We have included in the index only those schools which have produced at least three finalists over the period, and the 14 results should obviously be viewed in relation to the number of students from whom the index score is drawn.

The theoretical maximum score is 8.00 (ie each finalist is the overall winner).

CDN Interior Motives Student Design Competition: Schools quality index

	Number of Student finalists	Winning Index
Umea Institute	7	4.57
Azad University, Tehran	3	4.33
Chung Ang University	3	4.33
IED	3	4.366
Royal College of Art	25	4.04
Seoul National University of Technology	4	4.00
Strate College	6	3.83
Coventry University	11	3.82
Hong-ik University	8	3.75
Pforzheim University	3	3.67
Ural State Academy, Russia	3	3.67
College for Creative Studies	4	3.50
Art Center College of Design	3	3.00
Tsinghua University	3	3.00

source: judges' results for the period 2007-11.

Interesting results
On reviewing the results, the first observation is that they show London's RCA to be the clear leader overall. Its students are all at Masters level, however, while other schools are undergraduate or a mix of both. But any local bias (CDN is also headquartered in London) is eliminated because the judges, who are anyway based around the world, see student entries identified simply by code numbers. The names and schools of the finalists are announced only after the judging is complete.

The second observation is on what we have entitled the Winning Index. Measuring the achievement of students in the competition relative to the number that became finalists (itself a great success of course), shows a strong performance from Umea Institute, unexpectedly from Azad University in Tehran, and by no fewer than three South Korean schools, Chung Ang University , Seoul National University and Honk-ik University. Meanwhile the country's Jungang University has also produced a finalist (because only one it is not included).

Third is the performance of schools which are distinctly not mainstream; Azad University in Tehran and Russia's Ural State Academy are both in the winning index table, while three separate schools in Slovakia, one in Israel and another in Iran have all produced finalists. Design education in Iran certainly seems to be strong; Azad's results include two Awards winners in 2010, and yet exclude (because it is outside the timeframe we are assessing) their 2006 winner of the overall Student Design of the Year, Iman Maghsoudi.

Finally, what of the Chinese? The country has a shorter heritage of automotive design than many others, but Tsinghua University is just outside the top 10 in our leagues table at no.11. Having the minimum three finalists (but no winners yet) over the period means it squeezes into our winning index. The Beijing Institute of Technology has also produced a finalist. Perhaps in future, though, their students will tend to enter CDN's dedicated Car Design Awards China competition. 2012 is its third year and results are to be announced during the upcoming Beijing auto show in April.

For the full league table and all the results visit the competition website.

How the scoring works

No fewer than 421 different students from 84 different design schools have been shortlisted over the 10 years of the annual CDN Interior Motives Student Design Competition. We have chosen to count the results of the past five years, so from 2007 onwards, which is a total of 307 students from 66 schools. This is partly because the results then reflect recent teaching prowess, and partly to eliminate any ‘early adopter' advantage for those schools which were quickest to steer their students towards the competition.

Schools range from the most prestigious and well-known to the smaller and off-beat. Some are not focussed on transportation design at all. They include schools in countries like Moldova, Ireland, Israel and Mexico, as well as the expected European and North American power-houses (an omission of the Awards is that Japan's schools have rarely participated).

A student is shortlisted for an award if he or she receives the vote of at least one judge in the initial round of assessment of all the entries. For each shortlisted student, we have awarded their school one point in the league table.

If a student became a finalist, meaning the typically three who received the most judges' votes, the school gains 3 points. The judges then re-examine the work of these students, and one of them is selected as the winner in each awards category (there are between 6-10 categories per year), for which the school receives 5 points for each. At the conclusion, the judges chose the work of the ‘best' category winner to be the overall student design of the year. He (we have yet to see a woman as overall winner) earns the school 8 points.
Points are not cumulative, so a winner's points are 5, and do not include the 1 and the 3 for being shortlisted and becoming a finalist. An entry by a team of students is scored only once. And a student shortlisted for a number of awards categories in one year has only his/her best result counted; the competition is seeking to measure quality of entries, not volume.

A student achieving success in different years' competitions, however, is counted in each year and so contributes towards the school's overall score over the period of the league table. The rationale here is that there has clearly been some teaching between years.

For the Winning Index, only those schools which have produced at least three students who have become finalists are included.

Related Links:
CDN Interior Motives Awards2012
Car Design Awards China
Reports on the winners of all our competitions