'Birkbeck, University of London', sometimes referred to by its former name 'Birkbeck College' or by the abbreviation 'BBK', is a constituent college of the
University of London. At the undergraduate level, it aims at working people who want to study for degrees in the evenings (
adult education). At the postgraduate level, it offers many
Master's degree programmes that can be studied either part-time or full-time, though nearly all teaching is in the evening, whilst it also admits full-time (as well as part-time) students for PhDs. Its staff members have strong research reputations. It also offers many
continuing education courses leading to
extramural certificates and diplomas, as well as other short courses.
Location
Birkbeck's main building is on
Malet Street in
Bloomsbury, with a number of other buildings on nearby streets.
Virginia Woolf fans will also be interested to know that Birkbeck's School of History of Art, Film and Visual Media is housed in Woolf's former
Gordon Square residence in Bloomsbury.
Many Birkbeck classes are taught at other locations across London, including many other universities. This is due to a combination of Birkbeck's
widening participation strategy to make higher education accessible and also because nearly all classes on one day are taught at the same time, resulting in heavy competition for limited space.
In
2006 it was announced that Birkbeck will be expanding into
East London, in conjunction with the
University of East London. Initially space will be rented as well as utilising the
University of East London Stratford Campus, but the long-term aim is to construct a dedicated facility in
Stratford. The project will be known as
Birkbeck Stratford.
[3]
History
In
1823,
George Birkbeck, an early pioneer of adult education, founded the then "London
Mechanics Institute" at a meeting at the Crown and Anchor Tavern on the
Strand. Over two thousand people attended.
[4] However the idea was not universally popular and some accused Birkbeck of "scattering the seeds of evil."
[5]
Two years later the institute would move to the Southampton Buildings on
Chancery Lane. In
1830, the first female students were admitted. In
1858 changes to the
University of London's structure resulting in an opening up of access to the examinations for its degree. The Institute became the main provider of part-time university education.
The Institute changed its name to the "Birkbeck Literary and Scientific Institution" in
1866 and in
1885 it moved to the Breams Building, on
Fetter Lane, where it would remain for the next sixty-seven years.
The early twentieth century saw further developments, with
Birkbeck Students' Union being established in
1904, and in
1907 the institute's name changed once more, to "Birkbeck College". In
1913 a review of the University of London (which had been restructured in
1900) successfully recommended that Birkbeck become a constituent college, although the outbreak of the
First World War delayed this until
1920. The
Royal Charter for the college was granted in
1926.
The college's first female professor,
Dame Helen Gwynne-Vaughan began teaching
botany in
1921.
During the
Second World War, Birkbeck was the only central University of London college to not relocate out of the capital. In
1941 the library suffered a direct hit during
The Blitz but teaching continued. In
1952, the College moved to its present location in Malet Street.
In
1988 the Department of
Extra-Mural Studies of the University of London was incorporated into Birkbeck, becoming at first the Centre for Extra-Mural Studies. In later years it would go by the name of the Faculty of Continuing Education, then the School of Continuing Education.
In
2002, it dropped the word College to become simply Birkbeck, University of London. However, the term ''Birkbeck College'' is still often colloquially used, and survives on the façade of the main building itself. The following year a major redevelopment of the Malet Street building was opened.
It was announced in
2006 that Birkbeck had been granted £5 million by the
Higher Education Funding Council for England to expand its provision into
East London, working with the
University of East London.
The partnership was formally launched on
November 21 2006 and will be called Birkbeck Stratford.
[6]
The School of Continuing Education
The current School of Continuing Education, which specialises in
extra-mural studies did not become an integral part of Birkbeck until
1988 but has a long separate history.
In
1876 the
London Society for the Extension of University Education was founded, boosting the aims of encouraging working people to undertake higher education. In
1903 it became the Department of Extra-Mural Studies of the
University of London and it was integrated into Birkbeck in
1988. Initially known as the Centre for Extra-Mural Studies, it has also been called the Faculty of Continuing Education before adopting its current name in
2005.
[7]
Research and Teaching
While part-time undergraduate teaching remains the focus and mandate of Birkbeck, the college has recently grown into a powerhouse for progressive research in the arts and humanities.
The Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities
[8] was established in 2004, with the renowned but controversial Slovenian philosopher
Slavoj Zizek appointed as International Director. According to its website, the Institute aims to, among other things, "engage with important public issues of our time through a series of open debates, lectures, seminars and conferences" and "foster and promote a climate of interdisciplinary research and collaboration among academics and researchers". The launch of the Institute wasn't without controversy, provoking an article in ''
The Observer'' newspaper titled "What have intellectuals ever done for the world?"
[9] which criticised the ostensible irrelevance and elitism of contemporary public intellectuals.
