, mottoeng = Through efforts to heights
, established = 1825 –
Birmingham School of Medicine and Surgery1836 –
Birmingham Royal School of Medicine and Surgery1843 –
Queen's College1875 –
Mason Science College
Mason Science College was a university college in Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of Birmingham University. Founded in 1875 by industrialist and philanthropist Sir Josiah Mason, the college was incorporated into the University o ...
1898 –
Mason University College1900 – gained
university status
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...
by
royal charter
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, bu ...
, city =
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...
, province =
West Midlands
West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth.
Etymology
The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...
, country =
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
,
UK
, coor =
, campus = Urban, suburban
, academic_staff = 5,495 (2020)
, administrative_staff =
, head_label =
Visitor
A visitor, in English and Welsh law and history, is an overseer of an autonomous ecclesiastical or eleemosynary institution, often a charitable institution set up for the perpetual distribution of the founder's alms and bounty, who can interve ...
, head = The Rt Hon
Penny Mordaunt
Penelope Mary Mordaunt (; born 4 March 1973) is a British politician who has been Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council since September 2022. A member of the Conservative Party, she has been Member of Parliament (MP) ...
MP
, chancellor =
Lord Bilimoria
, vice_chancellor =
Adam Tickell
Adam Tickell FAcSS (born 1965) is a British economic geographer, whose work explores finance, English local governance, and the politics of ideas. He is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Birmingham, and was formerly Vice-Chancellor of the Univer ...
, type =
Public
In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...
, endowment = £134.5 million (2021)
, budget = £774.1 million (2020–21)
, students = ()
, undergrad = ()
, postgrad = ()
, affiliations =
Universitas 21
Universitas 21 (U21) is an international network of research-intensive universities. Founded in Melbourne, Australia in 1997 with 11 members, it has grown to include twenty-eight member universities in nineteen countries and territories.
The uni ...
Universities UK
Universities UK (UUK) is an advocacy organisation for universities in the United Kingdom. It began life in the early 20th century through informal meetings of vice-chancellors of a number of universities and principals of university colleges and ...
EUA ACUSutton 13
The Sutton Trust is an educational charity in the United Kingdom which aims to improve social mobility and address educational disadvantage. The charity was set up by educational philanthropist, Sir Peter Lampl in 1997.
Since then, it has under ...
Russell Group
The Russell Group is a self-selected association of twenty-four public university, public research university, research universities in the United Kingdom. The group is headquartered in Cambridge and was established in 1994 to represent its memb ...
, free_label =
, free =
, colours = The University
, website =
, logo =
The University of Birmingham (informally Birmingham University) is a
public
In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...
research university
A research university or a research-intensive university is a university that is committed to research as a central part of its mission. They are the most important sites at which knowledge production occurs, along with "intergenerational kno ...
located in
Edgbaston
Edgbaston () is an affluent suburban area of central Birmingham, England, historically in Warwickshire, and curved around the southwest of the city centre.
In the 19th century, the area was under the control of the Gough-Calthorpe family an ...
,
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...
, United Kingdom. It received its
royal charter
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, bu ...
in 1900 as a successor to
Queen's College, Birmingham
Queen's College was a medical school in central Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of the University of Birmingham. It was founded by surgeon William Sands Cox in 1825 as The Birmingham Medical School, a residential college for medi ...
(founded in 1825 as the
Birmingham School of Medicine and Surgery), and
Mason Science College
Mason Science College was a university college in Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of Birmingham University. Founded in 1875 by industrialist and philanthropist Sir Josiah Mason, the college was incorporated into the University o ...
(established in 1875 by Sir
Josiah Mason
Sir Josiah Mason (23 February 1795 – 16 June 1881) was an English industrialist, engaged in pen manufacture and other trades, and a philanthropist. He founded Mason Science College in 1875, which later became the University of Birmingham.
Bio ...
), making it the first English
civic or 'red brick' university to receive its own royal charter.
The present iteration of the university was modeled after
Cornell University
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...
. It is a founding member of both the
Russell Group
The Russell Group is a self-selected association of twenty-four public university, public research university, research universities in the United Kingdom. The group is headquartered in Cambridge and was established in 1994 to represent its memb ...
of British research universities and the international network of research universities,
Universitas 21
Universitas 21 (U21) is an international network of research-intensive universities. Founded in Melbourne, Australia in 1997 with 11 members, it has grown to include twenty-eight member universities in nineteen countries and territories.
The uni ...
.
The student population includes undergraduate and postgraduate students in 2019–20, which is the
largest in the UK (out of ). The annual income of the university for 2020–21 was £774.1 million of which £168.3 million was from research grants and contracts, with an expenditure of £738.5 million.
In the 2021
Research Excellence Framework
The Research Excellence Framework (REF) is a research impact evaluation of British higher education institutions. It is the successor to the Research Assessment Exercise and it was first used in 2014 to assess the period 2008–2013. REF is underta ...
, the University of Birmingham ranked equal 13th out of 129 institutions on grade point average, up from equal 31st in the previous REF in 2014.
The university is home to the
Barber Institute of Fine Arts
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts is an art gallery and concert hall in Birmingham, England. It is situated in purpose-built premises on the campus of the University of Birmingham.
The Grade I listed Art Deco building was designed by Robert At ...
, housing works by
Van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2,100 artworks, inclu ...
,
Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
and
Monet
Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...
; the
Shakespeare Institute
The Shakespeare Institute is a centre for postgraduate study dedicated to the study of William Shakespeare and the literature of the English Renaissance. It is part of the University of Birmingham, and is located in Stratford-upon-Avon.
The Insti ...
; the Cadbury Research Library, home to the
Mingana Collection
The Mingana Collection of Middle Eastern manuscripts, comprising over 3,000 documents, is held by the University of Birmingham's Cadbury Research Library.
History
In 1924 Alphonse Mingana, an ethnic Assyrian, made the first of three trips to th ...
of Middle Eastern manuscripts; the
Lapworth Museum of Geology
The Lapworth Museum of Geology is a geological museum run by the University of Birmingham and located on the university's campus in Edgbaston, south Birmingham, England. The museum is named after the geologist Charles Lapworth, its origins datin ...
; and the 100-metre
Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower
The Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower, or colloquially Old Joe, is a clock tower and campanile located in Chancellor's court at the University of Birmingham, in the suburb of Edgbaston. It is the tallest free-standing clock tower in the ...
, which is a prominent landmark visible from many parts of the city.
Academics
An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, ...
and
alumni
Alumni (singular: alumnus (masculine) or alumna (feminine)) are former students of a school, college, or university who have either attended or graduated in some fashion from the institution. The feminine plural alumnae is sometimes used for grou ...
of the university include former British Prime Ministers
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...
and
Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, (3 August 186714 December 1947) was a British Conservative Party politician who dominated the government of the United Kingdom between the world wars, serving as prime minister on three occasions, ...
,
[K. Feiling, ''The Life of Neville Chamberlain'' (London, 1970), 11–12.] the British composer
Sir Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...
and eleven
Nobel laureates
The Nobel Prizes ( sv, Nobelpriset, no, Nobelprisen) are awarded annually by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the Swedish Academy, the Karolinska Institutet, and the Norwegian Nobel Committee to individuals and organizations who make ou ...
.
History
Queen's College
![bbuilding](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d7/Bbuilding.jpg)
The earliest beginnings of the university were originally traced back to the
Queen's College, which is linked to
William Sands Cox
William Sands Cox (1802 in Birmingham – 23 December 1875 in Kenilworth) was a surgeon in Birmingham, England. He founded Birmingham's first medical school in 1825 as a residential Anglican-based college in Temple Row, where a blue plaque comm ...
in his aim of creating a medical school along strictly Christian lines, unlike the contemporary London medical schools. Further research revealed the roots of the
Birmingham Medical School
The University of Birmingham Medical School is one of Britain's largest and oldest medical schools with over 400 medical, 70 pharmacy, 140 biomedical science and 130 nursing students graduating each year. It is based at the University of Birmi ...
in the medical education seminars of John Tomlinson, the first surgeon to the
Birmingham Workhouse Infirmary
The Birmingham Union Workhouse was a workhouse on Western Road in Birmingham, England.
Earlier workhouse
The ''Birmingham Workhouse Infirmary'' was a workhouse constructed in 1734 on the site of the present day Coleridge Passage, now opposite B ...
, and later to the
Birmingham General Hospital
Birmingham General Hospital was a teaching hospital in Birmingham, England, founded in 1779 and closed in the mid-1990s.
History Summer Lane
In 1765, a committee for a proposed hospital, formed by John Ash and supported by Sir Lister Ho ...
. These classes, held in the winter of 1767–68, were the first such lectures ever held in England or Wales. The first clinical teaching was undertaken by medical apprentices at the General Hospital, founded in 1779. The medical school which grew out of the Birmingham Workhouse Infirmary was founded in 1828, but Cox began teaching in December 1825.
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...
granted her patronage to the Clinical Hospital in Birmingham and allowed it to be styled "The Queen's Hospital". It was the first provincial teaching hospital in England. In 1843, the medical college became known as Queen's College.
Mason Science College
In 1870, Sir
Josiah Mason
Sir Josiah Mason (23 February 1795 – 16 June 1881) was an English industrialist, engaged in pen manufacture and other trades, and a philanthropist. He founded Mason Science College in 1875, which later became the University of Birmingham.
Bio ...
, the Birmingham
industrialist
A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...
and philanthropist, who made his fortune in making key rings, pens, pen nibs and electroplating, drew up the Foundation Deed for
Mason Science College
Mason Science College was a university college in Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of Birmingham University. Founded in 1875 by industrialist and philanthropist Sir Josiah Mason, the college was incorporated into the University o ...
.
[Ives et al. 2000, p. 12.] The college was founded in 1875.
It was this institution that would eventually form the nucleus of the University of Birmingham. In 1882, the Departments of Chemistry, Botany and Physiology were transferred to Mason Science College, soon followed by the Departments of Physics and
Comparative Anatomy
Comparative anatomy is the study of similarities and differences in the anatomy of different species. It is closely related to evolutionary biology and phylogeny (the evolution of species).
The science began in the classical era, continuing in t ...
. The transfer of the Medical School to Mason Science College gave considerable impetus to the growing importance of that college and in 1896 a move to incorporate it as a
university college
In a number of countries, a university college is a college institution that provides tertiary education but does not have full or independent university status. A university college is often part of a larger university. The precise usage varies ...
was made. As the result of the Mason University College Act 1897 it became incorporated as Mason University College on 1 January 1898, with
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain (8 July 1836 – 2 July 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then a Liberal Unionist after opposing home rule for Ireland, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the Cons ...
becoming the President of its Court of Governors.
Royal charter
It was largely due to Chamberlain's enthusiasm that the university was granted a
royal charter
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, bu ...
by
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...
on 24 March 1900. The
Calthorpe family offered twenty-five acres (10 hectares) of land on the
Bournbrook
Bournbrook is an industrial and residential district in southwest Birmingham, England, in both the Selly Oak Council Ward and the Parliamentary District of Selly Oak. Prior to what is commonly termed the Greater Birmingham Act, which came in ...
side of their estate in July. The Court of Governors received the Birmingham University Act 1900, which put the royal charter into effect on 31 May.
The transfer of Mason University College to the new University of Birmingham, with Chamberlain as its first
chancellor
Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...
and Sir
Oliver Lodge
Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge, (12 June 1851 – 22 August 1940) was a British physicist and writer involved in the development of, and holder of key patents for, radio. He identified electromagnetic radiation independent of Heinrich Rudolf Hertz, H ...
as the first
principal, was complete. A remnant of Josiah Mason's legacy is the Mermaid from his coat-of-arms, which appears in the sinister chief of the university shield and of his college, the double-headed lion in the dexter.
The commerce faculty was founded by Sir
William Ashley in 1901, who from 1902 until 1923 served as first Professor of Commerce and Dean of the Faculty. From 1905 to 1908,
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...
held the position of Peyton Professor of Music at the university. He was succeeded by his friend
Granville Bantock
Sir Granville Ransome Bantock (7 August 186816 October 1946) was a British composer of classical music.
