The Great North Museum: Hancock is a museum of natural history and ancient civilisations in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
The museum was established in 1884 and was formerly known as the Hancock Museum. In 2006 it merged with Newcastle University’s Museum of Antiquities and Shefton Museum to form the Great North Museum. The museum reopened as the Great North Museum: Hancock in May 2009 following a major extension and refurbishment of the original Victorian building. The museum and most of its collections are owned by the Natural History Society of Northumbria, and it is managed by Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums on behalf of Newcastle University.
The museum is located on the campus of Newcastle University, next to the Great North Road, and close to Barras Bridge. The nearest Tyne & Wear Metro station is Haymarket, and there is also a bus station at Haymarket.
One of the Second World War air raid shelter openings into the Victoria Tunnel is beneath the grounds of the museum.
The collection of the Hancock Museum can be traced to about 1780 when Marmaduke Tunstall started accumulating ethnographic and natural history material from around the world. He then brought his collection from London to North Yorkshire. In 1790 Tunstall died, and George Allan of Darlington purchased Tunstall’s collection; and later in 1823 it was acquired by the Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle upon Tyne. A wombat, which is still on display, is considered to be the earliest object in the collection. It was the first complete wombat specimen to reach Europe. In 1829 the Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham and Newcastle upon Tyne (now the Natural History Society of Northumbria) was formed as a scientific offshoot of the Literary and Philosophical Society. Amongst the founding and early members of the Natural History Society were Joshua Alder, Albany Hancock, John Hancock, Prideaux John Selby and William Chapman Hewitson.
The museum opened on its current site in 1884 after the collection of the Natural History Society outgrew its small museum, located on Westgate Road, which opened in 1834. A major benefactor to the museum was William Armstrong who gave the then large sum of £11,500. Armstrong had also founded the College of Physical Science which later became part of Newcastle University. The museum was renamed in the 1890s, after the local Victorian naturalists, Albany and John Hancock. In 1959 the Natural History Society agreed with the University of Newcastle for the university to care for the building and collections, and since 1992 the university has contracted with Tyne & Wear Museums to manage the museum under a Service Level Agreement.
The Hancock Museum was closed on 23 April 2006 for refurbishment and did not reopen until 23 May 2009. It was completely refurbished and extended as part of the Great North Museum Project, at a cost of £26 million. Great North Museum project is a partnership between Newcastle University, Tyne & Wear Museums, Newcastle City Council, the Natural History Society of Northumbria and the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne. The project was made possible with funds from the Heritage Lottery Fund, TyneWear Partnership, One NorthEast, the European Regional Development Fund, Newcastle University, Newcastle City Council, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the Wolfson Foundation and The Northern Rock Foundation, as well as numerous other trusts and foundations. The building architects were Terry Farrell and Partners; Sir Terry Farrell is a native of Newcastle, and had previously been a student at Newcastle University.
The new museum includes new displays on natural history and geology, Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece, Romans and Hadrian’s Wall, World Cultures and Pre-history. It also includes an interactive study zone, an under 5’s space, and a digital Planetarium, as well as new learning facilities, a new temporary exhibition space, and a study garden. The new museum houses not only the Hancock Museum collections, but also those of the university’s Museum of Antiquities and Shefton Museum. The building that formerly housed the Museum of Antiquities was later demolished. The Hatton Gallery is also a part of the Great North Museum Project, but is not relocating to the Hancock, and is remaining in Newcastle University’s Fine Art Building.
In September 2008, the Great North Museum searched for a lookalike of the Emperor Hadrian, for a photo shoot, whose likeness would feature in a permanent display at the Hancock Museum. On 21 November 2008 the ‘Be Part of It’ campaign was launched, and it was announced that the Great North Museum: Hancock would be opening in May 2009. Athlete Jonathan Edwards is the patron of the ‘Be Part of It’ campaign. Other celebrity supporters of the museum include Sir Thomas Allen and Adam Hart-Davis. Donors to the campaign have the opportunity to have their name (or the name of a loved one) permanently included on a donor wall in the museum.
The Great North Museum formally re-opened on 23 May 2009. In August the museum announced that they had surpassed their expected annual target of 300,000 visitors. By August over 400,000 people had visited the reopened museum. On 6 November 2009 HM The Queen officially opened the Great North Museum. In 2009, the Great North Museum had over 600,000 visitors.
By August 2010, the reopened Great North Museum had welcomed its one millionth visitor.
Among the museum’s permanent residents are a life-size cast of an African elephant; the Egyptian mummy Bakt-en-Hor (previously known as Bakt-hor-Nekht); a full size replica of a T-Rex skeleton; and Sparkie, Newcastle’s famous talking budgie, who was stuffed after his death in 1962 and is now the subject of a new opera by Michael Nyman.
The full size cast of an African Elephant was built in the Living Planet gallery. The model was crafted by Zephyr Wildlife, who took a cast from an actual stuffed elephant at a museum in Bonn in Germany. To get the elephant into the museum a crane, from Bel Lift Trucks, had to be used. The full size model of a T-Rex dinosaur has been shipped from Canada, where it was built by a company called Research Casting International. It forms part of the display known as the Fossil Stories gallery. The T-Rex model was one of the first items to be placed in the new museum, due to its size. In 1908, the Manchester taxidermist Harry Ferris Brazenor mounted a "fine bison bull" for the museum.
Other exhibitions include ‘Hadrian’s Wall’ looking at Roman life in the north of England, ‘Natural Northumbria’ focusing on the wildlife found in the northeast, ‘Ancient Egypt’ looking at the Ancient Egyptians and featuring the museum’s two mummies, ‘Ice Age to Iron Age’ detailing the history of the British Isles over the past 12,000 years, ‘World Cultures’ featuring artifacts and displays from cultures across the globe, ‘The Shefton Collection’ with one of the most detailed collections of Greek artifacts in the UK and ‘Explore’ which is a more hands-on area of the museum and features regular interactive sessions.
