What is the history of UK universities?

Answer 1

I am not an expert on the history of UK universities but can I say something about my alma mater University Of Wales Aberystwyth.

Wales ,unlike Scotland and bits of England did not have an existing universities in the late 19th century. Wales was having a revival of national feeling in the mid 19th century and one idea to promote Welshness was to have a national university.

People all over Wales,and welsh people around the world collected money towards a university of Wales,poor people gave money outside churches on Sundays. Aberystwyth is a small town on the welsh coast. The railway from England reached there about 1865 and some business man built a large hotel to take all the tourists he hoped the trains would bring. But the hotel failed to make money. The people who wanted to have a welsh university bought the hotel building and in 1872 the university of wales was born. There are now several other parts of the university of wales,at Cardiff,Swansea,Bangor and Lampeter.

But Aberystwyth was the first and it took me in as a student in 1987 and thanks for that. To be honest if you are coming to university in Britain from abroad there are better universities for most subjects than Aberystwyth. But many of the better universities are in big ugly cities and you might get mugged have problems fitting in in a huge university. Aberysywyth is a charming small towwn,with 10000 students and about 45 pubs. It is safe place to study and is said to be good for mature students and foreign students.

I am from Edinburgh and we have 3 universities here Edinburgh,Heriot Watt and Napier and a university college St Margarets.

Until the establishment of University College, London, in 1826 England had only two universities - Oxford (founded c. 1170) and Cambridge (founded c. 1210). These two were in many respects federations of colleges, and over the centuries additional colleges were founded and admitted. So these universities were quite big. However, they were both expensive and Anglican. The new University College, London was non-demoninational. In 1830 Scotland had four universities - St Andrew's, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Edinburgh. At that time Ireland had Trinity College, Dublin. The foundation of new universities was slow until about 1900 and the quest for national efficiency between the Boer War and WWI.

The rapid and large-scale foundation of new universities in the U.K. didn't really get under way till the 1960s and there have been several new foundation since about 1992 (mainly based on former polytechnics).

In addition...

Historically, England & Wales did not bother much with "universities" until the C19th: Oxford & Cambridge were essentially federations of religious foundations ("colleges") providing humanist education for prospective Churchmen & State Administrators (often the same!) - eg the law taught was Canon (Church) Law, & all teachers ("dons") were ordained. University taught medicine was based on classical texts (Galen etc), contained little real "science" in our sense, & had limited practical relevance to treating real sick people!

Most "real" doctors trained outside the universities via a system of apprenticeship & attendance at hospitals treating the poor; usually charitable foundations of some sort. Qualifications were obtained from various "learned institutions" which were not part of the universities - eg the Society of Apothecaries, & the various Royal Colleges of Physicians & Surgeons etc.. Bizzarely, surgeons' licences were often issued by bishops - because it was the Church which authorised dissection of corpses for training & investigative purposes.

By the early C19th, when medicine & surgery were becoming more scientific, training became more systematic, & most larger cities formed proper medical schools, usually attached to charitable hospitals. Eventually, when universities were established in these cities (mainly from the late C19th onwards), these medical schools were incorporated into them.

Similarly, Common Lawyers (ie not Church or "Canon" Lawyers) usually attended the "Inns of Court" in London. These were Medieval foundations which taught Common Law, plus many other things including languages, logic, maths, music, philosophy, rhetoric, dance and combat arts! Also included were what today would be called accounting & business management. They were really schools for the sons of the gentry & aspirational merchant classes; often called "The Third University", they offered a more practical education than was available at Oxford & Cambridge. Most then returned home to run their family estates/ work in business, or - if well connected - to attend the Royal Court & seek a post in Government. Those actually wishing to be lawyers would continue their training as apprentices to working lawyers - called "clerks" or "pupils". Four of the ancient Inns of Court survive: today they train & regulate barristers - lawyers specialising in advocacy & specialised legal research.

NB To this day, British lawyers are still largely trained via the apprenticeship model; a law degree/ law "conversion" diploma being only the first phase of the training requirement, followed by the "Bar Vocational Course" for aspiring barristers, & the "Legal Practice Course" for prospective solicitors. After that come "pupillage" for barristers, or a "training contract" (usually 2 years) for solicitors. The year long BVC & LPC are tough (often 50% fail!), & most find pupillage/ training contracts very exacting & stressful. So, if you want to be a lawyer in the UK, university academic study of law only gets you halfway there: it's the easy bit, & what really counts are the 3-4 years of "vocational" training that come after...

Engineers & scientists were largely self-taught, and such formal training that did exist followed the apprenticeship model. University "scientists" like Isaac newton were, officially, philosophers/ logicians, & much of their experimental work was conducted covertly to avoid the very real danger of accusations of "dabbling in the occult", "heresy" etc.. Things were changing by the C17th (foundation of the Royal Society etc), but modern science was not really regarded as "respectable" until the C18th, & did not become a formal part of the university curriculum until the C19th..

Today, a university degree in engineering does not a qualified (Chartered) professional engineer make: you need a number of years experience in industry, plus a Master's or equivalent, & have to pass the requisite competency tests of the various Engineering Institutes/ Societies. A similar pattern is evident with most other professions - eg accountancy. Medical doctors only become certified independent medical practitioners following successful completion of at least 5 years of further training after graduation from medical school.

Most English & Welsh universities were established in the late C19th/ C20th when the expansion of manufacturing, trade, "Empire" etc necessitated more "modern" education for the growing, & increasingly influential, middle classes of the period. Increasing competition from Germany, in particular, with its excellent network of universities & technical institutions, also made many realise the need for properly trained engineers & scientists. It's no accident that most of the major provincial universities founded in this era were originally endowed by wealthy industrialists/ entrepreneurs. Eventually, even Oxbridge had to adapt to the new trend & reform: syllabuses were modernised, new subjects introduced, formal research (following the German model) promoted, and the "dons" no longer had to be unmarried, ordained members of the Church of England!

The situation in Scotland was a bit different: the "ancient universities" followed a more "Continental model", & medical & secular legal education had always been more formally based, for the initial stage, in these institutions. Nevertheless, further "qualifying" legal & medical training still tended to follow the apprenticeship model. Because there were more universities than in England & Wales, Scottish doctors & lawyers were more likely to have first obtained a university degree, but their real practical training came after graduation, & what really mattered was having a licence from the Faculty of Advocates (lawyers) or the Royal Medical & Surgical Colleges of Glasgow & Edinburgh.

Historically, therefore, many Britons have tended to be sceptical about the real value of university education: until relatively recently it was highly specialised, rather arcane in focus, & not the usual entry route per se to the "learned professions" where a more pragmatic/ practically focused apprenticeship model was preferred.

The expansion & modernisation of universities happened in response to the increasing demands of a developing urban/ industrial society for better educated managers, administrators, technologists, engineers & scientists. Expanding state bureaucracies, the universal education system, health services etc, also needed increasing numbers of educated "white collar workers", teachers etc.. The post 1945 CATs (Colleges of Advanced Technology) & Polytechnics were a continuation of this trend, providing more vocational/ practically focused education than the "traditional" universities. Since 1992 (1960s for most CATs) these institutions have generally been awarded university status - largely in recognition of the vital roles they have played (& continue to play!) in innovating new models of higher education (eg "Sandwich" courses; "modular" degree schemes etc) in the UK.