Biography
Granville Ransome Bantock was born in London. His father was an eminent Scottish surgeon.Hadden, J. Cuthbert, 1913, ''Modern Music ...
.
[Keith Anderton, slevenotes, ''Bantock: Hebridean Symphony'', Naxos 8.555473, 1989.]
The university's own heritage archives are accessible for research through the university's Cadbury Research Library which is open to all interested researchers.
During the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, the Great Hall in the Aston Webb Building was requisitioned by the
War Office
The War Office was a department of the British Government responsible for the administration of the British Army between 1857 and 1964, when its functions were transferred to the new Ministry of Defence (MoD). This article contains text from ...
to create the 1st Southern General Hospital, a facility for the
Royal Army Medical Corps
The Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) is a specialist corps in the British Army which provides medical services to all Army personnel and their families, in war and in peace. The RAMC, the Royal Army Veterinary Corps, the Royal Army Dental Corps a ...
to treat military casualties; it was equipped with 520 beds and treated 125,000 injured servicemen.
In June 1921, the university appointed
Linetta de Castelvecchio
Linetta Palamidessi de Castelvecchio Richardson (13 October 1880 – 4 June 1975) was an Italian-British scholar.
Career
Having taught informally at the two women's colleges of the University of Cambridge, she was a lecturer and head of Italian ...
as
Serena Professor of Italian
The Serena Professorship of Italian is the senior professorship in the study of Italian language, literature and culture at the University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, University of Manchester and University of Birmingham. At Cambridge, it ...
: she was the first woman to hold a chair at the university and one of the first women professors in Great Britain.
Expansion
![BirminghamBarberInstitute](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6b/BirminghamBarberInstitute.jpg)
In 1939, the
Barber Institute of Fine Arts
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts is an art gallery and concert hall in Birmingham, England. It is situated in purpose-built premises on the campus of the University of Birmingham.
The Grade I listed Art Deco building was designed by Robert At ...
, designed by
Robert Atkinson, was opened. In 1956, the first MSc programme in
Geotechnical Engineering
Geotechnical engineering is the branch of civil engineering concerned with the engineering behavior of earth materials. It uses the principles of soil mechanics and rock mechanics for the solution of its respective engineering problems. It als ...
commenced under the title of "Foundation Engineering", and has been run annually at the university since.
The UK's longest-running MSc programme in Physics and Technology of Nuclear Reactors also started at the university in 1956, the same year that the world's first commercial nuclear power station was opened at
Calder Hall
Sellafield is a large multi-function nuclear site close to Seascale on the coast of Cumbria, England. As of August 2022, primary activities are nuclear waste processing and storage and nuclear decommissioning. Former activities included nucle ...
in Cumbria.
In 1957, Sir
Hugh Casson
Sir Hugh Maxwell Casson (23 May 1910 – 15 August 1999) was a British architect. He was also active as an interior designer, as an artist, and as a writer and broadcaster on twentieth-century design. He was the director of architecture for t ...
and Neville Conder were asked by the university to prepare a masterplan on the site of the original 1900 buildings which were incomplete. The university drafted in other architects to amend the masterplan produced by the group. During the 1960s, the university constructed numerous large buildings, expanding the campus.
In 1963, the university helped in the establishment of the faculty of medicine at the University of Rhodesia, now the
University of Zimbabwe
The University of Zimbabwe (UZ) is a public university in Harare, Zimbabwe. It opened in 1952 as the University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, and was initially affiliated with the University of London. It was later renamed the University o ...
(UZ). UZ is now independent but both institutions maintain relations through student exchange programmes.
Birmingham also supported the creation of
Keele University
Keele University, officially known as the University of Keele, is a public research university in Keele, approximately from Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, England. Founded in 1949 as the University College of North Staffordshire, Keele ...
(formerly University College of North Staffordshire) and the
University of Warwick
The University of Warwick ( ; abbreviated as ''Warw.'' in post-nominal letters) is a public research university on the outskirts of Coventry between the West Midlands (county), West Midlands and Warwickshire, England. The university was founded i ...
under the Vice-Chancellorship of Sir Robert Aitken who acted as 'godfather' to the University of Warwick. The initial plan was to establish a satellite university college in
Coventry
Coventry ( or ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England. It is on the River Sherbourne. Coventry has been a large settlement for centuries, although it was not founded and given its ...
but Aitken advised an independent initiative to the University Grants Committee.
Malcolm X
Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little, later Malik el-Shabazz; May 19, 1925 – February 21, 1965) was an American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figure during the civil rights movement. A spokesman for the Nation of Is ...
, the Afro-American human rights activist, addressed the University Debating Society in 1965.
Scientific discoveries and inventions
![Aston Webb001](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/Aston_Webb001.JPG)
The university has been involved in many scientific breakthroughs and inventions. From 1925 until 1948, Sir
Norman Haworth
Sir Walter Norman Haworth FRS (19 March 1883 – 19 March 1950) was a British chemist best known for his groundbreaking work on ascorbic acid (vitamin C) while working at the University of Birmingham. He received the 1937 Nobel Prize in Chemi ...
was Professor and Director of the Department of Chemistry. He was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Science and acted as Vice-Principal from 1947 until 1948. His research focused predominantly on
carbohydrate chemistry
Carbohydrate chemistry is a subdiscipline of chemistry primarily concerned with the detection, synthesis, structure, and function of carbohydrates. Due to the general structure of carbohydrates, their synthesis is often preoccupied with the select ...
in which he confirmed a number of structures of optically active sugars. By 1928, he had deduced and confirmed the structures of
maltose
}
Maltose ( or ), also known as maltobiose or malt sugar, is a disaccharide formed from two units of glucose joined with an α(1→4) bond. In the isomer isomaltose, the two glucose molecules are joined with an α(1→6) bond. Maltose is the two- ...
,
cellobiose
Cellobiose is a disaccharide with the formula (C6H7(OH)4O)2O. It is classified as a reducing sugar. In terms of its chemical structure, it is derived from the condensation of a pair of β-glucose molecules forming a β(1→4) bond. It can be hyd ...
,
lactose
Lactose is a disaccharide sugar synthesized by galactose and glucose subunits and has the molecular formula C12H22O11. Lactose makes up around 2–8% of milk (by mass). The name comes from ' (gen. '), the Latin word for milk, plus the suffix '' - ...
,
gentiobiose
Gentiobiose is a disaccharide composed of two units of D-glucose joined with a β(1->6) linkage. It is a white crystalline solid that is soluble in water or hot methanol. Gentiobiose is incorporated into the chemical structure of crocin, the che ...
,
melibiose
Melibiose is a reducing disaccharide formed by an α-1,6 linkage between galactose and glucose (D-Gal-α(1→6)-D-Glc). It differs from lactose in the chirality of the carbon where the galactose ring is closed and that the galactose is linked to a ...
, gentianose,
raffinose
Raffinose is a trisaccharide composed of galactose, glucose, and fructose. It can be found in beans, cabbage, brussels sprouts, broccoli, asparagus, other vegetables, and whole grains. Raffinose can be hydrolyzed to D-galactose and sucrose by ...
, as well as the
glucoside
A glucoside is a glycoside that is derived from glucose. Glucosides are common in plants, but rare in animals. Glucose is produced when a glucoside is hydrolysed by purely chemical means, or decomposed by fermentation or enzymes.
The name was o ...
ring tautomeric structure of aldose sugars. His research helped to define the basic features of the
starch
Starch or amylum is a polymeric carbohydrate consisting of numerous glucose units joined by glycosidic bonds. This polysaccharide is produced by most green plants for energy storage. Worldwide, it is the most common carbohydrate in human diets ...
,
cellulose
Cellulose is an organic compound with the formula , a polysaccharide consisting of a linear chain of several hundred to many thousands of β(1→4) linked D-glucose units. Cellulose is an important structural component of the primary cell wall ...
,
glycogen
Glycogen is a multibranched polysaccharide of glucose that serves as a form of energy storage in animals, fungi, and bacteria. The polysaccharide structure represents the main storage form of glucose in the body.
Glycogen functions as one o ...
,
inulin
Inulins are a group of naturally occurring polysaccharides produced by many types of plants, industrially most often extracted from chicory. The inulins belong to a class of dietary fibers known as fructans. Inulin is used by some plants as a mea ...
and
xylan
Xylan (; ) (CAS number: 9014-63-5) is a type of hemicellulose, a polysaccharide consisting mainly of xylose residues. It is found in plants, in the secondary cell walls of dicots and all cell walls of grasses. Xylan is the third most abundant ...
molecules. He also contributed towards solving the problems with bacterial polysaccharides. He was a recipient of the
Nobel Prize in Chemistry
)
, image = Nobel Prize.png
, alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...
in 1937.
The
cavity magnetron
The cavity magnetron is a high-power vacuum tube used in early radar systems and currently in microwave ovens and linear particle accelerators. It generates microwaves using the interaction of a stream of electrons with a magnetic field while ...
was developed in the Department of Physics by Sir
John Randall,
Harry Boot
Henry Albert Howard Boot (29 July 1917 – 8 February 1983) was an English physicist who with Sir John Randall and James Sayers developed the cavity magnetron, which was one of the keys to the Allied victory in the Second World War.
Biography
...
and
James Sayers
James Sayers (or Sayer) (1748 – April 20, 1823) was an English caricaturist . Many of his works are described in the Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires Preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum which ha ...
. This was vital to the Allied victory in World War II. In 1940, the
Frisch–Peierls memorandum
The Frisch–Peierls memorandum was the first technical exposition of a practical nuclear weapon. It was written by expatriate German-Jewish physicists Otto Frisch and Rudolf Peierls in March 1940 while they were both working for Mark Oliphant a ...
, a document which demonstrated that the
atomic bomb
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb ...
was more than simply theoretically possible, was written in the Physics Department by Sir
Rudolf Peierls
Sir Rudolf Ernst Peierls, (; ; 5 June 1907 – 19 September 1995) was a German-born British physicist who played a major role in Tube Alloys, Britain's nuclear weapon programme, as well as the subsequent Manhattan Project, the combined Allied ...
and
Otto Frisch
Otto Robert Frisch FRS (1 October 1904 – 22 September 1979) was an Austrian-born British physicist who worked on nuclear physics. With Lise Meitner he advanced the first theoretical explanation of nuclear fission (coining the term) and first ...
. The university also hosted early work on
gaseous diffusion
Gaseous diffusion is a technology used to produce enriched uranium by forcing gaseous uranium hexafluoride (UF6) through semipermeable membranes. This produces a slight separation between the molecules containing uranium-235 (235U) and uranium-2 ...
in the Chemistry department when it was located in the Hills building.
![Poynting Physics building 2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/79/Poynting_Physics_building_2.jpg)
Physicist Sir
Mark Oliphant
Sir Marcus Laurence Elwin Oliphant, (8 October 1901 – 14 July 2000) was an Australian physicist and humanitarian who played an important role in the first experimental demonstration of nuclear fusion and in the development of nuclear weapon ...
made a proposal for the construction of a proton-
synchrotron
A synchrotron is a particular type of cyclic particle accelerator, descended from the cyclotron, in which the accelerating particle beam travels around a fixed closed-loop path. The magnetic field which bends the particle beam into its closed p ...
in 1943, however he made no assertion that the machine would work. In 1945, phase stability was discovered; consequently, the proposal was revived, and construction of a machine that could surpass proton energies of 1
GeV GEV may refer to:
* ''G.E.V.'' (board game), a tabletop game by Steve Jackson Games
* Ashe County Airport, in North Carolina, United States
* Gällivare Lapland Airport, in Sweden
* Generalized extreme value distribution
* Gev Sella, Israeli-Sou ...
began at the university. However, because of lack of funds, the machine did not start until 1953. The
Brookhaven National Laboratory
Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory located in Upton, Long Island, and was formally established in 1947 at the site of Camp Upton, a former U.S. Army base and Japanese internment c ...
managed to beat them; they started their
Cosmotron
The Cosmotron was a particle accelerator, specifically a proton synchrotron, at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Its construction was approved by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission in 1948, reaching its full energy in 1953, and continuing to r ...
in 1952, and had it entirely working in 1953, before the University of Birmingham.