Meanwhile, the
London Consortium graduate school -- a collaboration between Birkbeck, the
Tate Galleries, the
Institute of Contemporary Arts, the
Architectural Association, and, until 1999, the
British Film Institute -- has been running since the mid-1990s, offering masters and doctoral degrees in the interdisciplinary humanities and cultural studies, resourced and jointly taught by all the participating institutions.(
Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities). Its permanent and adjunct faculty include figures such as
Philip Dodd,
Colin MacCabe,
Laura Mulvey,
Steven Connor,
Marina Warner,
Juliet Mitchell,
Stuart Hall,
Roger Scruton,
Salman Rushdie, as well as Zizek. Its current chair is
Anthony Julius.
Statistics & Ratings
College
Birkbeck is often not included in British Newspaper University league tables, since these are usually based on the statistics for full-time undergraduates (of which Birkbeck had none in 2005-2006
2), but Birkbeck was ranked 13th in ''
The Guardian''
's 2001
Research Assessment Exercise league table and 26th by the ''
Times Higher Education Supplement''
's equivalent 2001 RAE league table. Birkbeck has also appeared in the
Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Top 500 World Universities ranking in 2007, placed in the 402-508th rank (the tables rank Universities in equal blocks of about 100 after the first 100 individually ranked Universities). It had previously appeared in the 2004 rankings in 404-502nd rank.
Departmental
''
The Guardian''
's 2001 RAE subject ranking league tables put Birkbeck in the top 10 for research in the following subjects: English (1st), History (1st), History of Art (2nd), Philosophy (6th), Iberian and Latin American Languages (1st), Earth Sciences (4th), Law (9th), Economics and Econometrics (5th), and Politics and International Studies (5th).
Birkbeck's School of English and Humanities was rated 5
★ in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise, as were the School of History, Classics and Archaeology, the School of Crystallography, and the section for Spanish and Latin American studies within the School of Languages, Linguistics and Culture -- ranking these departments with, and in some cases above, Oxford and Cambridge.
Organisation
The college is divided into four faculties, the Faculty of Arts, the Faculty of Social Sciences, the Faculty of Science and the Faculty of Continuing Education, which are sub-divided into 20 schools. The current
President of the college is the historian
Eric Hobsbawm.
Student life
As Birkbeck is primarily for part-time courses, often in the evenings, student life is less centralised than in other universities. It does not offer its own
halls of residence, for instance, though Birkbeck students do have access to the University of London's intercollegiate halls.
Birkbeck Students' Union offers a number of societies for students, as well as a football club that competes in the University of London league. It also provides student representation and support, a student magazine, a student shop and a bar. Birkbeck students also have access to the societies and clubs of the
University of London Union. Accordingly,
London Student distributes at the Union.
The college arms include a
lamp and an
owl, symbolising the college's motto ''In nocte consilium'' ("advice in the night"). Because of this, the student magazine is called ''
Lamp and Owl''. Since 2007 it was relaunched as The Lampanelle.
The college has entered teams in ''
University Challenge'' over the years with very varied results. In
1997 a team scored just 40 points - at that stage the lowest score since the series had been revived, though this has since been broken by
New Hall, Cambridge, the
University of Bradford and the ''University Challenge: The Professionals'' team of
Members of Parliament.
[10] 1998 saw a reversal of fortunes when Birkbeck reached the final, losing to
Magdalen College, Oxford. In
2003 Birkbeck again reached the final, facing another team of mature students from
Cranfield University. On this occasion Birkbeck won.
Fellows of Birkbeck
★
Edward Davey Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Kingston and Surbiton
★
Julia Goodfellow Chief Executive of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
★
Leonard Wolfson, Baron Wolfson
Notable Birkbeck people
References
1. Translation used by Birkbeck. Centre for Learning and Professional Development - Communication Skills
2. Table 0a - All students by institution, mode of study, level of study, gender and domicile 2005/06
3. Birkbeck projects win £8.7m HEFCE funding for innovative higher education provision in London
4. The History of Birkbeck
5. Birkbeck, University of London Continuing Education Courses 2002 Entry, , , , Birkbeck External Relations Department, 2002,
6. Birkbeck/UEL Partnership at Stratford launched
7. Birkbeck, University of London Continuing Education Courses 2004 Entry, , , , Birkbeck External Relations Department, 2004,
8. Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities
9. What have intellectuals ever done for the world?
10. New Hall, Cambridge in 1998 and University of Bradford in 2004 both scored 35 points. In the special series ''University Challenge: The Professionals'' the Members of Parliament achieved 25 points - the lowest score in the modern era. The score of 40 has also been achieved by Oxford Brookes University (1998), the University of St Andrews (2002 & 2005), Keele University (2002) and Queen's University Belfast (2005). Statistics for the original incarnation of the series are not known, though the lowest score achieved was by the University of Sussex in 1972 with a score of 10. University Challenge - Lowest Scores .
External links
★
BBK.ac.uk - The official Birkbeck website
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