There were live animals on display but these have now been withdrawn, as well as a conference area for corporate events and a fully provisioned learning suite for school visits.
The museum was entered into the ‘long list’ for the 2010 Art Fund Prize for museums and galleries.
The interactive Bio-Wall features hundreds of creatures, that visitors will be able to investigate and find out where they live and how they survive in such extreme places as the Arctic and Desert. There is also a great white shark display, polar bear and giraffe specimens from the historic Hancock collections and a moa skeleton. Also between May and October 2019 the museum hosted Dippy the dinosaur as part of its UK tour.
Within the museum’s archives are the nineteenth century botanical paintings by Margaret Rebecca Dickinson of plants from the Newcastle and Scottish Borders region.
Newcastle University (legally the University of Newcastle upon Tyne) is a public research university based in Newcastle upon Tyne, North East England. It has overseas campuses in Singapore and Malaysia. The university is a red brick university and a member of the Russell Group, an association of research-intensive UK universities.
The university finds its roots in the School of Medicine and Surgery (later the College of Medicine), established in 1834, and the College of Physical Science (later renamed Armstrong College), founded in 1871. These two colleges came to form the larger division of the federal University of Durham, with the Durham Colleges forming the other. The Newcastle colleges merged to form King’s College in 1937. In 1963, following an Act of Parliament, King’s College became the University of Newcastle upon Tyne.
The university subdivides into three faculties: the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences; the Faculty of Medical Sciences; and the Faculty of Science, Agriculture and Engineering. The university offers around 175 full-time undergraduate degree programmes in a wide range of subject areas spanning arts, sciences, engineering and medicine, together with approximately 340 postgraduate taught and research programmes across a range of disciplines.[6] The annual income of the institution for 2022–23 was £592.4 million of which £119.3 million was from research grants and contracts, with an expenditure of £558 million.
History
Durham University § Colleges in Newcastle
The establishment of a university in Newcastle upon Tyne was first proposed in 1831 by Thomas Greenhow in a lecture to the Literary and Philosophical Society. In 1832 a group of local medics – physicians George Fife (teaching materia medica and therapeutics) and Samuel Knott (teaching theory and practice of medicine), and surgeons John Fife (teaching surgery), Alexander Fraser (teaching anatomy and physiology) and Henry Glassford Potter (teaching chemistry) – started offering medical lectures in Bell’s Court to supplement the apprenticeship system (a fourth surgeon, Duncan McAllum, is mentioned by some sources among the founders, but was not included in the prospectus). The first session started on 1 October 1832 with eight or nine students, including John Snow, then apprenticed to a local surgeon-apothecary, the opening lecture being delivered by John Fife. In 1834 the lectures and practical demonstrations moved to the Hall of the Company of Barber Surgeons to accommodate the growing number of students, and the School of Medicine and Surgery was formally established on 1 October 1834.
On 25 June 1851, following a dispute among the teaching staff, the school was formally dissolved and the lecturers split into two rival institutions. The majority formed the Newcastle College of Medicine, and the others established themselves as the Newcastle upon Tyne College of Medicine and Practical Science with competing lecture courses. In July 1851 the majority college was recognised by the Society of Apothecaries and in October by the Royal College of Surgeons of England and in January 1852 was approved by the University of London to submit its students for London medical degree examinations. Later in 1852, the majority college was formally linked to the University of Durham, becoming the "Newcastle-upon-Tyne College of Medicine in connection with the University of Durham". The college awarded its first ‘Licence in Medicine’ (LicMed) under the auspices of the University of Durham in 1856, with external examiners from Oxford and London, becoming the first medical examining body on the United Kingdom to institute practical examinations alongside written and viva voce examinations. The two colleges amalgamated in 1857, with the first session of the unified college opening on 3 October that year. In 1861 the degree of Master of Surgery was introduced, allowing for the double qualification of Licence of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery, along with the degrees of Bachelor of Medicine and Doctor of Medicine, both of which required residence in Durham. In 1870 the college was brought into closer connection with the university, becoming the "Durham University College of Medicine" with the Reader in Medicine becoming the Professor of Medicine, the college gaining a representative on the university’s senate, and residence at the college henceforth counting as residence in the university towards degrees in medicine and surgery, removing the need for students to spend a period of residence in Durham before they could receive the higher degrees.
Attempts to realise a place for the teaching of sciences in the city were finally met with the foundation of the College of Physical Science in 1871. The college offered instruction in mathematics, physics, chemistry and geology to meet the growing needs of the mining industry, becoming the "Durham College of Physical Science" in 1883 and then renamed after William George Armstrong as Armstrong College in 1904. Both of these institutions were part of the University of Durham, which became a federal university under the Durham University Act 1908 with two divisions in Durham and Newcastle. By 1908, the Newcastle division was teaching a full range of subjects in the Faculties of Medicine, Arts, and Science, which also included agriculture and engineering.
Throughout the early 20th century, the medical and science colleges outpaced the growth of their Durham counterparts. Following tensions between the two Newcastle colleges in the early 1930s, a Royal Commission in 1934 recommended the merger of the two colleges to form "King’s College, Durham"; that was effected by the Durham University Act 1937. Further growth of both division of the federal university led to tensions within the structure and a feeling that it was too large to manage as a single body. On 1 August 1963 the Universities of Durham and Newcastle upon Tyne Act 1963 separated the two thus creating the "University of Newcastle upon Tyne". As the successor of King’s College, Durham, the university at its founding in 1963, adopted the coat of arms originally granted to the Council of King’s College in 1937.
