Universities in the UK

The UK has 106 institutions that have the title of university (if you count federal institutions like the Universities of London and Wales as one university). A university has been granted authority by the government to award degrees and to design and validate its own degree programmes. This means that your final Masters or Doctoral degree will be awarded by the university itself, and the university is responsible for the quality and organisation of the programme.

Each university is different from every other one. Each has its own range of degree programmes, its own character and its own reputation for subjects that it is regarded as being good at teaching and researching (and, of course, those where it may not be as strong!). They are different, too, because of their size, location, buildings or campuses and also in the sorts of student they see as their main market. Some see research as a very important part of their work. Others see teaching as the most important activity and may not be quite so concerned about research. In fact, the diversity of UK universities can be one of the most difficult factors in making a choice of where to study. It is important therefore to think carefully about what it is that you need or want from the university you choose – we will look at this issue a little later in this section.

To help understand the types of university, though, we can group them in a number of ways. The simplest grouping is into what are called ‘old universities’ and ‘new universities’.

‘Old universities’
Old universities are those that were called ‘university’ before 1992. Despite the name, though, not all of these universities have long histories, and there are a number of types of ‘old’ university.

Ancient universities
The ancient universities are those founded more than 150 years ago, and this group includes only five institutions – Oxford (founded in 1096), Cambridge (1209), Edinburgh (1583), London (1826) and Durham (1832). An important feature of Oxford, Cambridge and Durham universities is the individual colleges which make up the university. A college is a small separate institution that recruits its own students, but who are then automatically students of the university. Most take both male and female students, although a few remain as single sex colleges. The colleges provide accommodation, social and study facilities in their own right and are small communities, usually in distinctive and attractive ancient buildings. Some teaching is undertaken by the colleges, but most is provided by the academic departments of the university. The university is responsible for examinations and standards and provides the degree award at the end of a programme. Students in such a college environment often have a very strong allegiance to their college as well as to the university overall.

The civic universities
In the late 1800s, universities began to be recognised as important in providing the knowledge on which economic growth depended and as a symbol in themselves of knowledge and power. Several of the large cities in the UK established universities at this time. They include the universities of Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield and Glasgow, and The Queen’s University in Belfast in Northern Ireland. All were founded close to the city centre and are characterised by many large Victorian buildings of dark stone or brick. Between 1900 and 1960 a number of other cities developed universities with the same characteristics, including Leicester, Nottingham and Southampton. This whole group of universities are sometimes referred to as ‘redbrick universities’ because of their distinctive architectural characteristics.

The 1960s universities
During the early years of the 1960s a British government report recommended that the UK needed to increase the number of its universities to support economic growth. As a result many new universities were created. Some of these 1960s universities were established from new, built on greenfield campus sites, such as the universities of Bath, Essex, Keele, Lancaster and Warwick. Others were created from already existing colleges of advanced technology. These included the universities of Aston, Brunel and Bradford. Most of these universities are based on specialist campuses and are characterised by 1960s architectural designs using concrete and glass.

‘New’ universities
The ‘new’ universities are those institutions given university status since 1992. Many are not ‘new’ in a strict sense as they have been educational institutions for many years, some with histories that date back into the eighteenth century. Most are what were known in the 1970s and 1980s as polytechnics. In 1992 the government decided to give the polytechnics the same powers and status as universities, and as a result a large group of new universities was created, including for example, the universities of Hertfordshire, Luton, Portsmouth, Plymouth and Sunderland.

University groupings
A number of other groupings have become established to represent the interest of particular types of university or for marketing purposes. The following are some of the main groups you may come across.
• The Russell Group is an informal group of 20 universities which regard themselves as the premier research universities in the UK.
• The 1994 Group is a group of 19 research-led ‘old’ universities.
• Million+ (formerly the Coalition of Modern Universities) is a group of 29 ‘new’ universities.
• International groups: many universities in the UK have a high status and standing around the world, and a number of international groupings have been established between leading universities in many parts of the world to promote their own research and academic interests. Two such groups are the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) and Universitas 21.

Membership of any of these groups by a university is not in itself an indication of the quality of a particular programme that it might offer. Rather it indicates the aims and mission of the university and the position it is choosing for itself in the UK and global higher education market. It may indicate something of the priority the university places on research or teaching and how far it is part of national and global networks of researchers – but it should be used with caution in choosing where to study for your Masters or Doctoral degree.