Concentration on technology, languages and business is fitting for a university which commemorates James Watt, the pioneer of steam power, and George Heriot, financier to King James VI.

Still evolving more than 40 years after attaining university status, in many ways Heriot- Watt is Scotland’s most unconventional university.

The main campus, on the outskirts of Edinburgh is among the most modern in Britain.

While small in terms of full-time students – there are under 7,000 on campus – the university has a further 10,500 students in supported learning centres overseas and on distance learning courses.

Dubai

A new campus opened in Dubai in 2005 offering management, business, IT and a range of engineering subjects. With overseas students filling nearly a quarter of its places in Scotland, Heriot-Watt is one of the UK’s most international universities.

The university won the Scottish Council of Development and Industry’s 2007 award for Outstanding International Achieve-ment in Scotland’s Universities, partly for its support for international students.

For many years, Heriot-Watt’s main claim to fame outside the academic community lay in its degree in brewing and distilling. But the university has a wide variety of vocational programmes, as well as more conventional degrees.

Research in petroleum engineering is rated internationally outstanding, while modern languages are a more unexpected strength.

Strengths

Actuarial mathematics and statistics is one of only two centres in the UK, and photonics and optoelectronics, building and food science are all highly regarded. Both teaching and research are heavily multidisciplinary with a focus on applying knowledge to real-world challenges. Computer sciences and chemical, electrical and electronic, mechanical and petroleum engineering all achieved the top Commendable grades used in teaching assessments. An institutional review in 2006 produced the top grade of “broad confidence”.

Languages produced the best results in the university’s debut in the National Student Survey, in 2007. Science, engineering, management and languages are located on the main campus at Riccarton. There is a postgraduate campus in Orkney, specialising in renewable energy, and a Scottish Borders Campus in Galashiels, 35 miles south of Edinburgh, where the university took over and upgraded the Scottish College of Textiles.

Heriot-Watt and Borders College have signed a partnership agreement for a long-term collaboration to deliver higher and further education in the historically underprovided region. Both institutions will share the site, with the university concentrating on textiles, fashion design and management.

Heriot-Watt is also one of the most commercially diversified universities in Britain, with the share of private research funding consistently among the highest in the UK per member of academic staff. About half of the university’s income, around £60 million, comes from research, training and commercial services.

Employability

The subject mix also serves graduates well: Heriot-Watt is seldom far from the top of the employment league tables. The latest projected dropout rate of 15 per cent is an improvement on previous figures, although still higher than the UK average for the university’s subjects and entrance qualifications.

More than half of the undergraduates are from Scotland, and 15 per cent from other parts of Britain, over 90 per cent of them from state schools and colleges. The Edinburgh campus has an attractive parkland setting, with the students’ union at its heart and halls of residence conveniently placed.

Students have complained that the six-mile journey to the city centre leaves them isolated, but there are now frequent bus services. Sports enthusiasts are well provided for, and representative teams do well. Hearts, one of Edinburgh’s two SPL clubs, have their sports academy on campus, which is used by students and local people as well as the young professionals.

Music also thrives: there is a professional musician-inresidence and a number of scholarships, as well as a varied programme of events.

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