University of Buckingham
The University of Buckingham is a non-profit private university in Buckingham, England, and the oldest of the country's six private universities. It was founded as the University College at Buckingham in 1973 and admitted its first students in 1976. It was granted university status by royal charter in 1983.
Buckingham was closely linked to Margaret Thatcher, who, as Education Secretary, oversaw the creation of the university college in 1973 and as Prime Minister was instrumental in it being elevated to a university in 1983, thus creating the first private university in Britain since the establishment of the University Grants Committee in 1919. When she retired from politics in 1992, Margaret Thatcher became the university's second chancellor, a post she held until 1998. Buckingham's finances for teaching operate entirely on student fees and endowments; it does not receive direct state funding although its students can receive student loans from the Student Loans Company. It has formal charity status as a not-for-profit institution dedicated to the ends of research and education.
History
Some of the founding academics migrated from the University of Oxford, disillusioned or wary of aspects of the late-1960s ethos. On 27 May 1967, The Times published a letter from J. W. Paulley, a physician, who wrote: Three London conferences followed which explored this idea.The university was incorporated as the "University College of Buckingham" in 1976 and received its royal charter as a university from the Queen in 1983. As of May 2016, it is the only private university in the UK with a royal charter.
Its development was influenced by the Institute of Economic Affairs, in particular, Harry Ferns and Ralph Harris, heads of the institute. The university's foundation-stone was laid by Margaret Thatcher, who became the university's chancellor between 1993 and 1998.
The university's principals and vice-chancellors have been: Lord Beloff, former Gladstone Professor of Politics at the University of Oxford; Alan Peacock, founder of the economics department at the University of York and Fellow of the British Academy; Michael Barrett; Richard Luce, now Lord Luce, former Minister for the Arts; Robert Taylor; Terence Kealey; Anthony Seldon and James Tooley.
From 2004, students at Buckingham have been eligible for government student loans, which led to an increase in UK students at the university.
Campus
Near the centre of the town of Buckingham is the riverside campus, which is partly contained within a south-turning bend of the River Great Ouse. Here, on or just off Hunter Street, are some of the university's central buildings: Yeomanry House; the Anthony de Rothschild building ; the Humanities Library; and also some of the student accommodation, looking northwards across the river. Prebend House, a recently restored Georgian house, contains the Vice-Chancellor's office. On the other side of Hunter Street, on the so-called 'island', is the Tanlaw Mill, one of the university's social centres; with the main refectory, the Fitness Centre, and the Students' Union Office.Overlooking this site, on the hill above, is the extensive Chandos Building. This complex contains the Medical School. It also houses the Ian-Fairburn Lecture Theatre, the largest lecture theatre on the river-side site.
Further on, up the hill, on the London Road, is another element of the campus, in particular the schools of Law and Computing, which is housed in the Franciscan Building, surrounded by other student accommodation blocks. This is opposite the swimming pool and leisure centre. The university has been expanding in recent years. It has acquired a new site on the west side of the river, which will increase the capacity of the river-side campus as a whole.
Organisation and governance
Chancellor
On 24 February 2020, Dame Mary Archer was installed as chancellor of the university.Former chancellors were Lord Hailsham of St Marylebone, Baroness Margaret Thatcher, Martin Jacomb, Lord Tanlaw, and Lady Keswick.
Vice-chancellor
Since October 2020, the vice-chancellor is Professor James Tooley.Academic profile
Teaching
The university's schools are: Business, Computing, Education, Humanities and Social Sciences, Law, Medicine, Postgraduate Medicine and Allied Health, Psychology, and the Foundation Department. Each of these is presided over by a dean.The quality of the university's provision is maintained, as at other UK universities, by an external examiner system, by an academic advisory council, and by membership of the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education.
The university was created as a liberal arts college, and still describes itself as such, although in an interview with The Guardian in 2003, then-vice-chancellor Terence Kealey remarked that it had "become a vocational school for law and business for non-British students, because that's where the market has taken us". Consequently, major humanities subjects such as history and politics are no longer offered as stand-alone degrees, instead being combined with economics as a degree in international studies. Economics, however, is available as a stand-alone degree as is English literature, as a single honours subject, and in combinations with English Language, or Journalism, and related areas.