Above the portico of the Students’ Union building are bas-relief carvings of the arms and mottoes of the University of Durham, Armstrong College and Durham University College of Medicine, the predecessor parts of Newcastle University. While a Latin motto, mens agitat molem (mind moves matter) appears in the Students’ Union building, the university itself does not have an official motto.
Campus and location
The university occupies a campus site close to Haymarket in central Newcastle upon Tyne. It is located to the northwest of the city centre between the open spaces of Leazes Park and the Town Moor; the university medical school and Royal Victoria Infirmary are adjacent to the west.
The Armstrong building is the oldest building on the campus and is the site of the original Armstrong College. The building was constructed in three stages; the north east wing was completed first at a cost of £18,000 and opened by Princess Louise on 5 November 1888. The south-east wing, which includes the Jubilee Tower, and south-west wings were opened in 1894. The Jubilee Tower was built with surplus funds raised from an Exhibition to mark Queen Victoria’s Jubilee in 1887. The north-west front, forming the main entrance, was completed in 1906 and features two stone figures to represent science and the arts. Much of the later construction work was financed by Sir Isaac Lowthian Bell, the metallurgist and former Lord Mayor of Newcastle, after whom the main tower is named. In 1906 it was opened by King Edward VII.
The building contains the King’s Hall, which serves as the university’s chief hall for ceremonial purposes where Congregation ceremonies are held. It can contain 500 seats. King Edward VII gave permission to call the Great Hall, King’s Hall. During the First World War, the building was requisitioned by the War Office to create the first Northern General Hospital, a facility for the Royal Army Medical Corps to treat military casualties. Graduation photographs are often taken in the University Quadrangle, next to the Armstrong building. In 1949 the Quadrangle was turned into a formal garden in memory of members of Newcastle University who gave their lives in the two World Wars. In 2017, a statue of Martin Luther King Jr. was erected in the inner courtyard of the Armstrong Building, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his honorary degree from the university.
The Bruce Building is a former brewery, constructed between 1896 and 1900 on the site of the Hotspur Hotel, and designed by the architect Joseph Oswald as the new premises of Newcastle Breweries Limited. The university occupied the building from the 1950s, but, having been empty for some time, the building was refurbished in 2016 to become residential and office space.
The Devonshire Building, opened in 2004, incorporates in an energy efficient design. It uses photovoltaic cells to help to power motorised shades that control the temperature of the building and geothermal heating coils. Its architects won awards in the Hadrian awards and the RICS Building of the Year Award 2004. The university won a Green Gown award for its construction.
Plans for additions and improvements to the campus were made public in March 2008 and completed in 2010 at a cost of £200 million. They included a redevelopment of the south-east (Haymarket) façade with a five-storey King’s Gate administration building as well as new student accommodation. Two additional buildings for the school of medicine were also built. September 2012 saw the completion of the new buildings and facilities for INTO Newcastle University on the university campus. The main building provides 18 new teaching rooms, a Learning Resource Centre, a lecture theatre, science lab, administrative and academic offices and restaurant.
The Philip Robinson Library is the main university library and is named after a bookseller in the city and benefactor to the library. The Walton Library specialises in services for the Faculty of Medical Sciences in the Medical School. It is named after Lord Walton of Detchant, former Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Professor of Neurology. The library has a relationship with the Northern region of the NHS allowing their staff to use the library for research and study. The Law Library specialises in resources relating to law, and the Marjorie Robinson Library Rooms offers additional study spaces and computers. Together, these house over one million books and 500,000 electronic resources. Some schools within the university, such as the School of Modern Languages, also have their own smaller libraries with smaller highly specialised collections.
In addition to the city centre campus there are buildings such as the Dove Marine Laboratory located on Cullercoats Bay, and Cockle Park Farm in Northumberland.
International
In September 2008, the university’s first overseas branch was opened in Singapore, a Marine International campus called, NUMI Singapore. This later expanded beyond marine subjects and became Newcastle University Singapore, largely through becoming an Overseas University Partner of Singapore Institute of Technology.
In 2011, the university’s Medical School opened an international branch campus in Iskandar Puteri, Johor, Malaysia, namely Newcastle University Medicine Malaysia.
Student accommodation
Newcastle University has many catered and non-catered halls of residence available to first-year students, located around the city of Newcastle. Popular Newcastle areas for private student houses and flats off campus include Jesmond, Heaton, Sandyford, Shieldfield, South Shields and Spital Tongues.
Henderson Hall was used as a hall of residence until a fire destroyed it in 2023.
St Mary’s College in Fenham, one of the halls of residence, was formerly St Mary’s College of Education, a teacher training college.
Organisation and governance
The current Chancellor is the British poet and artist Imtiaz Dharker. She assumed the position of Chancellor on 1 January 2020. The vice-chancellor is Chris Day, a hepatologist and former pro-vice-chancellor of the Faculty of Medical Sciences.
The university has an enrolment of some 16,000 undergraduate and 5,600 postgraduate students. Teaching and research are delivered in 19 academic schools, 13 research institutes and 38 research centres, spread across three Faculties: the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences; the Faculty of Medical Sciences; and the Faculty of Science, Agriculture and Engineering. The university offers around 175 full-time undergraduate degree programmes in a wide range of subject areas spanning arts, sciences, engineering and medicine, together with approximately 340 postgraduate taught and research programmes across a range of disciplines.
It holds a series of public lectures called ‘Insights’ each year in the Curtis Auditorium in the Herschel Building. Many of the university’s partnerships with companies, like Red Hat, are housed in the Herschel Annex.
