University of East Anglia Totally Explained

Everything about The University Of East Anglia totally explained

The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a campus-based university located in Norwich, England, founded in 1963 as part of the British Government's initiative to enlarge the higher education sector. The university is a member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities. The University was ranked 20th in the The Times Good University Guide 2007, and joint first for student satisfaction among mainstream universities in the 2006 National Student Survey. The University was also ranked 57th in Europe, and one of the top 200 universities in the world, by the 2006 World University Rankings published by the Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

History and overview

UEA admitted its first students in 1963 in temporary accommodation in Earlham Hall, on the western edge of the city of Norwich about 3 miles from the city centre, while a prefabricated "University Village" was built nearby and used until the early 1980s. The permanent campus was built on the adjacent Earlham Golf Course, principally to a design by Sir Denys Lasdun.
   The UEA campus exhibits some interesting architectural features: the main teaching building takes the form of a continuous wall running approximately west-east. The early student residences built in the 1960s take the form of distinctive "ziggurats", but financial cutbacks by the early 1970s meant that the full original plan for building ziggurat residences had to be abandoned, and replaced by the less inspiring north-south wall of Waveney Terrace (which was demolished in 2006). UEA also took over the former RAF/US Air Force barracks at Horsham St. Faith airfield, and used them as residences. This outpost of campus life was formally known as "Fifers Lane" from the road it stood on, but was called "Horsham" or simply "Fifers" by its residents. It developed its own unique style of student life. Being adjacent to extant army accommodation, the on-site general shop was a branch of the NAAFI. It also reputedly featured its own ghost, the "headless airman". Fifers Lane eventually closed in 1994, when further residences, again in an advanced architectural style, were built on campus.
   In the mid-1970s, extraction of gravel in the valley of the River Yare, which runs to the south of the campus, resulted in the university acquiring its own 'Norfolk Broad' or lake (known as simply 'The Broad'). At more or less the same time, a bequest of tribal art and C.20th painting and sculpture, by artists such as Francis Bacon and Henry Moore, from the Sainsbury supermarket family resulted in the construction of the striking Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts at the western end of the main teaching wall, one of the first major works of architect Norman Foster. In 2001 the campus gained an extensive new sports facility called the "Sportspark", built thanks to a £14.5 million grant from Sport England. Because of the 1960s design, the university suffers in regard to providing access needs to all students, even though attempts have been made to improve facilities within the campus, the university's listed 1960s buildings are by law unadaptable.
   Other notable features of the UEA campus are "The Square", a central outdoor meeting place flanked by concrete steps; "The Blend", a cafe/coffee shop, "Zest" a student canteen and "The Street" which features a 24-hour launderette, the Union Food Outlet, Union Paper Shop, Union Post Office, a newly refurbished espresso bar, "DolcHe Vita", branches of NatWest and Barclays Bank and a Waterstone's book shop.
   UEA has had notable successes in terms of courses taught. Malcolm Bradbury for many years taught in the School of English and American Studies and his 1975 novel The History Man is believed to be based on his experiences there, satirising as it does life and work in a modern 1960s-built University campus. The German émigré novelist W. G. Sebald taught in the School of Literature until his untimely death, from a car accident, in 2001. The Climatic Research Unit in the School of Environmental Sciences was an early centre of work on climate change research.
   As at 1 December 2004, the university had 10,689 undergraduate students, 1,949 postgraduate taught students, and 1,054 postgraduate research students, giving a total of 13,692 students, of whom 73% were full-time students, 10.4% came from outside the European Union, and 63% were female. As at 31 July 2005 the university employed 2445 staff (including 517 academic staff, 368 research staff, 469 secretarial and clerical staff, 146 technical staff, and 287 administrative, senior library and computing staff). In the year ending 31 July 2005 the university's income was £124,161,000, and its expenditure was £120,040,000. (Statistics from the 2004-05 Annual Review).

Recent developments

A new hall of residence, Colman House, was opened in September 2004, creating accommodation for 400 students. The latest residences, Britten, Victory, Kett, Browne, and Paston Houses, were built around the Waveney Terrace area and were opened in September and October 2005. Half of Waveney Terrace was demolished in September 2005, and replaced with the first half of Britten House; the remaining demolition was completed in September 2006, with the second half of Britten House opening for the 2007 academic year. The residences are named after Benjamin Britten, Horatio Nelson's ship HMS Victory, Robert Kett, Sir Thomas Browne and the Paston family who wrote the Paston Letters.
   A new building for the School of Nursing and Midwifery (NAM) opened in February 2006; adjacent to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, it's named after Edith Cavell. The new campus Health and Community Centre, comprising the University Health Centre, a Laundrette and a Nursery for pre-school aged children, was also completed in 2006.
   The 2002 Medical School (MED) has already been expanded to provide more lecture space, seminar rooms and office space. It was completed in June 2007.
   Norfolk and Suffolk Terraces are undergoing internal refurbishment in keeping with their Listed Building status; Suffolk Terrace was completed in the summer of 2006, with completion for Norfolk Terrace scheduled for 2008.
   In partnership with the University of Essex, and with the support of Suffolk County Council, the East of England Development Agency, Ipswich Borough Council, Suffolk College, and the Learning and Skills Council, UEA secured £15 million funding from the Higher Education Funding Council for England for the creation of a new campus in the Waterfront area of Ipswich, called University Campus Suffolk (UCS), which opened in 2007.

