Red brick university

"Redbrick" redirects here. For other uses, see Redbrick (disambiguation).

File:BirminghamUniversityChancellorsCourt.jpg

The Aston Webb building, University of Birmingham

Red brick university (or redbrick university) is a term originally used to refer to six civic universities founded in the major industrial cities of England. The term is now used more broadly to refer to British universities founded in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in major cities. All of the six original redbrick institutions, or their predecessor institutes, gained university status before World War I and were initially established as civic science or engineering colleges.

Whilst the term was originally coined as these institutions were new and thus regarded by the ancient universities as arriviste, the description has since ceased to be derogatory with the 1960s proliferation of universities and the reclassification of polytechnics in 1992. The six institutions are members of the Russell Group (which receives two-thirds of all research grant funding in the United Kingdom).

Origins of the term and use

The term "red brick" or "redbrick" was first coined by Edgar Allison Peers, a professor of Spanish at the University of Liverpool, to describe the civic universities (under the pseudonym "Bruce Truscot" in his 1943 book Redbrick University). His reference was inspired by the fact that The Victoria Building at the University of Liverpool (designed by Alfred Waterhouse and completed in 1892 as the main building for University College, Liverpool) is built from a distinctive red pressed brick, with terracotta decorative dressings. On this basis the University of Liverpool claims be the original "red brick" institution, although the titular, fictional Redbrick University was a cipher for all the civic universities of the day.

While the University of Liverpool was an inspiration for the "red brick" university alluded to in Peers' book, receiving university status in 1903, the University of Birmingham was the first of the civic universities to gain independent university status in 1900 and the University has stated that the popularity of the term "red brick" owes to its own Chancellor's Court, constructed from Accrington red brick. The University of Birmingham grew from the Mason Science College (opened two years before University College Liverpool in 1880), an elaborate red brick and terracotta building in central Birmingham which was demolished in 1962.

Civic university movement

These universities were distinguished by being non-collegiate institutions that admitted men without reference to religion or background and concentrated on imparting to their students "real-world" skills, often linked to engineering. In this sense they owed their structural heritage to the Humboldt University of Berlin, which emphasised practical knowledge over the academic sort. This focus on the practical also distinguished the red brick universities from the ancient English universities of Oxford and Cambridge and from the newer (although still pre-Victorian) University of Durham, collegiate institutions which concentrated on divinity, the liberal arts and imposed religious tests (e.g. assent to the Thirty-Nine Articles) on staff and students. Scotland's ancient universities (St Andrews, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Edinburgh), usually grouped with Dundee, were founded on a different basis.

The first wave of large civic red brick universities all gained official university status before the First World War, all of these institutions have origins dating back to older medical or engineering colleges and were located in the industrial centres of the late Victorian and Edwardian eras that required strong scientific and technical workforces. These universities developed out of various 19th-century private research and education institutes in industrial cities. The 1824 Manchester Mechanics' Institute formed the basis of the Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST), and thus led towards the University of Manchester proper. The University of Birmingham has origins dating back to the 1825 Birmingham Medical School. The University of Leeds also owes its foundations to a medical school: the 1831 Leeds School of Medicine. The University of Bristol began with the 1876 University College, Bristol, the University of Liverpool with a University College in 1881, and the University of Sheffield with a university college in 1897.

Combined English Universities was a university constituency in the UK Parliament created by the Representation of the People Act 1918 for graduates of Durham University or the six red bricks. Oxford, Cambridge, and London had already been enfranchised. Reading University was added to the Combined English Universities constituency in 1928.

Name	University Charter Awarded	Predecessor institutions	Image	Notes
Victoria University	1880 (defunct 1903)	Owens College, Manchester (1851) Leeds School of Medicine (1831) University College Liverpool (1881)		Victoria University was a federal college based in Manchester with satellite sites in Leeds and Liverpool. It was defunct by 1903 as Leeds and Liverpool sought independent university status which led to the formation of the new Victoria University of Manchester in 1903 and which merged into the University of Manchester in 2004.
University of Birmingham	1900	Birmingham Medical School (1825) Mason Science College (1875) Mason University College (1898)	200px	The first independent civic university to be awarded full university status by Royal Charter.
University of Liverpool	1903	University College, Liverpool (1881)
University of Manchester	1903 (as Victoria University of Manchester) 2004 (as University of Manchester)	Mechanics' Institute, Manchester (1824) Owens College, Manchester (1851) Victoria University of Manchester (1903) UMIST (1956)		The federal Victoria University existed between 1880-1903. Victoria University of Manchester gained royal charter as a new entity in 1903. UMIST formed in 1956 and merged with the Victoria University of Manchester in 2004 to form the current University of Manchester.
University of Leeds	1904	Leeds School of Medicine (1831)
University of Sheffield	1905	Sheffield Medical School (1828) University College of Sheffield (1897)
University of Bristol	1909	University College Bristol (1876)

Other institutions

Many institutions share similar characteristics to the original six civic universities, namely those in the second wave of civic universities before the advent of the plate glass universities in 1961. These universities differed from the red bricks in that they evolved from local university colleges rather than civic institutes and all previously awarded external Oxford University and University of London degrees before being granted full status after the First World War. These include the University of Reading, founded in the late 19th century as an extension college of Oxford University which was the only university to receive its charter between the two world wars and describes itself as a "red brick" university. Queen's University Belfast, which became a civic university in 1908, also lays claim to the title having previously been established in 1845 as a college of the Queen's University of Ireland (later Royal University of Ireland). Many of the original constituent institutions of the University of Wales bear the "red brick" hallmarks: Aberystwyth; Bangor; Swansea; Cardiff. Certain constituent colleges of the University of London, such as Royal Holloway, Queen Mary and Goldsmiths College are also literally Victorian red brick in style.

Various other civic institutions with origins dating from the 19th and early 20th centuries have also been described as Red Brick: University of Dundee (originally an independent university college, before becoming a constituent college of the University of St Andrews), Birkbeck, University of London (founded in 1823), University of Exeter, University of Hull, and University of Leicester, (all originally extension colleges of the University of London), Newcastle University (originally an extension college of the University of Durham), University of Nottingham, and University of Southampton.

In 1963, the Robbins Report recommended expansion of the British university system. The universities established after this report are often known as the 'Plate Glass' universities.

See also

• Sandstone universities (Australia)
• Ancient Universities
• Ancient universities of Scotland
• Plate glass university
• Campus university
• New universities