| University of Warwick | |||||||||||||||
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| Motto | Mens agitat molem (Latin) | ||||||||||||||
| Motto in English | Mind over matter | ||||||||||||||
| Established | 1965 | ||||||||||||||
| Type | Public | ||||||||||||||
| Endowment | £5.8 million (as at 31 July 2010)[1] | ||||||||||||||
| Chancellor | Sir Richard Lambert | ||||||||||||||
| Vice-Chancellor | Prof Nigel Thrift | ||||||||||||||
| Admin. staff | 4,448 inc. 1,769 academic staff (full-time equivalent 2009/10)[1] | ||||||||||||||
| Students | 18,434 (full-time equivalent 2009/10)[1] | ||||||||||||||
| Undergraduates | 11,906 (full-time equivalent 2009/10)[1] | ||||||||||||||
| Postgraduates | 4,704 (full-time equivalent 2009/10)[1] | ||||||||||||||
| Location | Coventry, England, United Kingdom | ||||||||||||||
| Colours |
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| Affiliations | |||||||||||||||
| Website | www.warwick.ac.uk | ||||||||||||||
The University of Warwick (informally Warwick University or Warwick) is a public research university located in Coventry, United Kingdom. It was founded in 1965 as part of a government initiative to expand access to higher education and Warwick Medical School was opened in 2000.
Warwick describes itself as a "research-led institution" and in the last Research Assessment Exercise was ranked seventh in the UK.[2] Warwick is the second most-targeted university in the UK by top employers[3] and has a "strong reputation in the UK for research and excellent links with industry".[4] It had a total income of £408.5 million in 2009/10, of which £79.8 million came from research grants and contracts.[1]
Warwick is a member of AACSB, the Association of Commonwealth Universities, the Association of MBAs, EQUIS, the European University Association, the Russell Group and Universities UK.
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The idea for a university in Warwickshire was first mooted shortly after the Second World War, but it was a bold and imaginative partnership of the city and the county which brought the university into being on a 400-acre (1.6 km2) site jointly granted by the two authorities.[5] There was some discussion between local sponsors from both the city and county over whether it should be named after Coventry or Warwickshire.[5] The name "University of Warwick" was adopted, even though the County Town of Warwick itself lies some 8 miles (13 km) to its southwest and Coventry's city centre is only 3.5 miles (5.6 km) northeast of the campus.[6][7][8][9] The establishment of the University of Warwick was given approval by the government in 1961 and received its Royal Charter of Incorporation in 1965. Since then, the university has incorporated the former Coventry College of Education in 1979 and has extended its land holdings by the continuing purchase of adjoining farm land. The university also benefited from a substantial donation from the family of Jack Martin, which enabled the construction of the Warwick Arts Centre.
The university initially admitted a small intake of graduate students in 1964 and took its first 450 undergraduates in October 1965. Since its establishment Warwick has expanded its grounds to 721 acres (2.9 km2) with many modern buildings and academic facilities, lakes and woodlands. In the 1960s and 1970s, Warwick had a reputation as a politically radical institution.[10] More recently, the University was seen as a favoured institution of the Labour government which was in power from 1997 to 2010.[11][12] It was academic partner for a number of flagship Government schemes including the National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth and the NHS University (now defunct). Tony Blair described Warwick as "a beacon among British universities for its dynamism, quality and entrepreneurial zeal".[11]
The Leicester Warwick Medical School, a new medical school based jointly at Warwick and Leicester University, opened in September 2000.[13]
On the recommendation of Tony Blair, Bill Clinton chose Warwick as the venue for his last major foreign policy address as US President in December 2000. Sandy Berger, Clinton’s National Security Advisor, explaining the decision in his Press Briefing on 7 December 2000, said that: "Warwick is one of Britain's newest and finest research universities, singled out by Prime Minister Blair as a model both of academic excellence and independence from the government."[14] In his speech Clinton covered a number of issues, including Third World debt relief, fighting infectious diseases such as AIDS, basic education rights, and the "digital divide", which he summarized as the new development agenda for the 21st century. Clinton was accompanied by his wife Hillary Clinton and daughter Chelsea Clinton. During his visit, he planted a Pin Oak (Quercus palustris) sapling outside Senate House, the (then) university administration block.