Some degree programmes at Buckingham, Law for example, place greater emphasis on exams as an assessment method rather than coursework, but in general its degree programmes balance assessment between exams and coursework.
School of Medicine
The Medical School offers a 4.5 year MB ChB medical degree, accredited by the General Medical Council. Other medical courses are offered in the School of Postgraduate Medicine and Allied Health. The school opened in 2015 as the first private medical school in the UK, in partnership with the Milton Keynes NHS Foundation Trust."Alternative" medicine
The university ran a diploma course in "integrated medicine" that was later withdrawn under pressure from David Colquhoun, a campaigner against pseudoscience and alternative medicine. The Dean of the School, Karol Sikora, was a Foundation Fellow of Prince Charles's now-defunct alternative medicine lobby group, The Prince's Foundation for Integrated Health, and is Chair of the Faculty of Integrated Medicine, which is unaffiliated with any university but also includes Rosy Daniel and Mark Atkinson, who co-ordinated Buckingham's "integrated medicine" course. Daniel has been criticised by David Colquhoun for breaches of the Cancer Act 1939, regarding claims she made for Carctol, a herbal dietary supplement with no utility in treating cancer. Andrew Miles is on the scientific council of the College of Medicine an alternative medicine lobby group linked to the then Prince of Wales. Sikora is also a "professional member" of this organisation. The degree was stripped of validation by the University of Buckingham prior to the first graduation.School of Postgraduate Medicine and Allied Health
Postgraduate medical courses and non-clinical allied health courses are offered in a separate school from the clinical medical degree. The School of Postgradaute Medicine and Allied Health offers postgraduate Master of Surgery and Master of Medicine programmes aimed at overseas-qualified doctors preparing for the General Medical Council's Professional and Linguistic Assessments Board in order to practice in the UK.School of Education
The Department of Education has two aspects, research and vocational: it conducts research into education and school provision, and also maintains various PGCE courses for teacher training. The Department of Education has been home to some of the most prominent educationalists in Britain, including the late Chris Woodhead and Anthony O'Hear. Its postgraduate certificate in education – which deals with both the state and the independent sector – is accredited with Qualified Teacher Status which means that it also qualifies graduates to teach in the state sector.School of Business
The University of Buckingham has a business school which offers a range of undergraduate and postgraduate qualifications for students.The dean of the school is Debarpita Bardhan-Correia. A range of undergraduate and postgraduate business, entrepreneurship, accounting and finance degrees are offered by the Business School.
There are a number of lecturers including many BLEU certified ones, which are individuals who have completed a MSc with the university since 1999. There are also a number of lecturers who are CIM certified.
Vinson Centre for Economics and Entrepreneurship
On 28 November 2018 the University of Buckingham opened the Vinson Building, a multi-purposed facility for use by Buckingham's students and the local community. The university's Business Enterprise undergraduates and businesses that are members of Buckinghamshire Business First use the Buckingham Enterprise Hub, which is located in the Vinson Building.Degrees
The university offers traditional degrees over a shorter than usual time-frame. Students at Buckingham study for eight terms over two years, rather than nine terms over three, which fits a three-year degree into two years.Because Buckingham's degrees take two years to complete, students view its degrees as cost-effective compared to other UK university courses, once the income from an extra year's employment is taken into account. In some subject areas, notably Humanities, the university is now offering its degrees over different time-scales, i.e., the 2-year 'intensive' model, working the extra summer term per year, and the traditional 3-year model with the usual summer break each year.
External degrees and validation
The university awards undergraduate and graduate degrees to students who have studied at the Sarajevo School of Science and Technology.The university validated courses in medicine at Medipathways College, a small private college based in London. Medipathways operates dentistry and medicine courses. In late 2014 Medipathways was found by the Higher Education Quality Assurance Agency 'to be at serious risks of failure'; the university disagreed with the assessment. The company was wound up in September 2019.