The London School of Economics and Political Science

King, was a former LSE professor. The former chairman of the House of Commons education committee, Barry Sheerman, sits on its board of governors, along with Labour peer Lord (Frank) Judd. Also on the board are Tory MPs Virginia Bottomley and Richard Shepherd, as well as Lord Saatchi and Lady Howe.
Commenting in 2001 on the rising status of the LSE, the British magazine The Economist stated that "two decades ago the LSE was still the poor relation of the University of London's other colleges. Now... it regularly follows Oxford and Cambridge in league tables of research output and teaching quality and is at least as well-known abroad as Oxbridge". According to the magazine, the school "owes its success to the single-minded, American-style exploitation of its brand name and political connections by the recent directors, particularly Mr Giddens and his predecessor, John Ashworth" and raises money from foreign students' high fees, who were drawn to LSE by the prominence of its academic figures, such as Richard Sennett.
In 2006, the school published a report disputing the costs of British government proposals to introduce compulsory ID cards. LSE academics were also represented on numerous national and international bodies in the early 21st century, including the UK Airports Commission, Independent Police Commission, Migration Advisory Committee, UN Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation, London Finance Commission, HS2 Limited, the UK government's Infrastructure Commission and advising on architecture and urbanism for the London 2012 Olympics
The LSE gained its own degree-awarding powers in 2006 and the first LSE degrees (rather than degrees of the University of London) were awarded in 2008.
Following the passage of the University of London Act 2018, the LSE (along with other member institutions of the University of London) announced in early 2019 that they would seek university status in their own right while remaining part of the federal university. Approval of university title was received from the Office for Students …