Corporate identity

On 18 February 2008 the University of East Anglia began rolling out a new corporate identity, which was developed in response to a brand positioning project conducted in late 2006, and the five-year Corporate Plan approved by the University's Council in January 2008. All newly commissioned materials will use the new logo, but the roll-out will be implemented over a 12-18 month period, using up existing stocks of materials to ensure there's no wastage.
The title 'University of East Anglia' could now also considered to be somewhat too broad for a purely Norwich-based institution. With two universities based in Cambridge and a new university college becoming established in Ipswich (albeit with UEA as a stakeholding partner), the possibility of a new moniker such as the University of Norwich can't be discounted, although this isn't yet under consideration by the UEA's senior management.

Union of UEA Students

Connected to both "The Street" and "The Square" is one of the most popular Union venues: the "Union Pub and Bar" which underwent a massive extension and refurbishment at the cost of £1.2 million in 2002. More recently, the pub was voted pub of the week on Al Murray's happy Hour, 29/2/08. The pub took over "Breakers", a rather low-rent eatery with a scrapyard theme which was briefly turned into an unpopular pasta place. Other bars include "The Hive" (which, due to efforts from the Students' Union, was refurbished for the start of the 2004/05 year), and the "Graduate Students Club". In the same building is The LCR, known in full as either The Large or Lower Common Room. The LCR is home to weekly campus discos, as well as the many touring gigs. The students' union also run "The Waterfront" venue off campus in Norwich's King Street.
The UEA Union has a large range of services on offer for its students including a large selection of sports clubs and societies. These range from football and rugby clubs to a newer range of environmental societies such as 'The Campus Sustainability Initiative' who aim to set up a fund for environmental projects on campus called 'The Sustainability Initiative Fund'. Aside from the independent student newspaper Concrete, there's a thriving student media across a range of areas. In the 1970s, there was a highly successful student newspaper named Phoenix, which rose from the ashes of the original Concrete, that ran for several years. Livewire 1350AM, the award winning campus radio station, which transmits to air on 1350AM in the vicinity of the university as well as broadcasting on the internet, was established in 1989. Nexus UTV, the campus television station broadcasting news, documentaries, comedy shows and various other types of programming, shows regularly in the bar and is one of the oldest still-running student television stations in the country, having been established in 1968.
The student body is among the more politically active among UK universities. Turnout at ballots averages around 20% (compared to a national average of around 15%). In 2007 Union Council voted to oppose the National Union of Students' (NUS) no-platform policy which bans extremists such as the BNP and Hizb-ut Tahrir from standing in NUS elections. A letter was sent to NUS president Gemma Tumelty to inform her of this. She later voiced her disagreement but said she 'looked forward to having the debate' with the union's delegates at next years annual conference. The no-platform issue will now be put to a referendum of all students.

Notable alumni

See also

Academia

Sir Paul Nurse: President of Rockefeller University, former chair of the department of microbiology at Oxford University, winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Professor Paul Wellings: Vice-Chancellor of Lancaster University
Professor Ibrahim H. Umar: Vice-Chancellor of Bayero University, Nigeria (1979-1986), Chairman of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Authority (2000-2001)
Professor Don Grierson: British geneticist and Pro-Vice-Chancellor at Nottingham University
Professor Gerald Gazdar: former Professor of Computational Linguistics at Sussex University, pioneer of Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar

Politics

Valerie Amos, Baroness Amos: Labour Party politician and life peer, Leader of the House of Lords (2003-2007)

Thomas Galbraith, 2nd Baron Strathclyde: Leader of the Conservative Party in the House of Lords

Caroline Flint: Labour Member of Parliament, currently Minister of State for Housing and Planning

Iain Dale: Conservative blogger, author, and co-founder and presenter of 18 Doughty Street

Ivor Stanbrook: former Conservative Member of Parliament

Douglas Carswell: Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) for Harwich

Jovan Ratković: Advisor to Serbian President Boris Tadić on European Union and NATO relations

Dato' Wan Hisham Wan Salleh: Malaysian Politician

Rosalind Scott, Baroness Scott of Needham Market: Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Communities and Local Government

