Universities in The United Kingdom

Universities In The United Kingdom

Universities in the United Kingdom have generally been instituted by Royal Charter, Papal Bull, Act of Parliament or an instrument of government under the Education Reform Act 1988; in any case generally with the approval of the Privy Council, and only such recognised bodies can award degrees of any kind. Undergraduate applications to almost all United Kingdom universities are managed by UCAS - the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service.

Most universities in the country may be classified into 6 main categories:

• Ancient universities - the seven universities which were founded before 1800.
• London, Durham and its former constituent college at Newcastle and the colleges of the former University of Wales (at Lampeter, Aberystwyth, Bangor and Cardiff) - which were chartered in the 19th century.
• Red Brick universities - the large civic universities chartered at the beginning of the 20th century before World War 1.
• Plate Glass universities - the universities chartered after 1966 (formerly described as the 'new universities' or the 'Robbins expansion' universities).
• The Open University - Britain's 'open to all' distance learning University (est. 1968).
• New Universities - the Post-1992 universities formed from polytechnics or colleges of Higher Education.

The central co-ordinating body for universities in the United Kingdom is Universities UK.