Chancellors and vice-chancellors
For heads of the predecessor colleges, see Colleges of Durham University § Colleges in Newcastle.
Chancellors
Hugh Percy, 10th Duke of Northumberland (1963–1988)
Matthew White Ridley, 4th Viscount Ridley (1988–1999)
Chris Patten (1999–2009)
Liam Donaldson (2009–2019)
Imtiaz Dharker (2020–)
Vice-chancellors
Charles Bosanquet (1963–1968)
Henry Miller (1968–1976)
Ewan Stafford Page (1976–1978, acting)
Laurence Martin (1978–1990)
Duncan Murchison (1991, acting)
James Wright (1992–2000)
Christopher Edwards (2001–2007)
Chris Brink (2007–2016)
Chris Day (2017–present)
Civic responsibility
The university Quadrangle
The university describes itself as a civic university, with a role to play in society by bringing its research to bear on issues faced by communities (local, national or international).
In 2012, the university opened the Newcastle Institute for Social Renewal to address issues of social and economic change, representing the research-led academic schools across the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences[45] and the Business School.
Mark Shucksmith was Director of the Newcastle Institute for Social Renewal (NISR) at Newcastle University, where he is also Professor of Planning.
In 2006, the university was granted fair trade status and from January 2007 it became a smoke-free campus.
The university has also been actively involved with several of the region’s museums for many years. The Great North Museum: Hancock originally opened in 1884 and is often a venue for the university’s events programme.
Faculties and schools
Teaching schools within the university are based within three faculties. Each faculty is led by a Provost/Pro-vice-chancellor and a team of Deans with specific responsibilities.
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape
School of Arts and Cultures
Newcastle University Business School
Combined Honours Centre
School of Education, Communication and Language Sciences
School of English Literature, Language and Linguistics
School of Geography, Politics and Sociology
School of History, Classics and Archaeology
Newcastle Law School
School of Modern Languages
Faculty of Medical Sciences
School of Biomedical Sciences
School of Dental Sciences
School of Medical Education
School of Pharmacy
School of Psychology
Centre for Bacterial Cell Biology (CBCB)
Faculty of Science, Agriculture and Engineering
School of Computing
School of Engineering
School of Mathematics, Statistics and Physics
School of Natural and Environmental Sciences
Business School
Newcastle University Business School
As early as the 1900/1 academic year, there was teaching in economics (political economy, as it was then known) at Newcastle, making Economics the oldest department in the School. The Economics Department is currently headed by the Sir David Dale Chair. Among the eminent economists having served in the Department (both as holders of the Sir David Dale Chair) are Harry Mainwaring Hallsworth and Stanley Dennison.
Newcastle University Business School is a triple accredited business school, with accreditation by the three major accreditation bodies: AACSB, AMBA and EQUIS.
In 2002, Newcastle University Business School established the Business Accounting and Finance or ‘Flying Start’ degree in association with the ICAEW and PricewaterhouseCoopers. The course offers an accelerated route towards the ACA Chartered Accountancy qualification and is the Business School’s Flagship programme.
In 2011 the business school opened their new building built on the former Scottish and Newcastle brewery site next to St James’ Park. This building was officially opened on 19 March 2012 by Lord Burns.
The business school operated a central London campus from 2014 to 2021, in partnership with INTO University Partnerships until 2020.
Medical School
The BMC Medicine journal reported in 2008 that medical graduates from Oxford, Cambridge and Newcastle performed better in postgraduate tests than any other medical school in the UK.
In 2008 the Medical School announced that they were expanding their campus to Malaysia.
The Royal Victoria Infirmary has always had close links with the Faculty of Medical Sciences as a major teaching hospital.
School of Modern Languages
The School of Modern Languages consists of five sections: East Asian (which includes Japanese and Chinese); French; German; Spanish, Portuguese & Latin American Studies; and Translating & Interpreting Studies. Six languages are taught from beginner’s level to full degree level ‒ Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Spanish and Portuguese ‒ and beginner’s courses in Catalan, Dutch, Italian and Quechua are also available. Beyond the learning of the languages themselves, Newcastle also places a great deal of emphasis on study and experience of the cultures of the countries where the languages taught are spoken. The School of Modern Languages hosts North East England’s only branches of two internationally important institutes: the Camões Institute, a language institute for Portuguese, and the Confucius Institute, a language and cultural institute for Chinese.
The teaching of modern foreign languages at Newcastle predates the creation of Newcastle University itself, as in 1911 Armstrong College in Newcastle installed Albert George Latham, its first professor of modern languages.
The School of Modern Languages at Newcastle is the lead institution in the North East Routes into Languages Consortium and, together with the Durham University, Northumbria University, the University of Sunderland, the Teesside University and a network of schools, undertakes work activities of discovery of languages for the 9 to 13 years pupils. This implies having festivals, Q&A sessions, language tasters, or quizzes organised, as well as a web learning work aiming at constructing a web portal to link language learners across the region.
Newcastle Law School
Newcastle Law School is the longest established law school in the north-east of England when law was taught at the university’s predecessor college before it became independent from Durham University. It has a number of recognised international and national experts in a variety of areas of legal scholarship ranging from Common and Chancery law, to International and European law, as well as contextual, socio-legal and theoretical legal studies.
The Law School occupies four specially adapted late-Victorian town houses. The Staff Offices, the Alumni Lecture Theatre and seminar rooms as well as the Law Library are all located within the School buildings.