In 1947, Sir
Peter Medawar
Sir Peter Brian Medawar (; 28 February 1915 – 2 October 1987) was a Brazilian-British biologist and writer, whose works on graft rejection and the discovery of acquired immune tolerance have been fundamental to the medical practice of tissue ...
was appointed Mason Professor of Zoology at the university. His work involved investigating the phenomenon of tolerance and transplantation immunity. He collaborated with
Rupert E. Billingham
Rupert Everett Billingham Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS (15 October 1921 – 16 November 2002) was a British biologist who did significant research in the fields of reproductive immunology and organ transplantation. "He made numerous fundam ...
and they did research on problems of pigmentation and
skin grafting
Skin grafting, a type of graft surgery, involves the transplantation of skin. The transplanted tissue is called a skin graft.
Surgeons may use skin grafting to treat:
* extensive wounding or trauma
* burns
* areas of extensive skin loss due ...
in cattle. They used skin grafting to differentiate between monozygotic and dizygotic twins in cattle. Taking the earlier research of R. D. Owen into consideration, they concluded that actively acquired tolerance of homografts could be artificially reproduced. For this research, Medawar was elected a
Fellow of the Royal Society
Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...
. He left Birmingham in 1951 and joined the faculty at
University College London
, mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £143 million (2020)
, budget = ...
, where he continued his research on transplantation immunity. He was a recipient of the
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded yearly by the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute for outstanding discoveries in physiology or medicine. The Nobel Prize is not a single prize, but five separate prizes that, accord ...
in 1960.
Recent history
![View of Old Joe at night from the university learning center](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/View_of_Old_Joe_at_night_from_the_university_learning_center.jpg)
In 1999 talks commenced on the possibility of
Aston University
Aston University (abbreviated as ''Aston''. for post-nominals) is a public research university situated in the city centre of Birmingham, England. Aston began as the Birmingham Municipal Technical School in 1895, evolving into the UK's first c ...
integrating itself into the University of Birmingham as the University of Birmingham, Aston Campus. This would have resulted in the University of Birmingham expanding to become one of the largest universities in the UK, with a student body of 30,000. Talks were halted in 2001 after Aston University determined the timing to be inopportune. While Aston University management was in favour of the integration, and reception among staff was generally positive, the Aston student union voted two-to-one against the integration. Despite this set back, the Vice Chancellor of the University of Birmingham said the door remained open to recommence talks when Aston University is ready.
![Aston Webb Hall, Birmingham University](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/Aston_Webb_Hall%2C_Birmingham_University.jpg)
The
final round
A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...
of the first ever televised leaders' debates, hosted by the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...
, was held at the university during the
2010 British general election campaign on 29 April 2010.
On 9 August 2010 the university announced that for the first time it would not enter the
UCAS clearing process for 2010 admission, which matches under-subscribed courses to students who did not meet their firm or insurance choices, due to all places being taken. Largely a result of the
financial crisis of 2007–2010
Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of fina ...
, Birmingham joined fellow Russell Group universities including Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh and Bristol in not offering any clearing places.
The university acted as a training camp for the
Jamaican athletics team prior to the
2012 London Olympics
The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...
.
A new library was opened for the 2016/17 academic year, and a new sports centre opened in May 2017. The previous Main Library and the old Munrow Sports Centre, including the athletics track, have both since been demolished, with the demolition of the old library being completed in November 2017.
Controversies
![Aston Webb Building Entrance Statues University of Birmingham](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/Aston_Webb_Building_Entrance_Statues_University_of_Birmingham.JPG)
The discipline of
cultural studies
Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that examines the political dynamics of contemporary culture (including popular culture) and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices re ...
was founded at the university and between 1964 and 2002 the campus was home to the
Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies
Center or centre may refer to:
Mathematics
*Center (geometry), the middle of an object
* Center (algebra), used in various contexts
** Center (group theory)
** Center (ring theory)
* Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentricity ...
, a research centre whose members' work came to be known as the Birmingham School of Cultural Studies. Despite being established by one of the key figures in the field,
Richard Hoggart
Herbert Richard Hoggart (24 September 1918 – 10 April 2014) was a British academic whose career covered the fields of sociology, English literature and cultural studies, with emphasis on British popular culture.
Early life
Hoggart was bor ...
, and being later directed by the theorist
Stuart Hall, the department was controversially closed down.
Analysis showed that the university was fourth in a list of British universities that faced the most
employment tribunal
Employment tribunals are tribunal public bodies in England and Wales and Scotland which have statutory jurisdiction to hear many kinds of disputes between employers and employees. The most common disputes are concerned with unfair dismissal, red ...
claims between 2008 and 2011. They were the second most likely to settle these before the hearing date.
In 2011 a parliamentary
early day motion
In the Westminster parliamentary system, an early day motion (EDM) is a Motion (parliamentary procedure), motion, expressed as a single sentence, Table (parliamentary procedure), tabled by Member of Parliament, members of Parliament that formally ...
was proposed, arguing against the Guild suspending the elected Sabbatical Vice President (Education), who was arrested while taking part in protest activity.
In December 2011 it was announced that the university had obtained a 12-month-long injunction against a group of around 25 students, who occupied a residential building on campus from 23 to 26 November 2011, preventing them from engaging in further "occupational protest action" on the university's grounds without prior permission. It was misreported in the press that this injunction applied to all students, however the court order defines the defendants as:
Persons unknown (including students of the University of Birmingham) entering or remaining upon the buildings known as No. 2 Lodge Pritchatts Road, Birmingham at the University of Birmingham for the purpose of protest action (without the consent of the University of Birmingham).
The university and the Guild of Students also clarified the scope of the injunction in an e-mail sent to all students on 11 January 2012, stating: "The injunction applies only to those individuals who occupied the lodge". The university said that it sought this injunction as a safety precaution based on a previous occupation. Three separate human rights groups, including
Amnesty International
Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...
, condemned the move as restrictive on human rights.
In 2019, several women said the university refused to investigate allegations of
campus rape
Campus sexual assault is the sexual assault, including rape, of a student while attending an institution of higher learning, such as a college or university. The victims of such assaults are more likely to be female, but any gender can be victim ...
. One student who complained of rape in university accommodation was told by employees of the university that there were no specific procedures for handling rape complaints. In other cases students were told they would have to prove the alleged rapes occurred on university property. The university has been criticized by legal professionals for not adequately assessing the risk to students by refusing to investigate complaints of criminal conduct.
In June 2022 the University published a report into, and apologised for, its involvement in developing, promoting and administering electric-shock
conversion therapy
Conversion therapy is the pseudoscientific practice of attempting to change an individual's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to align with heterosexual and cisgender norms. In contrast to evidence-based medicine and cli ...
to gay men, during the period 1966-1983.
Campuses
Edgbaston campus
Original buildings
![BirminghamUniversityChancellorsCourt](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/45/BirminghamUniversityChancellorsCourt.jpg)
The main campus of the university occupies a site some south-west of
Birmingham city centre
Birmingham City Centre, also known as Central Birmingham and often known locally as town, is the central business district of Birmingham, England. Following the removal of the Inner Ring Road, the city centre is now defined as being the area wi ...
, in
Edgbaston
Edgbaston () is an affluent suburban area of central Birmingham, England, historically in Warwickshire, and curved around the southwest of the city centre.
In the 19th century, the area was under the control of the Gough-Calthorpe family an ...
. It is arranged around
Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower
The Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower, or colloquially Old Joe, is a clock tower and campanile located in Chancellor's court at the University of Birmingham, in the suburb of Edgbaston. It is the tallest free-standing clock tower in the ...
(affectionately known as 'Old Joe' or 'Big Joe'), a grand
campanile
A bell tower is a tower that contains one or more bells, or that is designed to hold bells even if it has none. Such a tower commonly serves as part of a Christian church, and will contain church bells, but there are also many secular bell tower ...
which commemorates the university's first chancellor,
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain (8 July 1836 – 2 July 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then a Liberal Unionist after opposing home rule for Ireland, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the Cons ...
. Chamberlain may be considered the founder of Birmingham University, and was largely responsible for the university gaining its Royal Charter in 1900 and for the development of the Edgbaston campus. The university's Great Hall is located in the domed
Aston Webb
Sir Aston Webb (22 May 1849 – 21 August 1930) was a British architect who designed the principal facade of Buckingham Palace and the main building of the Victoria and Albert Museum, among other major works around England, many of them in par ...
Building, which is named after one of the architects – the other was
Ingress Bell
Edward Ingress Bell (1837–1914) was an English architect of the late 19th century, and early 20th century, who worked for many years with Sir Aston Webb.
Bell was born in Ingress Park, Greenhithe, Kent, and had already undertaken commissi ...
. The initial site was given to the university in 1900 by Lord Calthorpe. The grand buildings were an outcome of the £50,000 given by steel magnate and philanthropist
Andrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie (, ; November 25, 1835August 11, 1919) was a Scottish-American industrialist and philanthropist. Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century and became one of the richest Americans i ...
to establish a "first class modern scientific college" on the model of
Cornell University
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...
in the United States. Funding was also provided by Sir
Charles Holcroft.
The original domed buildings, built in
Accrington red brick, semicircle to form Chancellor's Court. This sits on a drop, so the architects placed their buildings on two tiers with a drop between them. The clock tower stands in the centre of the Court.
The campanile itself draws its inspiration from the
Torre del Mangia
The Torre del Mangia is a tower in Siena, in the Tuscany region of Italy. Built in 1338-1348, it is located in the Piazza del Campo, Siena's main square, next to the Palazzo Pubblico (Town Hall). When built it was one of the tallest secular towe ...
, a medieval clock tower that forms part of the
Town Hall
In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or a municipal building (in the Philippines), is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses ...
in
Siena
Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.
The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centuri ...
, Italy. When it was built, it was described as 'the intellectual beacon of the Midlands' by the ''Birmingham Post''. The clock tower was Birmingham's tallest building from the date of its construction in 1908 until 1969; it is now the third highest in the city. It is one of the top 50 tallest buildings in the UK,
and the tallest free-standing clock tower in the world,
although there is some confusion about its actual height, with the university listing it both as
and tall in different sources.
![Old Joe Big](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Old_Joe_Big.jpg)
The campus has a wide diversity in architectural types and architects. "What makes Birmingham so exceptional among the Red Brick universities is the deployment of so many other major Modernist practices: only Oxford and Cambridge boast greater selections". The Guild of Students original section was designed by Birmingham inter-war architect
Holland Hobbiss who also designed the
King Edward's School opposite. It was described as "Redbrick Tudorish" by
Nikolaus Pevsner
Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner (30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983) was a German-British art historian and architectural historian best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, ''The Buildings of England'' (1 ...
.
The statue on horseback fronting the entrance to the university and
Barber Institute of Fine Arts
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts is an art gallery and concert hall in Birmingham, England. It is situated in purpose-built premises on the campus of the University of Birmingham.
The Grade I listed Art Deco building was designed by Robert At ...
is a 1722 statue of
George I George I or 1 may refer to:
People
* Patriarch George I of Alexandria ( fl. 621–631)
* George I of Constantinople (d. 686)
* George I of Antioch (d. 790)
* George I of Abkhazia (ruled 872/3–878/9)
* George I of Georgia (d. 1027)
* Yuri Dolgoruk ...
rescued from Dublin in 1937. This was saved by Bodkin, a director of the National Gallery of Ireland and first director of the Barber Institute. The statue was commissioned by the
Dublin Corporation
Dublin Corporation (), known by generations of Dubliners simply as ''The Corpo'', is the former name of the city government and its administrative organisation in Dublin since the 1100s. Significantly re-structured in 1660-1661, even more sign ...
from the Flemish sculptor
John van Nost
John Nost (Dutch: Jan van Nost) (died 1729) was a Flemish sculptor who worked in England in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.
Life
Originally from Mechelen in what is now Belgium, he moved to England in the second half of the 17th centur ...
.
Final negotiations for part of what is now the Vale were only completed in March 1947. By then, properties which would have their names used for halls of residences such as Wyddrington and Maple Bank were under discussion and more land was obtained from the Calthorpe estate in 1948 and 1949 providing the setting for the Vale. Landscape architect
Mary Mitchell designed the layout of the campus and she included mature trees that were retained from the former gardens.