We are in Shakespeare's country with Stratford but twenty minutes away by motorcade. His genius always provides apt quotations and in Henry VI Part Two, a powerful Duke chides the Earl of Warwick with the phrase "ambitious Warwick, let thy betters speak!". Important for us to remember that on a day such as this. But I cannot omit the Earl's riposte "Warwick may live to be the best of all!". - Sir Brian K. Follett[15]
In February 2001, IBM donated a new S/390 computer and software worth £2 million to Warwick, to form part of a "Grid" enabling users to remotely share computing power.[16] In April 2004 Warwick merged with the Wellesbourne and Kirton sites of Horticulture Research International.[17] In July 2004 Warwick was the location for an important agreement between the Labour Party and the Trade Unions on Labour policy and trade union law, which has subsequently become known as the Warwick Agreement. According to The Guardian newspaper the agreement "made peace between discontented elements in the unions and the government. It thereby averted the threat of mass disaffiliation from the party by the unions and helped to secure union support for Labour in the 2005 election."[18]
In June 2006 the new University Hospital Coventry opened, including a 102,000 sq ft university clinical sciences building.[19] Warwick Medical School was granted independent degree-awarding status in 2007, and the School's partnership with the University of Leicester was dissolved in the same year.[20][21] In February 2010, Lord Bhattacharyya, director and founder of the WMG unit at Warwick, made a £1 million donation to the university to support science grants and awards.[22][23]
Warwick is located on the outskirts of Coventry, 5.5 km (3.4 mi) southwest of the city centre (and not in Warwick as its name suggests). The university's main site comprises three contiguous campuses, all within walking distance of each other. The university also owns a site in Wellesbourne, acquired in 2004 when it merged with Horticulture Research International.
Warwick was found to have the best campus of any British university in a 2005 survey by Opinionpanel and the BBC.[24] In a recent survey of UK university students by The Times the Warwick campus came first.[25]
The main Warwick campus occupies a 2.8 km2 site straddling the boundary between the City of Coventry and the County of Warwickshire. The original buildings of the campus are in contemporary 1960s architecture, a style chosen in deliberate contrast to the medieval, classical, or "red brick" character of older British universities. The campus contains all of the main student amenities, all but four of the student halls of residence, and the Students' Union. Other amenities include a Costcutter supermarket, pharmacy, three bank branches (Natwest, Barclays and Santander), a hair salon, a post office, a copy shop, and an STA Travel agency. A Tesco superstore, which is open 24 hours, is located at the nearby Cannon Park shopping centre.
The main campus hosts a large leisure centre, comprising 25 m swimming pool, two sports halls, gymnasium, squash courts and rock-climbing facility. Elsewhere on campus are a number of other sports halls, outside tennis courts, 400 m athletics track, multi-purpose outdoor surfaces and cricket grounds. Sports facilities are being constantly expanded, following the commencement of Warwick Sport, a 2005 joint venture between the university and the Students' Union. Indoor tennis courts have recently been opened on the Westwood Campus sports venue and an Olympic-size swimming pool has been rumoured in the long-term, depending on Coventry City Council's priorities. Most of the university's sports facilities are open to the general public.
During the 2012 Summer Olympics, some football matches will be played at the nearby Ricoh Arena, home of Coventry City Football Club, and Warwick will provide training and residential facilities for the Olympic teams.[26]
In 2003 Warwick acquired the former headquarters of National Grid plc, which it converted into an administration building renamed University House. There is a student-run facility called the "Learning Grid" in the building, which includes two floors of PC clusters, scanners, photocopiers, a reference library, interactive whiteboards and plasma screens for use by individuals and for group work.[27]
Situated at the centre of Warwick's main campus, the Warwick Arts Centre is a multi-venue arts complex and attracts around 300,000 visitors a year to over 3,000 individual events embracing contemporary and classical music, drama, dance, comedy, films and visual art. The centre comprises six spaces on the same site, including a concert hall, two theatres, a cinema, gallery, and conference room as well as hospitality suites, a restaurant, cafe, shops, and two bars. The site also includes the university bookshop.
The Arts Centre also houses the University of Warwick Music Centre with practice rooms, and an ensemble rehearsal room where music societies and groups such as the Brass Band rehearse.
