Why it would make sense for Imperial and LSE to merge

International Students
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[<em>] Both are specialist schools that specialize in ** complimentary ** areas: Imperial in engineering, medicine, and natural sciences (physics, chemistry, biology); LSE in social sciences (cultural anthropology, economics, political science, sociology), humanities (history, human geography, philosophy), and law. The only areas where the two institutions overlap are mathematics (with different emphasis though by each of them) and business/management. There would be almost no redundancies and plenty of synergies in a prospective merger.
[</em>] Both schools are recognized as having world-class excellence in most of the areas where they specialize and have world-class faculty and research.
[<em>] Both schools are similarly selective with approximately equal average UCAS points for incoming freshmen and a few extra selective courses (e.g. economics and law at LSE; engineering courses, medicine and math at Imperial).
[</em>] Both schools are physically located in London, were founded in the late 19th/early 20th century, and have a similar “modern” culture (contrasting e.g. with the more traditional/formal Oxbridge culture). At one point in history, both were part of the federal University of London (LSE still is; Imperial has withdrawn and is now on its own).
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<p>What do you think ?</p>

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<p>why are you making this thread here, of all places lol ?</p>

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<p>Because this is the international students forum and both Imperial and LSE are international schools (from a U.S. perspective). Which other forum would you rather move the thread to ?</p>

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<p>there :D</p>

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<p>Thanks, feel free to move the thread then. I don’t know how to do it (sorry !).</p>

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<p>No they shouldn’t merge. They may look similar but it doesn’t provide enough basis for them to merge. There wont be any competition amongst institutions if everyone just decides to merge.</p>

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<p>As I said, Imperial and LSE do ** not ** compete with each other because, with very few exceptions, the sets of courses they offer are complementary. Both Imperial and LSE do compete however with Oxbridge and other (less prestigious) generalist universities like UCL, Warwick, Durham, etc. </p>

<p>Whereas it doesn’t make sense for two generalist universities to merge (for the reasons you stated above), a merger between two complementary specialist colleges makes a lot of sense.</p>