Construction on the Vale started in 1962 with the creation of a artificial lake and the building of Ridge, High, Wyddrington and Lake Halls. The first, Ridge Hall, opened for 139 women in January 1964, with its counterpart High Hall admitting its first male residents the following October.
1960s and modern expansion
The university underwent a major expansion in the 1960s due to the production of a masterplan by Casson, Conder and Partners. The first of the major buildings to be constructed to a design by the firm was the Refectory and Staff House which was built in 1961 and 1962. The two buildings are connected by a bridge. The next major buildings to be constructed were the Wyddrington and Lake Halls and the Faculty of Commerce and Social Science, all completed in 1965. The Wyddrington and Lake Halls, on Edgbaston Park Road, were designed by
H. T. Cadbury-Brown
Henry Thomas Cadbury-Brown RA (20 May 1913 – 9 July 2009) was an English architect. He was educated at the Architecture Association where he was influenced by the architecture of Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius. After graduating he worked fo ...
and contained three floors of student dwellings above a single floor of communal facilities.
The Faculty of Commerce and Social Science, now known as the Ashley Building, was designed by Howell, Killick, Partridge and Amis and is a long, curving two-storey block linked to a five-storey
whorl
A whorl ( or ) is an individual circle, oval, volution or equivalent in a whorled pattern, which consists of a spiral or multiple concentric objects (including circles, ovals and arcs).
Whorls in nature
File:Photograph and axial plane floral ...
. The two-storey block follows the curve of the road, and has load-bearing brick cross walls. It is faced in specially-made concrete blocks. The spiral is faced with faceted pre-cast concrete cladding panels.
It was
statutorily listed in 1993
and a refurbishment by
Berman Guedes Stretton Berman is a surname that may be derived from the German and Yiddish phrase ( ‘ bear-man’)https://dbs.anumuseum.org.il/skn/en/c6/e250048/Family_Name/BERMAN or from the Dutch , meaning the same. Notable people with the surname include:
* Abba ...
was completed in 2006.
Chamberlain, Powell and Bon were commissioned to design the Physical Education Centre which was built in 1966. The main characteristic of the building is the roof of the changing rooms and small gymnasium which has hyperbolic paraboloid roof light shells and is completely paved in quarry tiles. The roof of the sports hall consists of eight conoidal 2½-inch thick sprayed concrete shells springing from long pre-stressed valley beams. On the south elevation, the roof is supported on raking pre-cast columns and reversed shells form a
cantilever
A cantilever is a rigid structural element that extends horizontally and is supported at only one end. Typically it extends from a flat vertical surface such as a wall, to which it must be firmly attached. Like other structural elements, a canti ...
ed canopy.
Also completed in 1966 was the Mining and Minerals Engineering and Physical Metallurgy Departments, which was designed by
Philip Dowson
Sir Philip Henry Manning Dowson (16 August 1924 – 22 August 2014) was a leading British architect. He served as President of the Royal Academy from 1993 to 1999.
Early life
Philip Dowson was born in South Africa. Having moved to England, he ...
of
Arup Associates
Arup (officially Arup Group Limited) is a British multinational professional services firm headquartered in London which provides design, engineering, architecture, planning, and advisory services across every aspect of the built environmen ...
. This complex consisted of four similar three-storey blocks linked at the corners. The frame is of pre-cast reinforced concrete with columns in groups of four and the whole is planned as a tartan grid, allowing services to be carried vertically and horizontally so that at no point in a room are services more than ten feet away. The building received the 1966
RIBA
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally, founded for the advancement of architecture under its royal charter granted in 1837, three suppl ...
Architecture Award for the West Midlands.
It was
statutorily listed in 1993.
Taking the full five years from 1962 to 1967, Birmingham erected twelve buildings which each cost in excess of a quarter of a million pounds.
![University of Birmingham - geograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/40/University_of_Birmingham_-_geograph.org.uk_-_464655.jpg)
In 1967, Lucas House, a new hall of residence designed by
The John Madin Design Group, was completed, providing 150 study bedrooms. It was constructed in the garden of a large house. The Medical School was extended in 1967 to a design by Leonard J. Multon and Partners. The two-storey building was part of a complex which covers the southside of
Metchley Fort
Metchley Fort was a Roman fort in what is now Birmingham, England.
It lies on the course of a Roman road, Icknield Street, which is now the site of the present Queen Elizabeth Hospital and the University of Birmingham in Edgbaston. The fort was ...
, a Roman fort. In 1968, the Institute for Education in the Department for Education was opened. This was another Casson, Conder and Partners-designed building. The complex consisted of a group of buildings centred around an eight-storey block, containing study offices, laboratories and teaching rooms. The building has a reinforced concrete frame which is exposed internally and the external walls are of silver-grey rustic bricks. The roofs of the lecture halls, penthouse and Child Study wing are covered in copper.
Arup Associates returned in the 1960s to design the Arts and Commerce Building, better known as Muirhead Tower and houses the Institute of Local Government Studies. This was completed in 1969.
A£42 million refurbishment of the 16-storey tower was completed in 2009 and it now houses the Colleges of Social Sciences and the Cadbury Research Library, the new home for the university's Special Collections. The podium was remodeled around the existing Allardyce Nicol studio theatre, providing additional rehearsal spaces and changing and technical facilities. The ground floor lobby now incorporates a
Starbucks
Starbucks Corporation is an American multinational chain of coffeehouses and roastery reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It is the world's largest coffeehouse chain.
As of November 2021, the company had 33,833 stores in 80 c ...
coffee shop.
The name, Muirhead Tower, came from that of the first philosophy professor of the university
John Henry Muirhead
John Henry Muirhead (28 April 1855 – 24 May 1940) was a British philosopher best known for having initiated the Muirhead Library of Philosophy in 1890. He became the first person named to the Chair of Philosophy at the University of Birmingham ...
.
Recently completed is a 450-seat concert hall, called the Bramall Music Building, which completes the redbrick semicircle of the Aston Webb building designed by
Glenn Howells Architects
Glenn Paul Howells (born 15 July 1961) is a British architect and a director and founder of Glenn Howells Architects.
Early life
Howells was born in Stourbridge, England and educated in Plymouth.
Practice
His practice, Glenn Howells Archite ...
with venue design by
Acoustic Dimensions. This auditorium, with its associated research, teaching and rehearsal facilities, houses the Department of Music. In August 2011 the university announced that architects
Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands
Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands is a practice of architects, urban designers and masterplanners established in 1986 and practising out of London.
History
Alex Lifschutz and Ian Davidson met working on the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank Headquarters ...
and
S&P were appointed to develop a new Indoor Sports Centre as part of a £175 million investment in the campus.
Other features
![Lapworth Museum](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/Lapworth_Museum.jpg)
In 1978,
University station, on the
Cross-City Line
The Cross-City Line is a commuter rail line in the West Midlands region of England. It runs for from Redditch and Bromsgrove in Worcestershire, its two southern termini, to Lichfield, Staffordshire, its northern terminus, via Birmingham New Str ...
, was opened to serve the university and its hospital. It is the only university campus in mainland Britain with its own railway station. a new station is being constructed, adjacent to the existing facility.
Nearby, the Steampipe Bridge, which was constructed in 2011, transports steam across the Cross-City Railway Line and
Worcester & Birmingham Canal from the energy generation plant to the medical school as part of the university's sustainable energy strategy. Its laser-cut exterior is also a public art feature.
Located within the Edgbaston site of the university is the
Winterbourne Botanic Garden
Winterbourne Botanic Garden is a heritage site and botanic garden in Edgbaston, Birmingham, England. It is owned by the University of Birmingham.
The house was built as a family home for the Nettlefold family in 1904. The garden is a rare survi ...
, a 24,000 square metre (258,000 square foot)
Edwardian
The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history spanned the reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victori ...
Arts and Crafts
A handicraft, sometimes more precisely expressed as artisanal handicraft or handmade, is any of a wide variety of types of work where useful and decorative objects are made completely by one’s hand or by using only simple, non-automated re ...
style garden. The large statue in the foreground was a gift to the university by its sculptor Sir Edward Paolozzi – the sculpture is named 'Faraday', and has an excerpt from the poem 'The Dry Salvages' by
T. S. Eliot around its base.
The University of Birmingham operates the
Lapworth Museum of Geology
The Lapworth Museum of Geology is a geological museum run by the University of Birmingham and located on the university's campus in Edgbaston, south Birmingham, England. The museum is named after the geologist Charles Lapworth, its origins datin ...
in the Aston Webb Building in
Edgbaston
Edgbaston () is an affluent suburban area of central Birmingham, England, historically in Warwickshire, and curved around the southwest of the city centre.
In the 19th century, the area was under the control of the Gough-Calthorpe family an ...
. It is named after
Charles Lapworth
Charles Lapworth FRS FGS (20 September 1842 – 13 March 1920) was a headteacher and an English geologist who pioneered faunal analysis using index fossils and identified the Ordovician period.
Biography
Charles Lapworth was born at Faring ...
, a geologist who worked at Mason Science College.
Since November 2007, the university has been holding a
farmers' market
A farmers' market (or farmers market according to the AP stylebook, also farmer's market in the Cambridge Dictionary) is a physical retail marketplace intended to sell foods directly by farmers to consumers. Farmers' markets may be indoors or o ...
on the campus. Birmingham is the first university in the country to have an accredited farmers' market.
The considerable extent of the estate meant that by the end of the 1990s it was valued at £536 million.
[Ives, E. (2000). The First Civic University: Birmingham, 1880–1980 – An Introductory History. Birmingham: University of Birmingham Press.]
University of Birmingham marked its grand ending of Green Heart Project at the start of 2019.
Selly Oak campus
The university's
Selly Oak
Selly Oak is an industrial and residential area in south-west Birmingham, England. The area gives its name to Selly Oak ward and includes the neighbourhoods of: Bournbrook, Selly Park, and Ten Acres. The adjoining wards of Edgbaston and Harborne ...
campus is a short distance to the south of the main campus. It was the home of a federation of nine colleges, known as
Selly Oak Colleges
Selly Oak Colleges was a federation of educational facilities which in the 1970s and 1980s was at the forefront of debates about ecumenism - the coming together of Christian churches and the creation of new united churches such as the Church of ...
, mainly focused on theology, social work, and teacher training. The Federation was for many years associated with the University of Birmingham. A new library, the Orchard Learning Resource Centre, was opened in 2001, shortly before the Federation ceased to exist. The OLRC is now one of Birmingham University's site libraries. Among the
Selly Oak Colleges
Selly Oak Colleges was a federation of educational facilities which in the 1970s and 1980s was at the forefront of debates about ecumenism - the coming together of Christian churches and the creation of new united churches such as the Church of ...
was Westhill College, (later the University of Birmingham, Westhill), which merged with the university's School of Education in 2001. In the following years most of the remaining colleges closed, leaving two colleges which continue today,
Woodbrooke College
Woodbrooke Study Centre is a Quaker college in Selly Oak, Birmingham, England.
The only Quaker Study Centre in Europe, it was founded by George Cadbury in 1903 and occupies his former home on the Bristol Road. Woodbrooke's first Director of Stu ...
, a study and conference centre for the
Society of Friends
Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abili ...
, and
Fircroft College
Fircroft College is a specialist adult residential college based in Selly Oak, Birmingham, England.
The college was founded by George Cadbury Junior, son of George Cadbury Senior, in 1908 and offers over 150 short residential courses throughou ...
, a small adult education college with residential provision.
Woodbrooke College's Centre for Postgraduate Quaker Studies, established in 1998, works with the University of Birmingham to deliver research supervision for the degrees of MA by research and PhD.
The Selly Oak campus is now home to the Department of Drama and Theatre Arts in the newly refurbished
Selly Oak Colleges
Selly Oak Colleges was a federation of educational facilities which in the 1970s and 1980s was at the forefront of debates about ecumenism - the coming together of Christian churches and the creation of new united churches such as the Church of ...
