University of Reading

HISTORY

The University of Reading is a public university located in Reading, Berkshire in England. It was established in 1892 as an extension college of Christ Church, Oxford under the name University College, Reading. It received the power to grant its own degrees by Royal Charter in 1926 from King George V, and was the only university to receive such a charter between the two world wars.

The university is usually categorised as a red brick university, reflecting its original foundation in the 19th century. It has four main campuses both in the United Kingdom and internationally. London Road and Whiteknights are based in the town of Reading itself, and Greenlands is based on the banks of the River Thames. It also has a campus in Iskandar Puteri, Malaysia.

The university owes its first origins to the Schools of Art and Science established in Reading in 1860 and 1870. In 1892 the College at Reading was founded as an extension college by Christ Church, a college of the University of Oxford.

The new college received its first treasury grant in 1901. Three years later it was given a site, now the university’s London Road Campus, by the Palmer family of Huntley & Palmers fame. The same family supported the opening of Wantage Hall in 1908, and of the Research Institute in Dairying in 1912.

The college first applied for a Royal Charter in 1920 but was unsuccessful at that time. However a second petition, in 1925, was successful, and the charter was officially granted on 17 March 1926. With the charter, the college became the University of Reading, the only new university to be created in the United Kingdom between the two world wars.

In 1947 the university purchased Whiteknights Park, which was to become its principal campus. In 1984 the University started a merger with Bulmershe College of Higher Education, which was completed in 1989.

In January 2008, the university announced its merger with the Henley Management College to create the university’s new Henley Business School, bringing together Henley College’s expertise in MBAs with the University’s existing Business School and ICMA Centre. The merger took formal effect on 1 August 2008, with the new business school split across the university’s existing Whiteknights Campus and its new Greenlands Campus that formerly housed Henley Management College.

In late 2009 it was announced that the London Road Campus was to undergo a £30 million renovation, preparatory to becoming the new home of the university’s Institute of Education. This is planned for completion in the summer of 2011, and is being partially funded by the sale of the adjoining site of Mansfield Hall, a former hall of residence, for demolition and replacement by private sector student accommodation.

COURSES

A restructuring of the university was announced in September 2009, which would bring together all the academic schools into three faculties, these being the Faculty of Science, the Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Social sciences, and Henley Business School. The move was predicted to result in the loss of some jobs, especially in the film, theatre and television department, which will shortly be moving into a brand new £11.5 million building on Whiteknights Campus.

Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Science

• School of Arts and Communication Design
  • Department of Art
  • Department of Film, Theatre and Television
  • Department of Typography and Graphic Communication
• Institute of Education
• School of Humanities
  • Department of Classics
  • Department of History
  • Department of Philosophy
• School of Law
• School of Literature and Languages
  • Department of English Language and Literature
  • Department of Modern Languages and European Studies
• School of Politics, Economics and International Relations
  • Department of Economics
  • Department of Politics and International Relations
• International Study and Language Institute

Faculty of Life Sciences

• School of Agriculture, Policy and Development
• School of Biological Sciences
• School of Chemistry, Food and Pharmacy
  • Department of Chemistry
  • Food and Nutritional Sciences
  • The Reading School of Pharmacy
• School of Psychology and Clinical Language Science
  • Department of Clinical Language Sciences
  • Department of Psychology

Faculty of Science

• School of Construction Management and Engineering
• School of Archaeology, Geography and Environmental Science
  • Department of Archaeology
  • Department of Geography and Environmental Science
• School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences
  • Department of Mathematics and Statistics
  • Department of Meteorology
  • Department of Computer Science

Henley Business School is a highly selective, top-ranking business school, among only 58 institutions worldwide (less than 1% of business schools globally) to be granted Triple accreditation by the three largest and most influential business school accreditation associations: EQUIS, AMBA and the AACSB. It includes several academic areas:

• Business Informatics, Systems and Accounting
• Leadership and Organisational Behaviours
• International Business and Strategy
• ICMA Centre
• Real Estate and Planning

ENTRY REQUIREMENTS 

To find out more about entry requirements at Reading visit their website.

ACADEMIC STRENGTHS

They have won the Queen’s Anniversary Prize four times: for work on early modern staging, meteorology, archaeology and typographic research.

Their Department of Meteorology was awarded a prestigious Regius Professorship by HM The Queen in 2013. The department is recognised as one of the most outstanding of its kind in the world.

Key thematic research strengths in the five areas of: environment; food; health; prosperity and resilience; and heritage and creativity.

Specific areas of strengths as recognised in the national Research Excellence Framework 2014 include: agriculture, food science, meteorology, environmental science, architecture, the built environment and planning, business and management, typography, archaeology and classics.

TEACHING STANDARDS

At the University of Reading, the students will enjoy the very best education, delivered by academics with a rare passion for their subject, backed by a range of outstanding resources.

Their focus on cutting-edge research – covering subjects from climate change to heart disease – not only has a direct impact on the wider world, but also impacts on the students learning. If their academics make a discovery one day, it could hear about it in the lecture theatre the next.

There is one-to-one academic support available when the student need it.

CAREERS GUIDANCE

The range of employability support on offer from the Careers Centre includes:

• Professional careers consultants who can provide the students with specialist and personalised advice, including CV-checking and mock interviews
• Dedicated placements officers to support and train the students in preparation for their placement
• Students experience and development schemes to help them boost their employability
• Online resources, including free videos and assessment tools
• A full events calendar to help the students explore their options, build professional skills and meet employers
• A dedicated recruitment service exclusively for University of Reading students – My Jobs Online. The students can access this service from the September before they arrive giving them a headstart on finding a part-time job in the area
• An onsite Job Shop to help them find part-time or vacation work