London.

Birkbeck College,
Goldsmith's College,
Heythrop College,
Imperial College,
Jew's College,
King's College London,
Queen Mary and Westfield College,
University College London (UCL),
Wye College,
London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE),

Trinity College of Music,
Royal College of Music,
Royal Holloway College,
Royal Veterinary College,
Royal Academy of Music,
Royal Postgraduate Medical School,
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine,
School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS),
School of Pharmacy,
School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SEES),
London Business School,

There are several other institutions also which would better come under 'institutes'
rather than colleges, or are more properly regarded as part of another institution.
I just typed them in from the back of my University telephone directory.

I cannot speak for the original researcher, but I suppose what he tries to do is to emphasize the difference between Imperial College and the former Polytechnics, many of which are also called colleges. First of all, the academic prestige is quite different from those "colleges".

Secondly, Imperial College is almost a university on its own - its students are found on independent campuses, they are not members of the NUS, and with its science/technology/medicine/economics mixture of courses, it is quite a unique faculty. And rumours about IC giving out degrees on its own, divorcing the University of London, pop up quite frequently. So in effect, students feel as if they are in an independent university. How the bureaucracy is organized does not affect them directly anyway. So, from a student's perspective, Imperial College is a University in all but name....

Regards

Ikarus

This thread is long dead but you forgot St Georges Hospital Medical School, which is a college in itself and StBartholemews and the Royal London Hospital School of Medicine, which stupidly comes under Queen Marys College.