The centre comprises:
The White Koan, situated directly outside the main entrance of Warwick arts centre, is a modern art sculpture designed by the artist, Lilian Lijn.[28][29] The Koan is 6 metres (20 ft) high,[28] white in colour and decorated with elliptical of fluorescent lights. It is rotated by an electric motor whilst illuminated. The Koan is intended to represent the Buddhist quest for questions without answers (see koan).
The Koan was originally made in 1971 as part of the Peter Stuyvesant Foundation City Sculpture Project and was first sited in Plymouth and then in London at the Hayward Gallery. It was purchased by the university in 1972.[28]
In November 2005, Warwick made public its vision for the year 2020 and outlined proposals for how it would like to develop its campus over the next 15 years. These proposals built upon recent construction activity which included a new Mathematics and Statistics Building, a new Computer Science Building, new Business School buildings, the new Heronbank Residences and an expanded Sports Centre. The proposals would see a shift in the "centre of gravity" on campus away from the Students' Union towards the new University House and a proposed "Academic Square", located around the new maths and computer science buildings.
Warwick is governed by three formal bodies: the Court, Council and the Senate. In addition to these, a Steering Committee provide strategic leadership in between meetings of the formal bodies. Faculties are overseen by Faculty Boards which report to the Senate.[30] The Principal Officers of the university have responsibility for day-to-day operations of the University.[31]
In the financial year ended 31 July 2010, Warwick had a total income (including share of joint ventures) of £408.48 million (2008/09 - £375.66 million) and total expenditure of £388.91 million (2008/09 - £374.38 million).[1] Key sources of income included £133.27 million from academic fees and support grants (2008/09 - £115.86 million), £89.75 million from Funding Council grants (2008/09 - £86.82 million), £79.80 million from research grants and contracts (2008/09 - £72.98 million) and £0.76 million from endowment and investment income (2008/09 - £1.75 million).[1] During the 2009/10 financial year Warwick had a capital expenditure of £46.78 million (2008/09 - £51.90 million).[1]
At year end Warwick had reserves and endowments of £123.01 million (2008/09 - £111.35 million) and total net assets of £259.86 million (2008/09 - £236.76 million).[1]
Warwick University's coat of arms depicts atoms of two isotopes of lithium, a DNA helix to represent science and also the Bear and Ragged Staff, historically associated with Warwickshire (and previously the Earls of Warwick) and the Elephant and Castle of Coventry. The bear is not chained in the current depiction of the university's coat of arms, although it had been in its original grant of Letters Patent by the College of Arms.[32]
As of April 2008 the student population of Warwick was 21,598, with around a third being postgraduates.[34] 25% of the student body comes from overseas[35] and over 114 countries are represented on the campus. The university has 29 academic departments and over 40 research centres and institutes, in four faculties: arts, medicine, science and social sciences. There are 1,607 academic staff and 844 research staff (as of April 2008).[34]
In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), Warwick was ranked 7th overall amongst multi-faculty institutions and was the top-ranked university in the Midlands.[36] Over 65% of the University's academic staff were rated as being in "world-leading" or "internationally excellent" departments with top research ratings of 4* or 3*.[36] Warwick achieved a 35% increase in the number of staff it submitted in RAE2008 compared to RAE2001, the third largest increase in the Russell Group, and submitted almost 90% of its staff to RAE2008.
Warwick ranked in the top five in Environmental Science, History, Mathematics, Statistics, Economics, Engineering, Business School, French, Italian, Classics, Business and Management, Film Studies and Theatre Studies. Warwick departments which were ranked in the top 10 in the UK in the assessment were:
Entry to Warwick is competitive and according to The Sunday Times' University Guide 2006, Warwick has around ten applicants for every undergraduate place.[37][38] Warwick students also average top A-Level grades (often equivalent to more than A*AAa at A-level).[39]
Warwick minimum fees will be 9,000 pounds for undergraduates students in 2012.[40]
Warwick students can study abroad for a semester or a double degree (degrees awarded by both partners). International partners include Columbia University, Queen's University, McGill University, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, SDA Bocconi, Sciences Po Paris and University of Pennsylvania Wharton School.
