UNIVERSITY OF BEDFORDSHIRE

The 'University of Bedfordshire' is a university created by the merger of the University of Luton and the Bedford campus of De Montfort University on 1 August 2006 following approval by the Privy Council.^[2] Bedfordshire is a county in southern England. The University of Luton purchased the De Montfort campus in Bedford for an undisclosed sum.

Contents

History

Reputation

Campuses

Faculties

Educational partner institutions

Notable alumni

Photo Gallery

See also

References

External links

History

The 'University of Luton' was a university based in Luton, the largest town in Bedfordshire. The institution was founded as the Modern School in the 1890s. It became Luton College of Higher Education with the merger of Luton College of Technology and Putteridge Bury College of Education in the mid-seventies. With the passing of the Further and Higher Education Act, 1992 it converted to university status in 1993. On the 15 December 2005, the University announced that it was taking over the Bedford campus of De Montfort University. With permission from the Privy Council, the preferred name of the University of Bedfordshire came into effect on 1 August 2006.^[3]
The campus at Bedford dates back to the Bedford Training College for Teachers which was founded in 1882 and Bedford Physical Training College founded in 1903. There are currently just under 3,000 students based in Bedford.
Putteridge Bury is a neo-Elizabethan country mansion located on the edge of Luton on the A505 to Hitchin. The campus is situated in approximately thirty acres of landscaped gardens. Putteridge Bury can be traced back to Edward the Confessor's time and has links to the Domesday Book. The building was completed in 1911 and was designed by architects Sir Ernest George and Alfred Yeats in the style of Chequers, having had various redesigns and rebuilds over the years. The campus is home to the university's postgraduate business school as well as the university’s Conference Centre.

Reputation

Bedfordshire was ranked 84th of 113 British universities in ''The Times'' Good University Guide league table, released in August 2007^[4] and 95 out of 150 institutions in The Guardian's rankings. The Guardian's league tables are compiled mainly on the basis of teaching data (staff/student ratio, job prospects, inclusiveness), and the Times's also include data on research ratings and the percentage of students who complete a degree.
''The Sunday Times'' awarded the University the title of Best New University in 2004 (prior to the merger of the University).^[5]
The Guardian's national league tables for 2008 rates the University of Bedfordshire third in the country for Media-related courses^[6] with a score of 96.90 out of 100 and 13th for Sport. ^[7]. Hoever the same rankings list the university as 106 out of 110 in Computer Science and IT.^[8]
The Nursing and Midwifery programmes have been ranked fourth in the country.^{[9] [10]}
The QAA conducted a thorough institutional audit of the University as a whole in 2005 (prior to the merger of the University), this resulted in the audit team’s questioning of the academic standards of its awards and its lack of confidence in the universities quality standards.^[11] However, since the audit was taken in 2005 the QAA has been provided with information that indicates that appropriate action has been taken by the University in response to the findings of this report. As a result the audit was signed off in July 2007.^[12]
A small number of staff have complained in a survey about racism at the University.^[13]

Campuses

The University has three main campuses:^[14] Luton (in the town centre), Putteridge Bury (on the outskirts of Luton), and Bedford (on Polhill Avenue). There is also teaching for nursing and midwifery degrees on satellite sites at the Luton and Dunstable, Bedford, Stoke Mandeville and High Wycombe General hospitals.

Faculties

The University of Bedfordshire has four faculties, encompassing a number of schools, departments and divisions.^[15]

★ Faculty of Creative Arts, Technologies and Science

★
★ Computing and Information Systems

★
★ Education Studies

★
★ Media, Art and Design

★
★ Psychology

★
★ Science

★
★ Sport and Exercise Science

★ Faculty of Education and Contemporary Studies

★
★ Business and Applied Social Sciences

★
★ Education

★
★ Performing Arts and English

★
★ Physical Education and Sports Sciences

★ Faculty of Health and Social Science

★
★ Applied Social Studies

★
★ Healthcare (Nursing and Midwifery)

★ University of Bedfordshire Business School

★
★ Business and Marketing

★
★ Language and Communication

★
★ Law, Accounting and Strategy

★
★ Tourism, Leisure and Human Resource Management

Educational partner institutions

The University works together with a number of partner institutions to offer a range of courses.^[16]

★ Barnfield College

★ Bedford College

★ British School of Osteopathy

★ Castle College Nottingham (previously Broxtowe College, Nottingham)

★ Dunstable College

★ Grantham College

★ Leicester College

★ Luton Sixth Form College

★ Milton Keynes College

★ Oxford and Cherwell Valley College

★ Tresham Institute of Further and Higher Education

Notable alumni

★ Becky Jago - Presenter of BBC's Newsround - Media Performance.

★ Gemma Hunt - Presenter of CBBC - Media Performance.^[17]

★ Charlie George - Presenter on MAX TV - Media Performance.

★ Matt Fisher - Station Sound Imaging Producer BBC Radio 1 - Media Performance with Radio.

★ Debbie Randle - Senior Broadcast Journalist BBC Radio 1 - Modern English Studies.

★ Marie Kemp - Presenter on BBC Radio Berkshire - Media Performance and Radio.

★ Paul Woloszyn - BBC Digital Text - Modern English Studies.

★ Lucy Tricker - Chiltern FM Radio DJ

Photo Gallery

See also

★ De Montfort University

References

1. Table 0a - All students by institution, mode of study, level of study, gender and domicile 2005/06
2. http://www.beds.ac.uk/aboutus/history History
3. http://education.independent.co.uk/higher/article1210272.ece Article in The Independent re the Merger
4.
5. Best New University 2004
6. Guardian League table for media studies showing Bedfordshire as 3rd
7. Guardian rankings for Sports
8. [1]
9. Teaching Hospital rating
10. http://www.beds.ac.uk/courses/bysubject/heacar University of Bedfordshire Healthcare and Nursing homepage
11. [2]
12. [3]
13. see Phil Baty, 'Unacceptable harassment claimed by 9% in survey', Times Higher Education Supplement, 6 October 2006).
14. Campuses
15. Departments
16. Educational partners
17. http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/backstage/cbbc_stars/gemma.shtml

External links

★ University of Bedfordshire

★ University of Luton Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education Institutional Audit April 2005