Shrivenham - U.K. Military Colleges

U.K. Military Colleges

Shrivenham has been the site of UK military colleges since 1946 and the establishment of the Royal Military College of Science (RMCS) in the grounds of Beckett Hall. This college is now called the Defence College of Management and Technology, which is part of the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom.

The Defence Academy of the United Kingdom provides higher education for personnel in the British Armed Forces, Civil Service, other government departments and service personnel from other nations. The Defence Academy's current Director General is Peter Watkins who took up his post on 6 June 2011. The Defence Academy is headquartered at Shrivenham and delivers education and training in a number of sites. The majority of training is postgraduate with many courses being accredited for the award of civilian qualifications. Cranfield University, King's College London and SERCO Defence Science and Technology have strong links with the Defence Academy, being the academic providers at the aforementioned college.

The Conflict Studies Research Centre (CSRC) is just over the parish boundary in Watchfield.

Joint Services Command and Staff College (JSCSC) is a British military academic establishment providing training and education to experienced officers of the Royal Navy, British Army, Royal Air Force, Ministry of Defence Civil Service, and serving officers of other states.

JSCSC combined the single service provision of the British Armed Forces: Royal Naval College, Greenwich, Staff College, Camberley, RAF Staff College, Bracknell and the Joint Service Defence College, Greenwich. Initially formed at Bracknell in 1997, the college moved to a purpose-built facility in the grounds of the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom and is co-located with the Defence College of Management and Technology, Shrivenham.

The Defence College of Management and Technology (DA-CMT) is a UK postgraduate school, research institution and training provider formed in 2009 from five departments of the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom, and as such part of the British Armed Forces. Since 1984 Cranfield University has been the main academic provider of the College. A November 2005 contract extends the Cranfield relationship with DA-CMT to at least 2027.

The Conflict Studies Research Centre (CSRC) was part of the UK Defence Academy. It specialised in potential causes of conflict in a wide area ranging from the Baltic to Central Asia. This geographical focus was inherited from the Centre's original incarnation as the Soviet Studies Research Centre (SSRC) in 1972, at Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, examining the Soviet military threat. Renamed in the 1990s, the Centre later examined wider issues including foreign policy, energy security and demographic change. CSRC hosted a small number of deep country specialists, providing in-house expertise on their subject countries to government and academic customers in the UK and beyond, as well as publishing research in their own right. In 2006, CSRC was absorbed into the Advanced Research and Assessment Group (ARAG), another component of the UK Defence Academy, which was subsequently disbanded. In May 2010, former research staff of CSRC, laid off at its closure, re-formed the organisation independently of the Ministry of Defence.