School of Computing
The School of Computing was ranked in the Times Higher Education world Top 100. Research areas include Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and ubiquitous computing, secure and resilient systems, synthetic biology, scalable computing (high performance systems, data science, machine learning and data visualization), and advanced modelling. The school led the formation of the National Innovation Centre for Data. Innovative teaching in the School was recognised in 2017 with the award of a National Teaching Fellowship.
Cavitation tunnel
Newcastle University has the second largest cavitation tunnel in the UK. Founded in 1950, and based in the Marine Science and Technology Department, the Emerson Cavitation Tunnel is used as a test basin for propellers, water turbines, underwater coatings and interaction of propellers with ice. The Emerson Cavitation Tunnel was recently relocated to a new facility in Blyth.
Museums and galleries
The university is associated with a number of the region’s museums and galleries, including the Great North Museum project, which is primarily based at the world-renowned Hancock Museum. The Great North Museum: Hancock also contains the collections from two of the university’s former museums, the Shefton Museum and the Museum of Antiquities, both now closed. The university’s Hatton Gallery is also a part of the Great North Museum project, and remains within the Fine Art Building.
Academic profile
Reputation and rankings
Rankings
National rankings
Complete (2024)30
Guardian (2024)67
Times / Sunday Times (2024)37
Global rankings
ARWU (2023)201–300
QS (2024)110
THE (2024)168=
Newcastle University’s national league table performance over the past ten years
The university is a member of the Russell Group of the UK’s research-intensive universities. It is ranked in the top 200 of most world rankings, and in the top 40 of most UK rankings. As of 2023, it is ranked 110th globally by QS, 292nd by Leiden, 139th by Times Higher Education and 201st–300th by the Academic Ranking of World Universities. Nationally, it is ranked joint 33rd by the Times/Sunday Times Good University Guide, 30th by the Complete University Guide[68] and joint 63rd by the Guardian.
Admissions
UCAS Admission Statistics 20222021202020192018
Application 33,73532,40034,55031,96533,785
Accepte 6,7556,2556,5806,4456,465
Applications/Accepted Ratio 5.05.25.35.05.2
Offer Rate (%78.178.080.279.280.0)
Average Entry Tariff—151148144152
Main scheme applications, International and UK
UK domiciled applicants
HESA Student Body Composition
In terms of average UCAS points of entrants, Newcastle ranked joint 19th in Britain in 2014. In 2015, the university gave offers of admission to 92.1% of its applicants, the highest amongst the Russell Group.
25.1% of Newcastle’s undergraduates are privately educated, the thirteenth highest proportion amongst mainstream British universities. In the 2016–17 academic year, the university had a domicile breakdown of 74:5:21 of UK:EU:non-EU students respectively with a female to male ratio of 51:49.
Research
Newcastle is a member of the Russell Group of 24 research-intensive universities. In the 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF), which assesses the quality of research in UK higher education institutions, Newcastle is ranked joint 33rd by GPA (along with the University of Strathclyde and the University of Sussex) and 15th for research power (the grade point average score of a university, multiplied by the full-time equivalent number of researchers submitted).
Student life
Newcastle University Students’ Union (NUSU), known as the Union Society until a 2012 rebranding, includes student-run sports clubs and societies.
The Union building was built in 1924 following a generous gift from an anonymous donor, who is now believed to have been Sir Cecil Cochrane, a major benefactor to the university.[87] It is built in the neo-Jacobean style and was designed by the local architect Robert Burns Dick. It was opened on 22 October 1925 by the Rt. Hon. Lord Eustace Percy, who later served as Rector of King’s College from 1937 to 1952. It is a Grade II listed building. In 2010 the university donated £8 million towards a redevelopment project for the Union Building.
The Students’ Union is run by seven paid sabbatical officers, including a Welfare and Equality Officer, and ten part-time unpaid officer positions. The former leader of the Liberal Democrats Tim Farron was President of NUSU in 1991–1992. The Students’ Union also employs around 300 people in ancillary roles including bar staff and entertainment organisers.
The Courier is a weekly student newspaper. Established in 1948, the current weekly readership is around 12,000, most of whom are students at the university. The Courier has won The Guardian’s Student Publication of the Year award twice in a row, in 2012 and 2013. It is published every Monday during term time.
Newcastle Student Radio is a student radio station based in the university. It produces shows on music, news, talk and sport and aims to cater for a wide range of musical tastes.
NUTV, known as TCTV from 2010 to 2017, is student television channel, first established in 2007. It produces live and on-demand content with coverage of events, as well as student-made programmes and shows.
Student exchange
Newcastle University has signed over 100 agreements with foreign universities allowing for student exchange to take place reciprocally.
Sport
Newcastle is one of the leading universities for sport in the UK and is consistently ranked within the top 12 out of 152 higher education institutions in the British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) rankings. More than 50 student-led sports clubs are supported through a team of professional staff and a network of indoor and outdoor sports facilities based over four sites. The university have a strong rugby history and were the winners of the Northumberland Senior Cup in 1965.
The university enjoys a friendly sporting rivalry with local universities. The Stan Calvert Cup was held between 1994 and 2018 by major sports teams from Newcastle and Northumbria University. The Boat Race of the North has also taken place between the rowing clubs of Newcastle and Durham University.
As of 2023, Newcastle University F.C. compete in men’s senior football in the Northern League Division Two.
The university’s Cochrane Park sports facility was a training venue for the teams playing football games at St James’ Park for the 2012 London Olympics.