Roger Davison: Liberal Democrat politician and former Lord Mayor of Sheffield

Adrian Ramsay: Green Party politician

Antony Little: Conservative politician

Dr Rihab Taha: Iraqi Biological Weapons Chief, nicknamed Dr. Germ

Literature

Kazuo Ishiguro: author of Remains of the Day, Whitbread and Booker Prize winner

Ian McEwan: Booker Prize winning author

Anne Enright: Booker Prize winning author

Tash Aw: Whitbread Award winning author

Rose Tremain: Whitbread Award winning author, formerly a lecturer at UEA

Tracy Chevalier: historical novelist

Erica Wagner: author, critic, and literary editor of The Times

Christopher Catherwood: author and academic

Naomi Alderman: novelist

Toby Litt: novelist

Simon Scarrow: author

Hwee Hwee Tan: novelist

Snoo Wilson: playwritght, novelist and screenwriter

John Fraser: journalist and academic

Owen Sheers: author, poet and playwright

John Boyne: novelist

Trezza Azzopardi: novelist, currently lecturing at UEA

Deirdre Madden: novelist

Andrew Miller: novelist

Larissa Lai: novelist

Ben Rice: novelist

Andrew Jefford: journalist and author

Alexander Gordon Smith: novelist

Todd Swift: poet

Clive Sinclair: novelist

James Scudamore: novelist

Helen Cross: novelist

Susan Fletcher: novelist

Martyn Bedford: novelist

Amir Muhammad: writer and filmmaker

Louise Doughty: novelist, playwright and journalist

Helon Habila: novelist and academic

Mick Jackson: novelist

Tom Morton-Smith: playwright

Chris Sugden: author and humorist

Stephen Finucan: short story writer

David Sutton: editor of the Fortean Times magazine

David Almond: children's author

Media

Paul Whitehouse: comedian (The Fast Show)

Charlie Higson: comedian (The Fast Show) and author

David Cummings: musician and writer (The Fast Show)

Geraint Vincent: ITV News presenter

Gareth Malone: choirmaster from BBC 2's The Choir

Arthur Smith: author and comedian

Jack Davenport: actor (Pirates of the Caribbean)

John Rhys-Davies: actor (The Lord of the Rings)

Selina Scott: broadcaster

Asheem Singh: screenwriter

Jonathan Powell: former Controller of BBC One

Jane Root: former Controller of BBC Two

Jenny Abramsky: BBC executive

Stephen Lambert: television executive

Mark Seddon: journalist, currently a correspondent for Al Jazeera, former Labour politician

Tim Bentinck, 12th Earl of Portland: actor

Simon Nicholls: BBC comedy producer

Darren Bett: BBC Weather forecaster

Penny Tranter: BBC Weather forecaster

Martin Tyler: football commentator

Rebecca Lowe: sports reporter

Greg James: BBC Radio 1 DJ

Susanne Manning: musician

Colin Griffiths: MTV Presenter and DJ

Matt Tong: drummer of Bloc Party

Nina Conti: actress and comedian

James Frain: actor

Business & Economics

Tito Mboweni: Governor of the South African Reserve Bank

Alison Brimelow: President of the European Patent Office

John William Ward economist, opera administrator and former trade union leader

Other

Benedict Allen: explorer

Sir Robert Fulton: Governor of Gibraltar, British Royal Marines career military officer

John Armine Wodehouse: 5th Earl of Kimberley

Rear Admiral Neil Morisetti RN: Commander United Kingdom Maritime Forces (2005-07); presently Commandant of the Joint Services Command and Staff College

Alan Whiteside: former United Nations Commissioner for HIV/AIDS

Jack Lohman: Director of the Museum of London

Notable academics

See also

Trezza Azzopardi – lecturer in Creative Writing

Christopher Bigsby – Professor of American Studies

Malcolm Bowie – lecturer in French

Malcolm Bradbury – Professor of American Studies, founder of the UEA Creative Writing Course

Angela Carter – writer in residence

John Charmley – Professor of Modern History

Amit Chaudhuri – tutor in Creative Writing

Mike Douglass – lecturer in Development Studies

Anthony Edward Dyson – Reader in English Literature

Richard J. Evans – lecturer in Modern History

Giles Foden Professor of Creative Writing

Ian Gibson – Dean of Biology, honorary Professor

Lavinia Greenlaw Professor of Creative Writing

Garry L. Hagberg – Professor of Philosophy

Richard Hodges – Professor and Director of the Institute of World Archaeology

Patricia Hollis, Baroness Hollis of Heigham – lecturer and Reader in Modern History (1967–1990)

Phil Jones – Professor of Environmental Sciences, Director of the Climatic Research Unit

Ludmilla Jordanova – Professor of the History of Arts and Science

Paul Kennedy – Professor of History (1970–1983)

Hubert Lamb – founder and Director of the Climatic Research Unit

Michael Laskey – tutor in Creative Writing

Andrew Motion Professor of Creative Writing (1995-2002)

Julian Myerscough – lecturer in Law

Shirley Pearce – Professor of Health Psychology, Dean of the Institute of Health

David Pearl – Professor of Law

Carlos A. Peres – lecturer in Environmental Sciences

Brian Runnett – lecturer in Music

Lorna Sage – Professor of English Literature

W. G. Sebald – Professor of German Literature, founder of the British Centre for Literary Translation

Steve Smith – Director of the Centre for Public Choice Studies

Lawrence Stenhouse – founder member of the Centre for Applied Research in Education

George Szirtes Reader in Creative Writing

Peter Trudgill – lecturer, honorary Professor of Sociolinguistics

Angus Wilson – lecturer in Creative Writing

John Wymer – Senior Research Associate in Archaeology

Solly Zuckerman – Professor of Anatomy (1969–1974)Further Information

Get more info on 'University Of East Anglia'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://university_of_east_anglia.totallyexplained.com">University of East Anglia Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.