Birkbeck College of the University of London has a long-standing history dating back to the 19th century. Research at Birkbeck in 11 subject areas is rated as ‘internationally excellent’ and ‘world leading’ while over 90 percent of Birkbeck academics are research-active.   Birkbeck has been acknowledged as a ‘global elite‘ university and it is often shortlisted by the Times Higher Education Awards as University of the Year. Consistently ranked as one of the top 150 universities in the world, Birkbeck is placed as 25th in Europe in terms of 13 wide-ranging performance indicators, comprising research, teaching, and international mix.   Birkbeck is a member of academic organisations such as the Association of Commonwealth Universities and the European University Association and it has a huge number of strategically significant partnerships with some of the highly ranked east Asian and south American universities. The university was awarded The Queen’s Anniversary Prize for excellence in higher education research in 2006.