A
Ali Mohamed Shein, 7th President of Zanzibar
Richard Adams – fairtrade businessman
Kate Adie – journalist
Yasmin Ahmad – Malaysian film director, writer and scriptwriter
Prince Adewale Aladesanmi – Nigerian prince and businessman
Jane Alexander – Bishop
Theodosios Alexander (BSc Marine Engineering 1981) – Dean, Parks College of Engineering, Aviation and Technology of Saint Louis University
William Armstrong, 1st Baron Armstrong – industrialist; in 1871 founded College of Physical Science, an early part of the University
Roy Ascott – new media artist
Dennis Assanis – President, University of Delaware
Neil Astley – publisher, editor and writer
Rodney Atkinson – eurosceptic conservative academic
Rowan Atkinson – comedian and actor
Kane Avellano – Guinness World Record for youngest person to circumnavigate the world by motorcycle (solo and unsupported) at the age of 23 in 2017
B
Bruce Babbitt – U.S. politician; 16th Governor of Arizona (1978–1987); 47th United States Secretary of the Interior (1993–2001); Democrat
James Baddiley – biochemist, based at Newcastle University 1954–1983; the Baddiley-Clark building is named in part after him
Tunde Baiyewu – member of the Lighthouse Family
John C. A. Barrett – clergyman
G. W. S. Barrow – historian
Neil Bartlett – chemist, creation of the first noble gas compounds (BSc and PhD at King’s College, University of Durham, later Newcastle University)
Sue Beardsmore – television presenter
Alan Beith – politician
Jean Benedetti – biographer, translator, director and dramatist
Phil Bennion – politician
Catherine Bertola – contemporary painter
Simon Best – Captain of the Ulster Rugby team; Prop for the Ireland Team
Andy Bird – CEO of Disney International
Rory Jonathan Courtenay Boyle, Viscount Dungarvan – heir apparent to the earldom of Cork
David Bradley – science writer
Mike Brearley – professional cricketer, formerly a lecturer in philosophy at the university (1968–1971)
Constance Briscoe – one of the first black women to sit as a judge in the UK; author of the best-selling autobiography Ugly; found guilty in May 2014 on three charges of attempting to pervert the course of justice; jailed for 16 months
Steve Brooks – entomologist; attained BSc in Zoology and MSc in Public Health Engineering from Newcastle University in 1976 and 1977 respectively
Thom Brooks – academic, columnist
Gavin Brown – academic
Vicki Bruce – psychologist
Basil Bunting – poet; Northern Arts Poetry Fellow at Newcastle University (1968–70); honorary DLitt in 1971
John Burgan – documentary filmmaker
Mark Burgess – computer scientist
Sir John Burn – Professor of Clinical Genetics at Newcastle University Medical School; Medical Director and Head of the Institute of Genetics; Newcastle Medical School alumnus
William Lawrence Burn – historian and lawyer, history chair at King’s College, Newcastle (1944–66)
John Harrison Burnett – botanist, chair of Botany at King’s College, Newcastle (1960–68)
C.
Richard Caddel – poet
Ann Cairns – President of International Markets for MasterCard
Deborah Cameron – linguist
Stuart Cameron – lecturer
John Ashton Cannon – historian; Professor of Modern History; Head of Department of History from 1976 until his appointment as Dean of the Faculty of Arts in 1979; Pro-Vice-Chancellor 1983–1986
Ian Carr – musician
Jimmy Cartmell – rugby player, Newcastle Falcons
Steve Chapman – Principal and Vice-Chancellor of Heriot-Watt University
Dion Chen – Hong Kong educator, principal of Ying Wa College and former principal of YMCA of Hong Kong Christian College
Hsing Chia-hui – author
Ashraf Choudhary – scientist
Chua Chor Teck – Managing Director of Keppel Group
Jennifer A. Clack – palaeontologist
George Clarke – architect
Carol Clewlow – novelist
Brian Clouston – landscape architect
Ed Coode – Olympic gold medallist
John Coulson – chemical engineering academic
Caroline Cox, Baroness Cox – cross-bench member of the British House of Lords
Nicola Curtin – Professor of Experimental Cancer Therapeutics
Pippa Crerar – Political Editor of the Daily Mirror
D
Fred D’Aguiar – author
Julia Darling – poet, playwright, novelist, MA in Creative Writing
Simin Davoudi – academic
Richard Dawson – civil engineering academic and member of the UK Committee on Climate Change
Tom Dening – medical academic and researcher
Katie Doherty – singer-songwriter
Nowell Donovan – vice-chancellor for academic affairs and Provost of Texas Christian University
Catherine Douglas – Ig Nobel Prize winner for Veterinary Medicine
Annabel Dover – artist, studied fine art 1994–1998
Alexander Downer – Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs (1996–2007)
Chloë Duckworth – archaeologist and presenter
Chris Duffield – Town Clerk and Chief Executive of the City of London Corporation
E
Michael Earl – academic
Tom English – drummer, Maxïmo Park
Princess Eugenie – member of the British royal family. Eugenie is a niece of King Charles III and a granddaughter of Queen Elizabeth II. She began studying at Newcastle University in September 2009, graduating in 2012 with a 2:1 degree in English Literature and History of Art.
F
U. A. Fanthorpe – poet
Frank Farmer – medical physicist; professor of medical physics at Newcastle University in 1966
Terry Farrell – architect
Tim Farron – former Liberal Democrat leader and MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale
Ian Fells – professor
Andy Fenby – rugby player
Bryan Ferry – singer, songwriter and musician, member of Roxy Music and solo artist; studied fine art
E. J. Field – neuroscientist, director of the university’s Demyelinating Disease Unit
John Niemeyer Findlay – philosopher
John Fitzgerald – computer scientist
Vicky Forster – cancer researcher
Maximimlian (Max) Fosh- YouTuber and independent candidate in the 2021 London mayoral election.