Old Library and George Cadbury Hall 200-seat theatre. The UK
daytime television
Daytime is a block of television programming taking place during the late-morning and afternoon on weekdays. Daytime programming is typically scheduled to air between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., following the early morning d ...
show ''
Doctors
Doctor or The Doctor may refer to:
Personal titles
* Doctor (title), the holder of an accredited academic degree
* A medical practitioner, including:
** Physician
** Surgeon
** Dentist
** Veterinary physician
** Optometrist
*Other roles
** ...
'' is filmed on this campus. The
University of Birmingham School
University of Birmingham School is a mixed free school that occupies a new, purpose-built building located on the University of Birmingham's Selly Oak campus. The University of Birmingham School opened in September 2015, and is sponsored by th ...
occupies a brand new, purpose-built building located on the university's Selly Oak campus. The
University of Birmingham School
University of Birmingham School is a mixed free school that occupies a new, purpose-built building located on the University of Birmingham's Selly Oak campus. The University of Birmingham School opened in September 2015, and is sponsored by th ...
is sponsored by the University of Birmingham and managed by an Academy Trust. The
University of Birmingham School
University of Birmingham School is a mixed free school that occupies a new, purpose-built building located on the University of Birmingham's Selly Oak campus. The University of Birmingham School opened in September 2015, and is sponsored by th ...
opened in September 2015.
Mason College and Queen's College campus
![Mason Science College](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/92/Mason_Science_College.png)
The Victorian neo-gothic
Mason College
Mason Science College was a university college in Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of Birmingham University. Founded in 1875 by industrialist and philanthropist Sir Josiah Mason, the college was incorporated into the University o ...
Building in Birmingham city centre housed Birmingham University's Faculties of Arts and Law for over 50 years after the founding of the university in 1900. The Faculty of Arts building on the Edgbaston campus was not constructed until 1959–61. The Faculties of Arts and Law then moved to the Edgbaston campus. The original
Mason College
Mason Science College was a university college in Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of Birmingham University. Founded in 1875 by industrialist and philanthropist Sir Josiah Mason, the college was incorporated into the University o ...
Building was demolished in 1962 as part of the redevelopment within the inner ring road.
The 1843 Gothic Revival building constructed opposite the Town Hall between Paradise Street (the main entrance) and Swallow Street served as
Queen's College, one of the founder colleges of the university. In 1904 the building was given a new buff-coloured terracotta and brick front. The medical and scientific departments merged with Mason College in 1900 to form the University of Birmingham and sought new premises in Edgbaston. The theological department of Queen's College did not merge with Mason College, but later moved in 1923 to Somerset Road in Edgbaston, next to the University of Birmingham as the
Queen's Foundation, maintaining a relationship with the University of Birmingham until a 2010 review. In the mid 1970s, the original Queen's College building was demolished, with the exception of the grade II listed façade.
Organisation and administration
Academic departments
![Aston webb1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/89/Aston_webb1.JPG)
Birmingham has departments covering a wide range of subjects. On 1 August 2008, the university's system was restructured into five 'colleges', which are composed of numerous 'schools':
*Arts and Law (English, Drama and Creative Studies; History and Cultures; Languages, Cultures, Art History and Music; Birmingham Law School; Philosophy, Theology and Religion)
*Engineering and Physical Sciences (Chemistry; Chemical Engineering; Computer Science; Engineering (comprising the Departments of civil, Mechanical and Electrical, Electronic & Systems Engineering); Mathematics; Metallurgy and Materials; Physics and Astronomy)
*Life and Environmental Sciences (Biosciences; Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences; Psychology; Sport and Exercise Sciences)
*Medical and Dental Sciences (Institute of Cancer and Genomic Sciences; Institute of Clinical Sciences; Institute of Inflammation and Ageing; Institute of Applied Health Research; Institute of Cardiovascular Science; Institute of Immunology and Immunotherapy; Institute of Metabolism and Systems Research; Institute of Microbiology and Infection).
*Social Sciences (
Birmingham Business School Birmingham Business School may refer to:
* Birmingham Business School (University of Birmingham)
Birmingham Business School (BBS) is the business school of the University of Birmingham in England. Originally established as the School of Commerc ...
; Education; Government and Society; Social Policy)
*Liberal Arts and Sciences
The university is home to a number of research centres and schools, including the Birmingham Business School, the oldest business school in England, the
University of Birmingham Medical School
The University of Birmingham Medical School is one of Britain's largest and oldest medical schools with over 400 medical, 70 pharmacy, 140 biomedical science and 130 nursing students graduating each year. It is based at the University of Birmi ...
, the International Development Department, the
Institute of Local Government Studies
The Institute of Local Government Studies (ILGS) is a Government of Ghana institution established in 1999 with the mandate to educate students in public management and development. The institution is backed by Act of Parliament, 647 of 2003. The i ...
, the
Centre of West African Studies
Centre of West African Studies (CWAS) is a division of the School of Historical Studies at the University of Birmingham, England. The centre provides teaching and research into issues of African development, culture, anthropology, sociology, polit ...
, the Centre for Russian and East European Studies, the Centre of Excellence for Research in Computational Intelligence and Applications and the
Shakespeare Institute
The Shakespeare Institute is a centre for postgraduate study dedicated to the study of William Shakespeare and the literature of the English Renaissance. It is part of the University of Birmingham, and is located in Stratford-upon-Avon.
The Insti ...
. An Institute for Research into Superdiversity was established in 2013. Apart from traditional research and PhDs, under the department of Engineering and Physical Sciences, the university offers split-site PhD in Computer Science.
The university is also home to the
Birmingham Solar Oscillations Network
The Birmingham Solar Oscillations Network (BiSON) consists of a network of six remote solar observatories monitoring low-degree solar oscillation modes. It is operated by the High Resolution Optical Spectroscopy group of the School of Physics ...
(BiSON) which consists of a network of six remote solar observatories monitoring low-degree solar oscillation modes. It is operated by the High Resolution Optical Spectroscopy group of the School of Physics and Astronomy, funded by the
Science and Technology Facilities Council
The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) is a United Kingdom government agency that carries out research in science and engineering, and funds UK research in areas including particle physics, nuclear physics, space science and astro ...
(STFC).
International Development Department
The International Development Department (IDD) is a multi-disciplinary academic department focused on
poverty reduction
Poverty reduction, poverty relief, or poverty alleviation, is a set of measures, both economic and humanitarian, that are intended to permanently lift people out of poverty.
Measures, like those promoted by Henry George in his economics clas ...
through developing effective governance systems. The department is one of the leading UK centres for the postgraduate study of
international development
International development or global development is a broad concept denoting the idea that societies and countries have differing levels of economic or human development on an international scale. It is the basis for international classifications ...
. The department has been described as being a "highly regarded, long-established specialist unit" with a "global reputation" by ''
The Independent
''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...
''.
Off-campus establishments
![Masoncroft](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/65/Masoncroft.jpg)
A number of the university's centres, schools and institutes are located away from its two campuses in Edgbaston and Selly Oak:
* The
Shakespeare Institute
The Shakespeare Institute is a centre for postgraduate study dedicated to the study of William Shakespeare and the literature of the English Renaissance. It is part of the University of Birmingham, and is located in Stratford-upon-Avon.
The Insti ...
, in
Stratford-upon-Avon
Stratford-upon-Avon (), commonly known as just Stratford, is a market town and civil parish in the Stratford-on-Avon district, in the county of Warwickshire, in the West Midlands region of England. It is situated on the River Avon, north-we ...
, which is a centre for postgraduate study dedicated to the study of
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
and the
literature
Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...
of the
English Renaissance
The English Renaissance was a Cultural movement, cultural and Art movement, artistic movement in England from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that is usually regarded as beginni ...
.
* The
Ironbridge Institute
The Ironbridge Institute is a centre offering postgraduate and professional development courses in cultural heritage, located in the Ironbridge Gorge region of Shropshire, England.
The institute is located in Coalbrookdale, just outside Ironbridg ...
, in
Ironbridge
Ironbridge is a large village in the borough of Telford and Wrekin in Shropshire, England. Located on the bank of the River Severn, at the heart of the Ironbridge Gorge, it lies in the civil parish of The Gorge. Ironbridge developed beside, an ...
, which offers postgraduate and professional development courses in
heritage
Heritage may refer to:
History and society
* A heritage asset is a preexisting thing of value today
** Cultural heritage is created by humans
** Natural heritage is not
* Heritage language
Biology
* Heredity, biological inheritance of physical c ...
.
* The School of Dentistry (the UK's oldest dental school), in Birmingham City Centre.
* The Raymond Priestley Centre, near
Coniston in the
Lake District
The Lake District, also known as the Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous for its lakes, forests, and mountains (or ''fells''), and its associations with William Wordswor ...
, which is used for
outdoor pursuits
Outdoor recreation or outdoor activity refers to recreation done outside, most commonly in natural settings. The activities that encompass outdoor recreation vary depending on the physical environment they are being carried out in. These activitie ...
and
field work
Field research, field studies, or fieldwork is the collection of raw data outside a laboratory, library, or workplace setting. The approaches and methods used in field research vary across disciplines. For example, biologists who conduct f ...
.
There is also a
Masonic Lodge
A Masonic lodge, often termed a private lodge or constituent lodge, is the basic organisational unit of Freemasonry. It is also commonly used as a term for a building in which such a unit meets. Every new lodge must be warranted or chartered ...
that has been associated with the university since 1938.
University of Birmingham Observatory
![UoBirmingham Observatory](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/UoBirmingham_Observatory.jpg)
In the early 1980s, the University of Birmingham constructed an observatory next to the university playing fields, approximately south of the Edgbaston campus. The site was chosen because the night sky was ~100 times darker than the skies above campus. First light was on 8 December 1982, and the Observatory was officially opened by the
Astronomer Royal
Astronomer Royal is a senior post in the Royal Households of the United Kingdom. There are two officers, the senior being the Astronomer Royal dating from 22 June 1675; the junior is the Astronomer Royal for Scotland dating from 1834.
The post ...
,
Francis Graham-Smith
Sir Francis Graham-Smith (born 25 April 1923) is a British astronomer. He was the thirteenth Astronomer Royal from 1982 to 1990 and was knighted in 1986.
Biography
Education
He was educated at Rossall School, Lancashire, England, and attended ...
, on 13 June 1984. The observatory was upgraded in 2013.
The Observatory is used primarily for undergraduate teaching. It has two main instruments, a 16" Cassegrain reflector, Cassegrain (working at f/19) and a 14" Meade Instruments, Meade LX200R (working at f/6.35). A third telescope is also present and is used exclusively for visual observations.
Members of the public are given chance to visit the Observatory at regular ''Astronomy in the City'' events during the winter months. These events include a talk on the night sky from a member of the university's student Birmingham University Astronomical Society, Astronomical Society; a talk on current astrophysics research, such as exoplanets, galaxy clusters or gravitational-wave astronomy, a question-and-answer session, and the chance to observing using telescopes both on campus and at the Observatory.
Branding
The original coat of arms was designed in 1900. It features a double headed lion (on the left) and a mermaid holding a mirror and comb (to the right). These symbols owe to the coat of arms of the institution's predecessor, Mason College.
In 2005 the university began rebranding itself. A simplified edition of the shield which had been introduced in the 1980s reverted to a detailed version based on how it appears on the university's original Royal Charter.
Academic profile
Libraries and collections
![Bham-library](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2a/Bham-library.jpg)
Library Services operates six libraries. They are the Barber Fine Art Library, Barnes Library, Main Library, Orchard Learning Resource Centre, Dental Library, and the Shakespeare Institute Library. Library Services also operates the Cadbury Research Library.
The Shakespeare Institute's library is a major United Kingdom resource for the study of English Renaissance literature.
The Cadbury Research Library is home to the University of Birmingham's historic collections of rare books, manuscripts, archives, photographs and associated artefacts. The collections, which have been built up over a period of 120 years consist of over 200,000 rare printed books including significant incunabula, as well as over 4 million unique archive and manuscript collections. The Cadbury Research Library is responsible for directly supporting the university's research, learning and teaching agenda, along with supporting the national and international research community.
The Cadbury Research Library contains the Chamberlain collection of papers from
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...