Warwick University Library is located in the middle of the main campus. It houses approximately 1,242,000 books[41] and over 13 km of archives and manuscripts. It has recently been remodelled and now houses new services to support Research and Teaching practice and collaboration between departments. The Wolfson Research Exchange opened in October 2008 and provides collaboration spaces (both physical and virtual), seminar rooms, conference facilities and study areas for Postgraduate Research students. The Teaching Grid, which opened in 2008, is a flexible space which allows teaching staff to try out new technologies and techniques. The library also runs the Learning Grid based in University House, which is a technology rich space for all members of the university to use and provides access to video conferencing facilities, smart boards, networked PCs and a collection of core text books.
In 2008 the university launched a new prize, the Warwick Prize for Writing, worth £50,000. It is defined as "an international cross-disciplinary award which will be given biennially for an excellent and substantial piece of writing in the English language, in any genre or form, on a theme that will change with every award". The inaugural winner of the award was Naomi Klein for her critically acclaimed book Shock Doctrine.
| ARWU[42] (2011/12, national) |
16-19 | |
|---|---|---|
| ARWU[42] (2011/12, world) |
151-200 | |
| QS[43] (2011/12, national) |
9 | |
| QS[43] (2011/12, world) |
50 | |
| THE[44] (2011/12, national) |
28 | |
| THE[44] (2011/12, world) |
157 | |
| Complete/The Independent[45] (2012, national) |
8 | |
| The Guardian[46] (2012, national) |
6 | |
| The Sunday Times[47] (2012, national) |
8 | |
| The Times[48] (2012, national) |
8 | |
According to a 2011 High Fliers Research survey, Warwick is the "second most targeted university in the UK by top employers."[3]
Warwick is consistently ranked amongst the top ten universities in the UK according to league tables of British universities. In 2008 the Sunday Times released averages of all its tables over 10 years, ranking Warwick as 7th in the country from 1998–2007. [49] According to the Times Higher Education, Warwick is ranked 6th in the UK for salary.[50]
The business school is ranked 2nd by SSRN and 4th by SMBG-Eduniversal. It is ranked 25th by the CNN-Expansion ranking.[51] In the world MBA rankings published by The Economist, Warwick Business School ranked 34th.[52] In the Financial Times, Warwick ranked 42nd in the world for its Full-time MBA and 35th for its Executive MBA.[53][53] The Economist Intelligence Unit's Which MBA? Guide, published annually, ranked Warwick's Full-Time MBA program 22nd in the world and top 10 in Europe.[54] The Academic Ranking of World Universities, ARWU released in 2011, placed the University of Warwick 36th worldwide for the subject of economics/business, ahead of INSEAD, London Business School, Vanderbilt University, and University of Southern California, and 41st worldwide in the field of mathematics. The important Economics Department Ranking by IDEAS/RePEc places the University of Warwick on 22nd worldwide (5th in Europe). This means that the department is placed ahead of Cambridge, and Dartmouth College.[55]
According to the Financial Times, Warwick's master in finance is ranked 5th in the world.[56]
Internationally, Warwick is ranked inconsistently by major global university rankings providers. While it was placed 50th overall[57] by QS World University Rankings and 151–200th[58] by Academic Ranking of World Universities, it was not included among top 200 universities by recent Times Higher World University Rankings and came in at 220th (based on the full THE World University Rankings in their iPhone application).[59] But ARWU placed the Warwick in the position 49th worldwide in the field of social sciences. The university claims the inconsistency is due to its relative youth in comparison to other universities.[60]
However, it is ranked 2nd in the UK by SSRN and the French ranking SMBG-Eduniversal ranked Warwick Business School 4th in the UK, 18th in the world and described it as a "universal business school with major international influence".[61]
According to the Times Higher Education, Warwick is ranked 6th in the UK for salary. [62]
Undergraduate student life at Warwick is divided into two phases. In the first year, student life revolves around campus and, in particular, the Students' Union (with its sports clubs, societies and entertainment facilities). In subsequent years students live off-campus, many live in Leamington Spa, Kenilworth or either Earlsdon or Canley in Coventry.
The University of Warwick Students' Union is one of the largest students' unions in the UK, and currently has over 260 societies and 76 sports clubs. Sports clubs include everything from basketball to rowing. There are new societies every year, including Jailbreak and more recently the HOMMOUS Society.[63] It has an annual turnover of approximately £6 million, the profit from which is used to provide services to students and to employ its staff and Sabbatical officers. The Union is divided into two buildings: Union North (mainly societies and administration) and Union South (entertainment facilities). Union South contains four club venues, seven bars and a cafe over four floors, with some "full Union (building)" events such as Top Banana and Skool Dayz. Drinks prices are not considered to be particularly cheap[64] but have recently been reduced for some events.
