Surrey is a fantastic location with London to the north and surrounded by the wonderful counties of Kent, Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. It regularly ranks among the best places to live in the UK, with an attraction for families seeking a rural base without sacrificing connections to the capital city. It is no real surprise that it has become one of the wealthiest counties in the UK with so many global services, spaces and industries making this the base of their UK headquarters. With financial, technological and scientific companies looking to Surrey to inform and influence their future strategies, the higher education institutions here are responding with innovative and practical courses that promise to find the very best emerging talent.
Our guide to the universities of Surrey demonstrates how and why this area is fast becoming a hub for research, academic and creative excellence in England.
Royal Holloway, University Of London
The town of Egham is a wonderfully verdant stretch of England, placed between Windsor and Heathrow. This is where you will find Royal Holloway, less than 20 miles from central London, with a campus of 135 acres that allows students to live in rural peace and tranquillity with quick and simple access to the capital when needed.
This educational institution began life as a pioneering college for women in 1879, in an incredibly radical move at the time. The philanthropist and entrepreneur Thomas Holloway was keen to make higher education a possibility for women and found patronage from Queen Victoria in 1886 to give it royal designation.
Today, it is a co-educational constituent college of the University of London, following a merger with Bedford College in 1985, offering degrees from this prestigious federation. It consistently ranks amongst the top 30 universities in the UK with global recognition as an academic centre of excellence in humanities, science and social science. And its reputation for innovative and cutting-edge research has seen partnerships recently emerge with The Centre for Digital Creativity, The Information Security Group and The Centre for Climate Crisis Thinking, to name a select few.
The facilities here are a great example of a modern seat of learning with advanced laboratories, theatre spaces and over a thousand study spaces open and accessible for its student population. The magnificent Founder’s Building acts as the centrepiece and symbolic heart of Royal Holloway, with an ornate red-brick Victorian design that has become iconic in the area. Notable alumni include the suffragette Emily Wilding Davison, celebrated screen actor Mark Strong and paralympic gold medal winner Sophie Christiansen.
University of Surrey
The University of Surrey’s history can be traced directly back to the Battersea Polytechnic Institute, created in 1891 which eventually became Battersea College of Technology in the 1950s before achieving university status in 1966 as it moved to Guildford. As the town is only 35 minutes from London, it remains connected to its city centre beginnings while offering a campus that makes the most of the idyllic county surroundings. The campus itself is compact, modern and easy to navigate with almost 200 study spaces and a library that is home to over a million volumes to draw from. Elsewhere, the robotics workshops and laboratories are a fantastic proving ground for young minds that want to garner attention from the Research & Development and technology start-ups that populate the adjacent Surrey Research Park. This is all in addition to the on-site Surrey Sports Park with Olympic swimming pool, climbing walls and fitness suites decked out with world class machines and equipment.
The obvious strengths in engineering, health sciences, space technology and cybersecurity have made The University of Surrey renowned for graduate employability, earning it multiple Queen’s Anniversary Prizes and even the status of 2016 University of the Year by The Sunday Times & Good University Guide. Notable alumni here include Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, the former President of Mauritius and Professor Sir David King, known for his work on climate change and energy policy for the UK government.
University of Creative Arts (UCA)
The town of Farnham in Surrey has long held connections with the arts of craft and design. It was the establishment of schools such as Farnham School of Art in the area that eventually drove several creative institutions to join together in 2005 to create UCA Farnham, before achieving full University status in 2008. With such dedication to the pursuit of creative endeavours, it should be no surprise that the UCA campus boasts a wealth of exceptional resources and facilities that include world-class film and photography studios with an on-site cinema for showcasing work. Here, students will benefit from animation and videogame design suites with continually updated software and technology applications and fashion ateliers with digital textile printers.
As one of the country’s leading creative universities, UCA prioritises practice-based learning that delivers practical and hands-on experiences for all students from the very first lectures and lessons. Many of the courses that run here hold strong links with the relevant industries that involve assignments with work on current and real-time briefs for global brands. Students from over 90 countries make up the current student cohort for a truly international feel that often turns exhibitions into globally recognised events. Notable alumni from UCA include the iconic fashion designers Zandra Rhodes and Karen Millen, movie director Gareth Edwards and photographer Lara Jade.
So much of the success of higher education institutions involves how well equipped they are to teach students about their place in a rapidly developing world. These universities need to instil classic values of learning, growth and curiosity while making sure that they understand their own input on how to change the future for the better. The universities in Surrey look perfectly placed to make that happen in a location that combines the best attributes of English cities and the countryside too.