,
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain (8 July 1836 – 2 July 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then a Liberal Unionist after opposing home rule for Ireland, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the Cons ...
and Austen Chamberlain, the Avon Papers belonging to Anthony Eden with material on the Suez Crisis, the Cadbury Papers relating to the Cadbury Schweppes, Cadbury firm from 1900 to 1960, the Mingana Collection of Middle Eastern Manuscripts of Alphonse Mingana, the Noël Coward Collection, the papers of
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...
, Oswald Mosley, and David Lodge (author), David Lodge, and the records of the English YMCA and of the Church Missionary Society. The Cadbury Research Library has recently taken in the complete archive of UK Save the Children. The Library holds important first editions such as De Humani Corporis (1543) by Versalius, the Complete Works (1616) of Ben Jonson, two copies of The Temple of Flora (1799-1807) by Robert Thornton and comprehensive collections of the works of Joseph Priestley and D H Lawrence as well as many other significant works.
In 2015, Birmingham Quran manuscript, a Quranic manuscript in the Mingana Collection was identified as one of the oldest to have survived, having been written between 568 and 645.
At the beginning of the 2016/17 academic year, a new main library opened on the Edgbaston campus and the old library has now been demolished as part of the plans to create a 'Green Heart' as per the original plans for the university whereby the clock tower would be visible from the North Gate. The Harding Law Library was closed and renovated to become the university's Translation and Interpreting Suite.
Medicine
![BirminghamQueenElizabethHospitalMedicalSchool](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c4/BirminghamQueenElizabethHospitalMedicalSchool.jpg)
The University of Birmingham's medical school is one of the largest in Europe with well over 450 medical students being trained in each of the clinical years and over 1,000 teaching, research, technical and administrative staff . The school has centres of excellence in cancer, pharmacy, immunology, cardiovascular disease, neuroscience and endocrinology and renowned nationally and internationally for its research and developments in these fields. The medical school has close links with the National Health Service (England), NHS and works closely with 15 teaching hospitals and 50 primary care training practices in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands.
The University Hospital Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust is the main teaching hospital in the West Midlands. It has been given three stars for the past four consecutive years. The trust also hosts the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine, based at Selly Oak Hospital, which provides medical support to military personnel such as military returned from fighting in the Iraq War.
Rankings and reputation
![Bloye BUGS mermaid, stone](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Bloye_BUGS_mermaid%2C_stone.jpg)
The 2022 ''U.S. News & World Report'' ranks Birmingham 91st in the world. In 2019, it is ranked 137th among the universities around the world by ''SCImago Institutions Rankings''.
In 2021 the Times Higher Education placed Birmingham 12th in the UK.
In 2013, Birmingham was named 'University of the Year 2014' in the ''Times Higher Education'' awards.
The 2013 QS World University Rankings placed Birmingham University at 10th in the UK and 62nd internationally. Birmingham was ranked 12th in the UK in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise with 16 percent of the university's research regarded as world-leading and 41 percent as internationally excellent, with particular strengths in the fields of music, physics, biosciences, computer science, mechanical engineering, political science, international relations and law.
Course satisfaction was at 85% in 2011 which grew to 88% in 2012.
In 2015 the Complete University Guide placed Birmingham 5th in the UK for graduate prospects.
Data from the ''Higher Education Funding Council for England'' (HEFCE) placed the university amongst the twelve elite institutions who among them take more than half of the students with the highest A-level grades.
Birmingham traditionally had a focus on science, engineering, commerce and coal mining, but has now expanded its provision. It hosted the first Cancer Research UK Centre, and making notable contributions to gravitational-wave astronomy, hosting the Institute of Gravitational Wave Astronomy.
The School of Computer Science ranked 1st in the 2014 Guardian University Guide, 4th in the 2013 Sunday Times League Table and 6th in the 2014 Sunday Times League Table.
The Department of Philosophy ranked 3rd in the 2017 Guardian University League Tables, below the University of Oxford and above the University of Cambridge, with the first being the University of St Andrews.
The combined course of Computer Science and Information Systems, titled Computer Systems Engineering was ranked 4th in the 2016 Guardian University guide.
The Department of Political Science and International Studies (POLSIS) ranked 4th in the UK and 22nd in the world in the Hix rankings of political science departments. The sociology department also ranked 4th by The Guardian University guide. The Research Fortnight's University Power Ranking, based on quality and quantity of research activity, put the University of Birmingham 12th in the UK, leading the way across a broad range of disciplines including Primary Care, Cancer Studies, Psychology and Sport and Exercise Sciences. The School of Physics and Astronomy also performed well in the rankings, being ranked 3rd in the 2012 Guardian University Guide and 7th in The Complete University Guide 2012. The School of Chemical Engineering is ranked second in the UK by the 2014 Guardian University Guide.
Admissions
![Birmingham Business School](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fe/Birmingham_Business_School.jpg)
In terms of average UCAS points of entrants, Birmingham ranked 25th in Britain in 2014. According to the 2017 ''Times'' and ''Sunday Times'' Good University Guide, approximately 20% of Birmingham's undergraduates come from independent schools.
The university gives offers of admission to 79.2% of its applicants, the 8th highest amongst the
Russell Group
The Russell Group is a self-selected association of twenty-four public university, public research university, research universities in the United Kingdom. The group is headquartered in Cambridge and was established in 1994 to represent its memb ...
. In the 2016–17 academic year, the university had a domicile breakdown of 76:5:18 of UK:EU:non-EU students respectively with a female to male ratio of 56:44.
Birmingham Heroes
To highlight leading areas of research, the university has launched the Birmingham Heroes scheme. Academics who lead research that impacts on the lives of people regionally, nationally and globally can be nominated for selection. Heroes include:
* Alberto Vecchio and Andreas Freise for their work as part of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration towards the first observation of gravitational waves
* Martin Freer, Toby Peters and Yulong Ding for their work on energy efficient cooling
* Philip Newsome, Thomas Solomon and Patricia Lalor for tackling the silent killers, liver disease and diabetes
* James Arthur, Kristján Kristjánsson, Sandra Cooke and Tom Harrison for promoting character in education
* Lisa Bortolotti, Ema Sullivan-Bissett and Michael Larkin for their work on how to break down the social stigma, stigma associated with mental illness
* Kate Thomas, Joe Alderman, Rima Dhillon and Shayan Ahmed for their research in and teaching of List of life sciences, life sciences
* Pam Kearns, Charlie Craddock and Paul Moss for cancer research
* Anna Phillips, Glyn Humphreys and Janet Lord who research healthy ageing
* Pierre Purseigle, Peter Gray and Bob Stone for using their historical knowledge to advise government organisations
* Paul Bowen and Nick Green for research into new Materials science, materials to improve Electric generator, energy generation
* Lynne Macaskie, William Bloss and Jamie Lead for their study of pollutants, particularly Nanotechnology, nanoscale pollutants
* Paul Jackson, Scott Lucas and Stefan Wolff for their work helping with post-conflict and advice on the application of aid
*Hongming Xu, Clive Roberts and Roger Reed for work on sustainable transport
* Moataz Attallah, Kiran Trehan and Tim Daffron for driving economic growth through improving aerospace engineering, developing enterprise and pioneering industrial applications of synthetic biology
Birmingham Fellows
The Birmingham Fellowship scheme was launched in 2011. The scheme encourages high potential early career researchers to establish themselves as rounded academics and continue pursuing their research interests. This scheme was the first of its kind, and has since been emulated in several other
Russell Group
The Russell Group is a self-selected association of twenty-four public university, public research university, research universities in the United Kingdom. The group is headquartered in Cambridge and was established in 1994 to represent its memb ...
universities across the UK. Since 2014, the scheme has been divided int
Birmingham Research Fellowshipsan
Birmingham Teaching Fellowships
Birmingham Fellows are appointed to permanent academic posts (with two or three year probation periods), with five years protected time to develop their research.
Birmingham Fellows are usually recruited at a lecturer or senior lecturer level. In the first period of the fellowship, emphasis is placed on the research aspect, publishing high quality academic outputs, developing a trajectory for their work and gaining external funding. However, development of teaching skills is encouraged.
Teaching and supervisory responsibilities, as well as administrative duties, then steadily increase to a normal lecturer's load in the Fellow's respective discipline by the fifth year of the fellowship. Birmingham Fellows are not expected to carry out academic administration during their term as Fellows, but will do once their posts turn into lectureships ('three-legged contract'). When accepted into the Birmingham Research Fellowship, Fellows receive a start-up package to develop or continue their research projects, an academic mentor and support for both research and teaching. All fellows are said to become part of the Birmingham Fellows Cohort, which provides them a university-wide network and an additional source of support and mentoring.
International cooperation
In Germany the University of Birmingham cooperates with the Goethe University Frankfurt, Goethe University in Frankfurt/Main. Both cities are linked by a long-lasting partnership agreement.
Student life
Guild of Students
![BirminghamBUGS](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/24/BirminghamBUGS.jpg)
The University of Birmingham Guild of Students is the university's students' union, student union. Originally the Guild of Undergraduates, the institution had its first foundations in the Mason Science College in the centre of Birmingham around 1876. The University of Birmingham itself formally received its Royal Charter in 1900 with the Guild of Students being provided for as a Student Representative Council. It is not known for certain why the name 'Guild of Students' was chosen as opposed to 'Union of Students', however, the Guild shares its name with Liverpool Guild of Students, another 'redbrick university'; both organisations subsequently founded the National Union of Students (United Kingdom), National Union of Students. The Union Building, the Guild's bricks and mortar presence, was designed by the architect Holland W. Hobbiss.
The Guild's official purposes are to represent its members and provide a means of socialising, though societies and general amenities. The university provides the Guild with the Union Building effectively rent free as well as a block grant to support student services. The Guild also runs several bars, eateries, social spaces and social events.
The Guild supports a variety of student societies and volunteering projects, roughly around 220 at any one time. The Guild complements these societies and volunteering projects with professional staffed services, including its walk-in Advice and Representation Centre (ARC), Student Activities, Jobs/Skills/Volunteering, Student Mentors in halls, and Community Wardens around
Bournbrook
Bournbrook is an industrial and residential district in southwest Birmingham, England, in both the Selly Oak Council Ward and the Parliamentary District of Selly Oak. Prior to what is commonly termed the Greater Birmingham Act, which came in ...
. The Guild of Students was where the international volunteering charity InterVol was conceived and developed as a student-led volunteering project; the group currently supports charitable organisations in four developing countries. Another two of the Guild's long-standing societies are Student Advice and Nightline (previously Niteline), which both provide peer-to-peer welfare support. The Guild was one of the first universities in the United Kingdom to publish a campus newspaper, ''Redbrick (Newspaper), Redbrick'', supported financially by the Guild of Students and advertising revenue.
The Guild undertakes its representative function through its officer group, seven of whom are full-time, on sabbatical from their studies, and ten of whom are part-time and hold their positions whilst still studying. Elections are held yearly, conventionally February, for the following academic year. These officers have regular contact with the university's officer-holders and managers. In theory, the Guild's officers are directed and kept to account over their year in office by Guild Council, an 80-seat decision-making body. The Guild also supports the university "student reps" scheme, which aims to provide an effective channel of feedback from students on more of a departmental level.
Sport
![Aston Webb from UOB Clock Tower](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/Aston_Webb_from_UOB_Clock_Tower.JPG)
The University of Birmingham opened the new Sport and Fitness Centre in May 2017 providing brand new facilities including gym, squash courts, 50m swimming pool, and climbing wall. The University has two international standard hockey pitches, completed in 2017, flexible 3G pitches which can be used for 5-a-side and 11-a-side football, as well as netball and tennis courts, and a 400m athletics track at Edgbaston Park Road.
As of the 2019 league, the university is ranked seventh in the British Universities and Colleges Sport league table.
University of Birmingham Sport provides a range of competitive and participation sports, for both the student and local community. Services include 180 fitness classes a week, 56 different sport clubs, including rowing, basketball, cricket, football, rugby union, netball, field hockey, American football, and triathlon. The wide selection has ensured the university has over 4,000 students participating in sport each year. The university also opened the Raymond Priestley Centre in 1981 on the shores of Coniston Water in the Lake District, offering students, staff and community alike to explore outdoor activities and learning in the area.