Rose Frain – artist
G
Hugh Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster – aristocrat, billionaire, businessman and landowner
Peter Gibbs – television weather presenter
Ken Goodall – rugby player
Peter Gooderham – British ambassador
Michael Goodfellow – Professor in Microbial Systematics
Robert Goodwill – politician
Richard Gordon – author
Teresa Graham – accountant
Thomas George Greenwell – National Conservative Member of Parliament
H
Sarah Hainsworth – Pro-Vice-Chancellor and Executive Dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science at Aston University
Reginald Hall – endocrinologist, Professor of Medicine (1970–1980)
Alex Halliday – Professor of Geochemistry, University of Oxford
Richard Hamilton – artist
Vicki L. Hanson – computer scientist; honorary doctorate in 2017
Rupert Harden – professional rugby union player
Tim Head – artist
Patsy Healey – professor
Alastair Heathcote – rower
Dorothy Heathcote – academic
Adrian Henri – ‘Mersey Scene’ poet and painter
Stephen Hepburn – politician
Jack Heslop-Harrison – botanist
Tony Hey – computer scientist; honorary doctorate 2007
Stuart Hill – author
Jean Hillier – professor
Ken Hodcroft – Chairman of Hartlepool United; founder of Increased Oil Recovery
Robert Holden – landscape architect
Bill Hopkins – composer
David Horrobin – entrepreneur
Debbie Horsfield – writer of dramas, including Cutting It
John House – geographer
Paul Hudson – weather presenter
Philip Hunter – educationist
Ronald Hunt – Art Historian who was librarian at the Art Department
Anya Hurlbert – visual neuroscientis
I
Martin Ince – journalist and media adviser, founder of the QS World University Rankings
Charles Innes-Ker – Marquess of Bowmont and Cessford
Mark Isherwood – politician
Jonathan Israel – historian
J
Alan J. Jamieson – marine biologist
George Neil Jenkins – medical researcher
Caroline Johnson – Conservative Member of Parliament
Wilko Johnson – guitarist with 1970s British rhythm and blues band Dr. Feelgood
Rich Johnston – comic book writer and cartoonist
Anna Jones – businesswoman
Cliff Jones – computer scientist
Colin Jones – historian
David E. H. Jones – chemist
Francis R. Jones – poetry translator and Reader in Translation Studies
Phil Jones – climatologist
Michael Jopling, Baron Jopling – Member of the House of Lords and the Conservative Party
Wilfred Josephs – dentist and composer
K
Michael King Jr. – civil rights leader; honorary graduate. In November 1967, MLK made a 24-hour trip to the United Kingdom to receive an honorary Doctorate of Civil Law from Newcastle University, becoming the first African American the institution had recognised in this way.
Panayiotis Kalorkoti – artist; studied B.A. (Hons) in Fine Art (1976–80); Bartlett Fellow in the Visual Arts (1988)
Rashida Karmali – businesswoman
Jackie Kay – poet, novelist, Professor of Creative Writing
Paul Kennedy – historian of international relations and grand strategy
Mark Khangure – neuroradiologist
L
Joy Labinjo – artist
Henrike Lähnemann – German medievalist
Dave Leadbetter – politician
Lim Boon Heng – Singapore Minister
Lin Hsin Hsin – IT inventor, artist, poet and composer
Anne Longfield – children’s campaigner, former Children’s Commissioner for England
Keith Ludeman – businessman
M
Jack Mapanje – writer and poet
Milton Margai – first prime minister of Sierra Leone (medical degree from the Durham College of Medicine, later Newcastle University Medical School)
Laurence Martin – war studies writer
Murray Martin, documentary and docudrama filmmaker, co-founder of Amber Film & Photography Collective
Adrian Martineau – medical researcher and professor of respiratory Infection and immunity at Queen Mary University of London
Carl R. May – sociologist
Tom May – professional rugby union player, now with Northampton Saints, and capped by England
Kate McCann – journalist and television presenter
Ian G. McKeith – professor of Old Age Psychiatry
John Anthony McGuckin – Orthodox Christian scholar, priest, and poet
Wyl Menmuir – novelist
Zia Mian – physicist
Richard Middleton – musicologist
Mary Midgley – moral philosopher
G.C.J. Midgley – philosopher
Moein Moghimi – biochemist and nanoscientist
Hermann Moisl – linguist
Anthony Michaels-Moore – Operatic Baritone
Joanna Moncrieff – Critical Psychiatrist
Theodore Morison – Principal of Armstrong College, Newcastle upon Tyne (1919–24)
Andy Morrell – footballer
Frank Moulaert – professor
Mo Mowlam – former British Labour Party Member of Parliament, former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, lecturer at Newcastle University
Chris Mullin – former British Labour Party Member of Parliament, author, visiting fellow
VA Mundella – College of Physical Science, 1884—1887; lecturer in physics at the College, 1891—1896: Professor of Physics at Northern Polytechnic Institute and Principal of Sunderland Technical College.
Richard Murphy – architect
N
Lisa Nandy – British Labour Party Member of Parliament, former Shadow Foreign Secretary
Karim Nayernia – biomedical scientist
Dianne Nelmes – TV producer
O
Sally O’Reilly – writer
Mo O’Toole – former British Labour Party Member of European Parliament
P
Ewan Page – founding director of the Newcastle University School of Computing and briefly acting vice-chancellor; later appointed vice-chancellor of the University of Reading
Rachel Pain – academic
Amanda Parker – Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire since 2023
Geoff Parling – Leicester Tigers rugby player
Chris Patten, Baron Patten of Barnes – British Conservative politician and Chancellor of the University (1999–2009)
Chris M Pattinson former Great Britain International Swimmer 1976-1984
Mick Paynter – Cornish poet and Grandbard
Robert A. Pearce – academic
Hugh Percy, 10th Duke of Northumberland – Chancellor of the University (1964–1988)
Jonathan Pile – Showbiz Editor, ZOO magazine
Ben Pimlott – political historian; PhD and lectureship at Newcastle University (1970–79)
Robin Plackett – statistician
Alan Plater – playwright and screenwriter
Ruth Plummer – Professor of Experimental Cancer Medicine at the Northern Institute for Cancer Research and Fellow of the UK’s Academy of Medical Sciences.
