Christ’s College has topped the 2022 Tompkins Table with a commanding lead once again.

With 46.10% of its undergraduates receiving firsts – a 2.1% increase since the last edition of the Table was published – Christ’s have maintained their string of first-place finishes since 2018.

With a score of 76.41, Christ’s is far ahead of the colleges that came second, Trinity (72.32) and third, St Catharine’s (72.25). Jesus College (71.23) had a standout showing to reach fourth, up nine places since 2019, the last time the Tompkins Table was published.

Over half of Christ’s female undergraduates graduating in 2022 achieved firsts (58.2%), while the proportion of male undergraduates receiving firsts fell to 45.6% this year. Christ’s director of admissions, Dr Emily Tomlinson, has previously cited the contribution of women to Christ’s success in 2019 – a trend that seems to have continued this year.

Dr Tomlinson said: “both the College and the University have work to do in tackling attainment gaps, but the success of our Women Finalists suggests that some things might be moving in the right direction, at last.”

Wolfson College achieved its best-ever finish this year at 21st, edging Hughes Hall and St Edmund’s College to finish as the highest-placed mature college. Meanwhile, King’s College recorded its worst performance in over 25 years, placed 22nd on the table.

As in 2019, Lucy Cavendish College remains at the bottom of the Tompkins Table. It had the lowest percentage of firsts of any college (16.91%), but that is nevertheless an improvement since the last edition of the table.

Lucy Cavendish’s JCR president admitted that “it is disappointing to see the position of Lucy in the Tompkins table this year,” but claimed “these statistics do not reflect the vibrant, diverse and highly successful college that Lucy Cavendish is today.”

Despite its impressive performance in 2019, Peterhouse College finished 15th – losing ground to Churchill College, Jesus and St John’s College this year and dropping 11 places.

The 2022 Tompkins Table

Position	College	Score%	Firsts	Position in 2019
1	Christ’s	76.41	46.10	1
2	Trinity	72.32	38.51	2
3	St Catharine’s	72.25	38.86	9
4	Jesus	71.23	36.42	13
5	Pembroke	71.04	46.01	3
6	St John’s	70.71	35.36	15
7	Gonville and Caius	70.4	32.45	16
8	Churchill	70.12	33.10	5
9	Corpus Christi	69.61	33.21	11
10	Queens’	69.38	31.51	6
11	Emmanuel	69.27	32.76	7
12	Clare	68.72	29.59	24
13	Downing	68.32	28.86	23
14	Selwyn	68.26	28.18	8
15	Peterhouse	67.78	30.77	4
16	Sidney Sussex	67.72	27.62	13
17	Robinson	67.67	28.02	21
18	Magdalene	67.49	28.53	18
19	Trinity Hall	67.01	26.91	10
20	Fitzwilliam	66.51	26.12	17
21	Wolfson	66.4	27.63	27
22	King’s	65.75	25.40	12
23	Hughes Hall	65.7	23.70	25
24	Newnham	65.55	25.82	22
25	Girton	64.33	22.24	20
26	Homerton	63.9	21.86	26
27	Murray Edwards	63.88	20.81	19
28	St Edmund’s	62.84	22.11	28
29	Lucy Cavendish	61.4	16.91	29

The Tompkins Table compares the academic performances of the 29 Cambridge colleges offering undergraduate courses. It has been published annually since 1981 and was first created by Peter Tompkins, a third-year mathematics student at Trinity College at the time. However, it was not published in 2020 and 2021 due to exam disruptions.

The last official Tompkins Table was published in 2019. Due to Covid-19 exam mitigations, the data for 2020-2021 was impacted by changes to how grades were awarded and achieved.

In previous years, the ranking system has received backlash from Cambridge SU, who argued in 2018 that the table reflected “the worst of the academic culture here in Cambridge.”