Sir Raymond Priestley, vice-chancellor of the university in 1938, and his Director of Sport A.D. Munrow, helped establish the first undergraduate courses in Physical Education in 1946, developed their sports facilities – starting with the gymnasium in 1939, and made participation in recreational sport compulsory for all new undergraduates from 1940 to 1968. Birmingham became the first UK university to offer a sports degree.
Many University of Birmingham students and alumni have competed at Olympics, Paralympics and Commonwealth Games. In 2004, six graduates and one student competed in the 2004 Athens Summer Olympics, and four alumni competed at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, including cyclist Paul Manning (cyclist), Paul Manning who won an Olympic Gold. In 2012, Pamela Relph MBE was part of the rowing mixed coxed four that won Paralympic gold, and she successfully defended her title in Rio: the only current international para-rower to be a double Paralympic Champion.
In the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia, six students and eighteen alumni attended representing England, Scotland, Wales, and Guernsey, and competing in sports including hockey, 1500m, badminton, and cycling.
The university hosted the Jamaican track and field team prior to the
2012 London Olympics
The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...
. The team, including the world's fastest man, Usain Bolt – who became the first man in history to defend his 100 metres and 200 metres titles at the Olympics – won team gold for the along with Nesta Carter, Yohan Blake and Michael Frater. Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won gold in the women's 100 metres. The team returned to the university in 2017 to prepare for London's Indoor Championships, staying in the Chamberlain Hall on the Vale Village, and using the newly established Sport & Fitness facilities and athletics track.
University of Birmingham Sport has since been host to a number of international teams; the Australian and South Africa teams ahead of the men's Rugby World Cup in 2015, the Jamaican, England and New Zealand netball teams before the Vitality Nations Cup in January 2020, and 19 nations for the individual competition at the World University Squash Championships in 2018.
Birmingham was selected as the host for the 2022 Commonwealth Games and the University was chosen as the venue for hockey and squash, due to the ability of existing facilities to host the games with only temporary structures needing to be constructed for seating, lighting, and broadcasting. The University was the largest athletes village during the games, hosting 3,500 athletes in Tennis Courts and the Vale, and the University was the official training venue for both swimming and athletics.
University of Birmingham Sport also offers around 30 scholarships and bursaries to national and international students of exceptional athletic ability.
Housing
The university provides housing for most first-year students, running a guarantee scheme for all those UK applicants who choose Birmingham as their firm UCAS choice. 90 per cent of university-provided housing is inhabited by first-year students.
The university maintained gender-segregated halls until 1999 when Lake and Wyddrington "halls" (treated as two different halls, despite being physically one building) were renamed as Shackleton Hall. Chamberlain Hall (Eden Tower), a seventeen-storey tower block, was originally known as High Hall, for male students, and the connected Ridge Hall (later renamed to the Hampton Wing), for female students. University House was decommissioned as accommodation to house the expanding Business School, while Mason Hall has been demolished and rebuilt, opening in 2008. In the summer of 2006, the university sold three of its most distant halls (Hunter Court, the Beeches and Queens Hospital Close) to private operators, while later in the year and during term, the university was forced urgently to decommission both the old Chamberlain Tower (High Hall) and also Manor House over fire safety inspection failures. The university has rebranded its halls offerings into three villages.
Vale Village
![20131110ChamberlainHall](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/20131110ChamberlainHall.jpg)
The Vale Village includes Chamberlain Hall, Shackleton, Maple Bank, Tennis Court, Elgar Court and Aitken residences. A sixth hall of residence, Mason Hall, re-opened in September 2008 following a complete rebuild. Approximately 2,700 students live in the village.
Shackleton Hall (originally Lake Hall, for male students, and Wyddrington Hall, for female students) underwent an £11 million refurbishment and was re-opened in Autumn 2004. There are 72 flats housing a total of 350 students. The majority of the units consist of six to eight bedrooms, together with a small number of one, two, three or five bedroom studio/apartments. The redevelopment was designed by Birmingham-based architect Patrick Nicholls while employed at Aedas, now a director of Glancy Nicholls Architects.
Maple Bank was refurbished and opened in summer 2005. It consists of 87 five bedroom flats, housing 435 undergraduates.
The Elgar Court residence consists of 40 six bedroom flats, housing a total of 236 students. It opened in September 2003.
Tennis Court consists of 138 three, four, five and six bedroom flats and houses 697 students.
The Aitken wing is a small complex consisting of 23 six and eight bedroom flats. It houses 147 students.
Construction of the new Mason Hall commenced in June 2006 following complete demolition of the original 1960s structures. It was designed by Aedas Architects. The entire project is thought to have cost £36.75 million. It has since been completed, with the first year of students moving in September 2008.
The new Chamberlain Tower and neighbouring low rise blocks opened in September 2015. Chamberlain is home to more than 700 first year students. It replaced the old 1964-built 18-storey (above ground level) High Hall (later renamed Eden Tower), for male students and low rise Ridge Hall (later renamed Hampton Wing) for female students, which closed in 2006. The 50-year-old Eden Tower was removed at the start of 2014. Previously known as High Hall, the tower and its associated low rise blocks were demolished after studies revealed it would be uneconomical to refurbish them and would not provide the quality of accommodation which the University of Birmingham desires for students.
The largest student-run event, the Vale Festival or 'ValeFest', is held annually on the Vale. The Festival celebrated its 10th event in 2014, raising £25,000 for charity. The 2019 event was headlined by The Hunna and Saint Raymond.
Pritchatts Park Village
![Barber Institute Interior](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/53/Barber_Institute_Interior.jpg)
The Pritchatts Park Village houses over 700 undergraduate and postgraduate students. Halls include 'Ashcroft', 'The Spinney' and 'Oakley Court', as well as 'Pritchatts House' and the 'Pritchatts Road Houses'.
The Spinney is a small complex of six houses and twelve smaller flats, housing 104 students in total.
Ashcroft consists of four purpose built blocks of flats and houses 198 students. The four-storey Pritchatts House consists of 24 duplex units and houses 159 students. Oakley Court consists of 21 individual purpose-built flats, ranging in size from five to thirteen bedrooms. Also included are 36 duplex units. A total of 213 students are housed in Oakley Court, made up of undergraduates. Oakley Court was completed in 1993 at a cost of £2.9 million. It was designed by Birmingham-based Associated Architects.
Pritchatts Road is a group of four private houses that were converted into student residences. There is a maximum of 16 bedrooms per house.
Selly Oak Village
![Bloye BUGS mermaid, bronze](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/12/Bloye_BUGS_mermaid%2C_bronze.jpg)
Selly Oak Village consists of three residences in the
Selly Oak
Selly Oak is an industrial and residential area in south-west Birmingham, England. The area gives its name to Selly Oak ward and includes the neighbourhoods of: Bournbrook, Selly Park, and Ten Acres. The adjoining wards of Edgbaston and Harborne ...
and
Bournbrook
Bournbrook is an industrial and residential district in southwest Birmingham, England, in both the Selly Oak Council Ward and the Parliamentary District of Selly Oak. Prior to what is commonly termed the Greater Birmingham Act, which came in ...
areas: Jarratt Hall, which is owned by the university, Douper Hall, and The Metalworks. As of 2008, the village had 637 bed spaces for students.
Jarratt Hall is a large complex designed around a central courtyard and three landscaped areas. It housed 587 undergraduate students as of 2012. Jarratt Hall did not accommodate postgraduate students until September 2013, due to ongoing refurbishment of kitchens and the heating system.
Student Housing Co-operative accommodation
Birmingham Student Housing Co-operative was opened in 2014 by students of the university to provide affordable self managed housing for its members. The co-operative manages a property on Pershore Road in Selly Oak.
Notable people
Academics
![Peter Brian Medawar](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Peter_Brian_Medawar.jpg)
The faculty and staff members connected with the university include Nobel laureates Sir
Norman Haworth
Sir Walter Norman Haworth FRS (19 March 1883 – 19 March 1950) was a British chemist best known for his groundbreaking work on ascorbic acid (vitamin C) while working at the University of Birmingham. He received the 1937 Nobel Prize in Chemi ...
(Professor of Chemistry, 1925–1948),
[ Sir ]Peter Medawar
Sir Peter Brian Medawar (; 28 February 1915 – 2 October 1987) was a Brazilian-British biologist and writer, whose works on graft rejection and the discovery of acquired immune tolerance have been fundamental to the medical practice of tissue ...
(Mason Professor of Zoology, 1947–1951),[ John Robert Schrieffer (NSF Fellow at Birmingham, 1957), David Thouless, Michael Kosterlitz, and Sir Fraser Stoddart.
Physicists include John Henry Poynting, Freeman Dyson, Sir ]Otto Frisch
Otto Robert Frisch FRS (1 October 1904 – 22 September 1979) was an Austrian-born British physicist who worked on nuclear physics. With Lise Meitner he advanced the first theoretical explanation of nuclear fission (coining the term) and first ...
, Sir Rudolf Peierls
Sir Rudolf Ernst Peierls, (; ; 5 June 1907 – 19 September 1995) was a German-born British physicist who played a major role in Tube Alloys, Britain's nuclear weapon programme, as well as the subsequent Manhattan Project, the combined Allied ...
, Sir Marcus Oliphant, Sir Leonard Huxley (physicist), Leonard Huxley, Harry Boot
Henry Albert Howard Boot (29 July 1917 – 8 February 1983) was an English physicist who with Sir John Randall and James Sayers developed the cavity magnetron, which was one of the keys to the Allied victory in the Second World War.
Biography
...
, Sir John Randall, and Edwin Ernest Salpeter. Chemists include Sir William A. Tilden. Mathematicians include Jonathan Bennett (mathematician), Jonathan Bennett, Henry Daniels, Daniela Kühn, Deryk Osthus, Daniel Pedoe and G. N. Watson. In music, faculty members include the composers Sir Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...
and Sir Granville Bantock
Sir Granville Ransome Bantock (7 August 186816 October 1946) was a British composer of classical music.
Biography
Granville Ransome Bantock was born in London. His father was an eminent Scottish surgeon.Hadden, J. Cuthbert, 1913, ''Modern Music ...
. Geologists include Charles Lapworth
Charles Lapworth FRS FGS (20 September 1842 – 13 March 1920) was a headteacher and an English geologist who pioneered faunal analysis using index fossils and identified the Ordovician period.
Biography
Charles Lapworth was born at Faring ...
, Frederick William Shotton, Frederick Shotton, and Sir Alwyn Williams (geologist), Alwyn Williams. In medicine, faculty members include Sir Melville Arnott and Sir Bertram Windle. Biologists include William Hillhouse and George Stephen West, both Mason Professors of Botany.
Author and literary critic David Lodge (author), David Lodge taught English from 1960 until 1987. Poet and playwright Louis MacNeice was a lecturer in classics 1930–1936. English novelist, critic, and man of letters Anthony Burgess taught in the extramural department (1946–50). Richard Hoggart
Herbert Richard Hoggart (24 September 1918 – 10 April 2014) was a British academic whose career covered the fields of sociology, English literature and cultural studies, with emphasis on British popular culture.
Early life
Hoggart was bor ...
founded the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies
Center or centre may refer to:
Mathematics
*Center (geometry), the middle of an object
* Center (algebra), used in various contexts
** Center (group theory)
** Center (ring theory)
* Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentricity ...
. Sir Alan Walters was Professor of Econometrics and Statistics (1951–68) and later became Chief Economic Adviser to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Solly Zuckerman, Baron Zuckerman, Lord Zuckerman was Professor of Anatomy 1946–1968 and also served as chief scientific adviser to the British government from 1964 to 1971. Mervyn King, Baron King of Lothbury, Lord King of Lothbury was a Professor in the Faculty of Commerce and later became Governor of the Bank of England. Sir William James Ashley was first Dean and the founder of the Birmingham Business School.