Poh Kwee Ong – Deputy President of SembCorp Marine
John Porter – musician
Rob Powell – former London Broncos coach
Stuart Prebble – former chief executive of ITV
Oliver Proudlock – Made in Chelsea star; creator of Serge De Nîmes clothing line[
Mark Purnell – palaeontologist
Q
Pirzada Qasim – Pakistani scholar, Vice Chancellor of the University of Karachi
Joyce Quin, Baroness Quin – politician
R
Andy Raleigh – Rugby League player for Wakefield Trinity Wildcats
Brian Randell – computer scientist
Rupert Mitford, 6th Baron Redesdale – Liberal Democrat spokesman in the House of Lords for International Development
Alastair Reynolds – novelist, former research astronomer with the European Space Agency
Ben Rice – author
Lewis Fry Richardson – mathematician, studied at the Durham College of Science in Newcastle
Matthew White Ridley, 4th Viscount Ridley – Chancellor of the University 1988-1999
Colin Riordan – VC of Cardiff University, Professor of German Studies (1988–2006)
Susie Rodgers – British Paralympic swimmer
Nayef Al-Rodhan – philosopher, neuroscientist, geostrategist, and author
Neil Rollinson – poet
Johanna Ropner – Lord lieutenant of North Yorkshire
Sharon Rowlands – CEO of ReachLocal
Peter Rowlinson – Ig Nobel Prize winner for Veterinary Medicine
John Rushby – computer scientist
Camilla Rutherford – actress
S
Jonathan Sacks – former Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth
Ross Samson – Scottish rugby union footballer; studied history
Helen Scales – marine biologist, broadcaster, and writer
William Scammell – poet
Fred B. Schneider – computer scientist; honorary doctorate in 2003
Sean Scully – painter
Nigel Shadbolt – computer scientist
Tom Shakespeare – geneticist
Jo Shapcott – poet
James Shapiro – Canadian surgeon and scientist
Jack Shepherd – actor and playwright
Mark Shucksmith – professor
Chris Simms – crime thriller novel author
Graham William Smith – probation officer, widely regarded as the father of the national probation service
Iain Smith – Scottish politician
Paul Smith – singer, Maxïmo Park
John Snow – discoverer of cholera transmission through water; leader in the adoption of anaesthesia; one of the 8 students enrolled on the very first term of the Medical School
William Somerville – agriculturist, professor of agriculture and forestry at Durham College of Science (later Newcastle University)
Ed Stafford – explorer, walked the length of the Amazon River
Chris Steele-Perkins – photographer
Chris Stevenson – academic
Di Stewart – Sky Sports News reader
Diana Stöcker – German CDU Member of Parliament
Miodrag Stojković – genetics researcher
Miriam Stoppard – physician, author and agony aunt
Charlie van Straubenzee – businessman and investment executive
Peter Straughan – playwright and short story writer
T
Mathew Tait – rugby union footballer
Eric Thomas – academic
David Tibet – cult musician and poet
Archis Tiku – bassist, Maxïmo Park
James Tooley – professor
Elsie Tu – politician
Maurice Tucker – sedimentologist
Paul Tucker – member of Lighthouse Family
George Grey Turner – surgeon
Ronald F. Tylecote – archaeologist
V
Chris Vance – actor in Prison Break and All Saints
Géza Vermes – scholar
Geoff Vigar – lecturer
Hugh Vyvyan – rugby union player
W
Alick Walker – palaeontologist
Matthew Walker – Professor of Neuroscience and Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley
Tom Walker – Sunday Times foreign correspondent
Lord Walton of Detchant – physician; President of the GMC, BMA, RSM; Warden of Green College, Oxford (1983–1989)
Kevin Warwick – Professor of Cybernetics; former Lecturer in Electrical & Electronic Engineering
Duncan Watmore – footballer at Millwall F.C.
Mary Webb – artist
Charlie Webster – television sports presenter
Li Wei – Chair of Applied Linguistics at UCL Institute of Education, University College London
Joseph Joshua Weiss – Professor of Radiation Chemistry
Robert Westall – children’s writer, twice winner of Carnegie Medal
Thomas Stanley Westoll – Fellow of the Royal Society
Gillian Whitehead – composer
William Whitfield – architect, later designed the Hadrian Building and the Northern Stage
Claire Williams – motorsport executive
Zoe Williams – sportswoman, worked on Gladiators
Donald I. Williamson – planktologist and carcinologist
Philip Williamson – former Chief Executive of Nationwide Building Society
John Willis – Royal Air Force officer and council member of the University
Lukas Wooller – keyboard player, Maxïmo Park
Graham Wylie – co-founder of the Sage Group; studied Computing Science & Statistics BSc and graduated in 1980; awarded an honorary doctorate in 2004
Y
Hisila Yami, Nepalese politician and former Minister of Physical Planning and Works (Government of Nepal
John Yorke – Controller of Continuing Drama; Head of Independent Drama at the BBC
Martha Young-Scholten – linguist
Paul Younger – hydrogeologist
Posted by millicand@rocketmail.com on 2022-10-25 22:58:16
Tagged: , great-north-museum , rhino-statue , england , newcastle , United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland , UK , europe , european , eurasia , britain , great britain , british , british isles , english