The union has a enviable tradition of hosting cult and up-and-coming bands; recently it has seen bands such as Ash, Sugababes, Amerie, The Kooks, Reel Big Fish, The Departure, The Subways, Idlewild, The Rory McKenna Variety Show, Hell is for Heroes, The Automatic, The Dave Wright Experience, Boy Kill Boy, Amy Winehouse, The Killers, The Streets, Feeder and Scouting for Girls. The Union South building underwent an £11 million refurbishment in Spring 2008, which was completed in January 2010. The new facilities included a club and gig venue, a pub, various food outlets, spaces for societies and a pool room.
The union is a member of the National Union of Students (NUS) and National Postgraduate Committee (NPC).
Warwick hosts many major student-run events including One World Week,[65] Warwick Economics Summit,[66] People & Planet's Go Green Week, Warwick International Development Summit, Tedx Warwick, RAG Week and Warwick Student Arts Festival.
The Warwick Economics Summit is a yearly international forum. It gathers selected students from universities in the UK (for example the LSE, Oxford and Cambridge) and internationally (for example Princeton, MIT, Bocconi and Kazan State University), to listen world-class renowned speakers.[67]
Warwick is also home to the largest student-run Real Ale Festival in Great Britain, which takes place annually, always in the eighth week of second academic term. The festival is organised and staffed by the Warwick University Real Ale Society. A charity skydiving weekend, The Great Warwick Jump, was set up by the Skydiving Club in 2008 and is now the largest charity event at the University,[68] raising £20,274.00 for charities worldwide in its first year. The second year saw a new British record for the most tandem jumps in 24 hours with 137 and a total of £57,374 raised for various charities.
Warwick won BBC television's University Challenge competition for the first time in 2007, beating the title holders University of Manchester in the final.[70]
Under the leadership of its first Vice-Chancellor, Lord Butterworth, Warwick was one of the first UK universities to adopt a business approach to higher education, develop close links with the business community and exploit the commercial value of its research.
Warwick has established a number of stand-alone units to manage and extract commercial value from its research activities. The four most prominent examples of these units are:
As a result of these activities, Warwick is the only UK University to generate more income through commercial activities than it receives from Government grants, which has allowed it to invest generously in facilities and undergo rapid growth. Research is the greatest source of income for the university, followed by overseas students and Warwick Accommodation.[71]
Warwick Accommodation provides on-campus accommodation for first-year undergraduates, final-year undergraduates (depending on availability) and postgraduate students. Off-campus accommodation is also provided and consists of privately owned houses which are University managed upon a commission charge. The location of such houses is usually within the catchment area of Coventry and Leamington Spa for student convenience.
Many of the 5,700 on-campus rooms are used by conference guests outside of term-time. En suite rooms which include Arthur Vick, Jack Martin and Benefactors residences, as well as the standard single Rootes residence, are usually the primary allocation blocks for conference delegates.
Warwick Conferences offers three dedicated, year-round conference centres: Scarman House, Radcliffe and Arden. Every year, on average 65,000 conference delegates are catered for, with services ranging from banqueting to access to sport facilities. Warwick Conferences has won several awards, including 4 Gold M&IT, Godiva, MIMA and CCE Chefs challenge awards.[72]
Warwick Retail is a commercial retail and publishing operation owned by the university. Its operations include:
The university also created and owns the temporary employment agency Unitemps[73] and the higher education recruitment website www.jobs.ac.uk.[74]
There has been some criticism that Warwick has become too commercially minded at the expense of academic creativity and diversity. The most famous proponent of this critique was the noted historian E.P. Thompson, who wrote Warwick University Ltd in 1971.[75]
Nevertheless, with the appointment of Sir Nicholas Scheele as Chancellor in 2002, the university signalled that it intended to continue and expand its commercial activities. In an interview for the BBC, Scheele said: "I think in the future, education and industry need to become even more closely linked than they have been historically. As government funding changes, the replacement could well come through private funding from companies, individuals and grant-giving agencies."[76]
Warwick has over 150,000 alumni.[77]
Notable current and former faculty and staff at Warwick include:
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