Sir Nathan Bodington was Professor of Classics. Sir Michael Lyons (UK politician), Michael Lyons was Professor of Public Policy from 2001 to 2006. Sir Kenneth Mather was Professor of genetics (1948) and recipient of the 1964 Darwin Medal. Sir Richard Redmayne was Professor of Mining and later became first Chief Inspector of Mines. The art historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner
Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner (30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983) was a German-British art historian and architectural historian best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, ''The Buildings of England'' (1 ...
held a research post at the university. Sir Ellis Waterhouse was Barber Professor of Fine Art (1952–1970). John Cadman, 1st Baron Cadman, Lord Cadman taught petroleum engineering and is credited with creating the course 'Petroleum Engineering'. The philosopher Sir Michael Dummett held an assistant lectureship at the university. Gordon Borrie, Baron Borrie, Lord Borrie was a professor of law and dean of the faculty of law. Sir Charles Raymond Beazley was Professor of History. Prison reformer Margery Fry was first warden of University House, University of Birmingham, University House.
Vice-Chancellors and Principals include Sir Oliver Lodge
Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge, (12 June 1851 – 22 August 1940) was a British physicist and writer involved in the development of, and holder of key patents for, radio. He identified electromagnetic radiation independent of Heinrich Rudolf Hertz, H ...
, Robert Hunter (physician), Lord Hunter of Newington, Sir Charles Grant Robertson, Sir Raymond Priestley, and Sir Michael Sterling.
Alumni
Four List of Nobel laureates, Nobel Prize laureates are Birmingham University alumni: Francis Aston, Maurice Wilkins, Sir John Vane, and Sir Paul Nurse. In addition soil scientist Peter Bullock (scientist), Peter Bullock contributed to the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, which was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, Nobel Peace Prize in 2007.
The university's alumni in the sphere of British government and politics include: British Prime Ministers Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, (3 August 186714 December 1947) was a British Conservative Party politician who dominated the government of the United Kingdom between the world wars, serving as prime minister on three occasions, ...
and Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...
; Chief Minister of Gibraltar Joe Bossano; British cabinet minister and UN Under-Secretary-General Valerie Amos, Baroness Amos, Baroness Amos; Cabinet Ministers Julian Smith (politician), Julian Smith and Hilary Armstrong; British ministers of state Ann Widdecombe, Richard Tracey, Derek Fatchett, and Anna Soubry; British High Commissioner to New Zealand and Ambassador to South Africa Sir David Aubrey Scott; Governor of the Turks and Caicos Islands Nigel Dakin; Welsh Assembly Government minister Jane Davidson; and UN weapons inspector David Kelly (weapons expert), David Kelly.
Birmingham's alumni in the field of government and politics in other countries include Prime Minister of St. Lucia Kenny Anthony; Prime Minister of the Bahamas Perry Christie; Singapore Minister of Finance Hu Tsu Tau Richard; Singapore Senior Minister of State Matthias Yao; Minister of Defence of Kenya Mohamed Yusuf Haji; Tanzanian minister Mark Mwandosya; Tongan minister ʻAna Taufeʻulungaki; Ethiopian cabinet minister Junedin Sado; Deputy Prime Minister of Mauritius Rashid Beebeejaun; Saudi minister Abdulaziz bin Mohieddin Khoja; Foreign Minister of Gambia Bala Garba Jahumpa; Ghanaian minister Juliana Azumah-Mensah; Egyptian Minister William Selim Hanna; Nigerian minister Emmanuel Chuka Osammor; Saint Lucian minister Alvina Reynolds; Lebanese foreign minister Lucien Dahdah; Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema and Zimbabwean ministers David Karimanzira and Didymus Mutasa.
Alumni in the world of business include: director of the Bank of England Eric Roll, Baron Roll of Ipsden, Lord Roll of Ipsden; CEO of J Sainsbury plc Mike Coupe; Chairman of the Shell Transport and Trading Company plc Sir John Jennings (businessman), John Jennings; automobile executive Sir George Turnbull (businessman), George Turnbull; President of the Confederation of British Industry Sir Clive Thompson (businessman), Clive Thompson; CEO and chairman of BP Sir Peter Walters; Chairman of British Aerospace Sir Austin Pearce; mobile communications entrepreneur Mo Ibrahim; fashion designer and retailer George Davies (retailer), George Davis; founder of Osborne Computer Corporation Adam Osborne; and chairman & CEO of Bass plc Sir Ian Prosser.
Alumni in the legal arena include Hong Kong Chief Justice of the Court of Final Appeal Geoffrey Ma Tao-li; Hong Kong Judge of the Court of Final Appeal Robert Tang; Justice of Appeal at the Court of Appeal in Tanzania Robert Kisanga; Justice of the Supreme Court of Belize Michelle Arana; Lord Justice of Appeal Sir Philip Otton; and High Court Judges Dame Nicola Davies (judge), Nicola Davies, Sir Michael Davies (judge), Michael Davies, Sir Henry Globe, and Dame Lucy Theis.
Alumni in the armed forces include Chief of the General Staff General Sir Mike Jackson (British Army officer), Mike Jackson; and Director General of the Army Medical Services Alan Hawley (British Army officer), Alan Hawley.
Alumni in the sphere of religion include Metropolitan Archbishop and Primate of the Anglican Church in South East Asia Bolly Lapok; Anglican Bishops Paul Bayes, Alan Smith (bishop), Alan Smith, Stephen Venner, Michael Langrish, and Eber Priestley; Anglican Suffragan Bishops Brian Castle and Colin Docker; Catholic Archbishop Kevin McDonald (bishop), Kevin McDonald; and Catholic bishop Philip Egan.
Alumni in the field of healthcare include: chair of the National Institute for Clinical Excellence David Haslam (physician), David Haslam; Dame Hilda Lloyd, the first woman to be elected as president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists; Chief Scientific Officer in the NHS Sue Hill; Chief Dental Officer for England Barry Cockcroft (dentist), Barry Cockcroft; and Chief Medical officer for England Sir Liam Donaldson.
Alumni in the domain of engineering include: Chairman of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority and of the Central Electricity Generating Board Walter Marshall, Baron Marshall of Goring, Lord Marshall of Goring; Chairman of British Aerospace Sir Austin Pearce; Chief Engineer of the PWD Shaef in World War II Sir Francis McLean (engineer), Francis McLean; and Director of Production at the Ministry of Munitions during World War I Sir Henry Fowler (engineer), Henry Fowler.
Alumni in the creative industries include actors Madeleine Carroll, Tim Curry, Tamsin Greig, Matthew Goode, Nigel Lindsay, Elliot Cowan, Geoffrey Hutchings, Judy Loe, Jane Wymark, Mariah Gale, Hadley Fraser, Elizabeth Henstridge, and Norman Painting; actors and comedians Victoria Wood and Chris Addison; dancer/choreographer and co-creator of 'Riverdance' Jean Butler, social media influencer and YouTuber Hannah Witton, children's author and scholar Fawzia Gilani-Williams, author Polly Ho-Yen, musicians Simon Le Bon of Duran Duran and Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac, and travel writer Alan Booth.
Alumni in academia include: University Vice-Chancellors Frank Horton (physicist), Frank Horton, Sir Robert Howson Pickard, Sir Louis Matheson, Derek Burke, Sir Alex Jarratt, Sir Philip Baxter, Vincent Watts, P. B. Sharma, Berrick Saul, and Wahid Omar (academic), Wahid Omar; neurobiologist and Emeritus Professor at the University of Cambridge Sir Gabriel Horn, physicians Sir Alexander Markham, Sir Gilbert Barling, Brian MacMahon, Aaron Valero, and Sir Arthur Thomson (physician), Arthur Thomson; neurologist Sir Michael Owen (neurologist), Michael Owen; physicists John Stewart Bell, Sir Alan Cottrell, Brian Flowers, Baron Flowers, Lord Flowers, Harry Boot
Henry Albert Howard Boot (29 July 1917 – 8 February 1983) was an English physicist who with Sir John Randall and James Sayers developed the cavity magnetron, which was one of the keys to the Allied victory in the Second World War.
Biography
...
, Elliott H. Lieb (recipient of the 2003 Henri Poincaré Prize), Stanley Mandelstam, Edwin Ernest Salpeter (recipient of the 1997 Crafoord Prize in Astronomy), Sir Ernest William Titterton, and Raymond Wilson (physicist), Raymond Wilson (recipient of the 2010 Kavli Prize in Astrophysics); statistician Peter McCullagh; chemist Sir Robert Howson Pickard; biologists Sir Kenneth Murray (biologist), Kenneth Murray and Lady Noreen Murray; zoologists Desmond Morris and Karl Shuker; behavioural neuroscientist Barry Everitt (scientist), Barry Everitt; palaeontologist Harry B. Whittington; computer scientist Mike Cowlishaw; Women's writing academic Lorna Sage; philosopher John Lewis (philosopher), John Lewis; economist and historian Homa Katouzian; theologian and biochemist Arthur Peacocke; labour economics, labour economist David Blanchflower; Professor of Social Policy at the London School of Economics Sir John Hills (academic), John Hills; geographer Geoffrey J.D. Hewings; Professor of Geology and ninth President of Cornell University Frank H. T. Rhodes; Government Chief Scientific Adviser Sir Alan Cottrell; and former astronaut Rodolfo Neri Vela.
Alumni in the world of sport are many. They include Lisa Clayton, the first woman to sail the globe single-handed; 400 metres runner Allison Curbishley, who won silver at the 1998 Commonwealth Games; team pursuit cyclist Paul Manning (cyclist), Paul Manning, who won bronze, silver and gold at the Olympics of 2004, 2008 and 2012; sports scholar Izzy Christiansen, who played football for Birmingham City, Everton and Manchester City before her call up to the senior England squad; Warwickshire and England cricketer Jim Troughton; and Adam Pengilly who competed as a skeleton racer at the 2006 Winter Olympics, 2006 and 2010 Winter Olympics and was elected to the IOC Athletes' Commission, International Olympic Committee Athletes' Commission in 2010.
Triathlete Chrissie Wellington and Rachel Joyce (triathlete), Rachel Joyce won the ITU Long Distance World Championship on 2008 and 2011, and Chrissie holds the four fastest times in the World Ironman competition. She received an OBE in 2009, and the current world-class gym at the Sport & Fitness club on campus is named in her honour.
Whilst still studying at the university, student Lily Owsley scored the field hockey gold medal-winning goal at the 2016 Summer Olympics, 2016 Rio Olympics with the help of teammate and fellow UoB graduate Sophie Bray.
Middle-distance athlete Hannah England won the World Championship 1500m silver in 2011 and after retiring from athletics officially in 2019, worked alongside fellow athlete and husband Luke Gunn in the Sport department at the university.
In recent years, Birmingham has seen scholars such as athletes Jonathan Davies (athlete), Jonny Davies, 2020 British indoor champion over 3000m; Sarah McDonald, a former 1500m British Champion, and Mari Smith, the current British indoor silver medallist over 800m pass through the doors. Fran Williams, senior England netballer player, won Bronze with the England Roses at the Vitality Netball World Cup in Liverpool in 2019, the youngest player on the squad at 22 years old, and Laura Keates, England international rugby player, who was part of the 2014 World Cup-winning squad.
Barbara Slater, daughter of Wolverhampton Wanderer's legend and UoB's Director of Sport in 1972 Bill Slater, became Director of BBC Sport from 2009, and was the first woman to hold this title. She led the broadcast of the London 2012 Olympics – the biggest television event in British broadcasting history. Former Manchester United Chief Executive David Gill learned the ropes of financing at Birmingham, studying Industrial, Economic and Business Studies in 1978; sports commentator Simon Brotherton developed his career whilst studying at UoB, and Sir Patrick Head, founder of the Williams team which dominated Formula One in the 1990s, studied Mechanical Engineering.
Across disciplines, John Crabtree (businessman), John Crabtree, who graduated in law in 1972, achieved success as a lawyer and businessman, was awarded the OBE for his charity work, and served as High Sheriff of the West Midlands and Lord Lieutenant of the West Midlands, and as chair of the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games Organising Committee.
See also
* Armorial of UK universities
* List of modern universities in Europe (1801–1945)
* List of universities in the United Kingdom
References
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External links
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Guild of Students (The Guild functions as the Students' Union)
University of Birmingham Foundation
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University of Birmingham,
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