Hull recorded one of the biggest rises in applications of any university at the start of 2009.

Its 25 per cent increase followed a big drop in the previous year, but growth on this scale is almost unprecedented for a traditional university.

The success came after the latest in a string of excellent performances in the National Student Survey.

The university has been in or around the top ten for overall student satisfaction in every round of the survey, with American studies, history, archaeology and philosophy, theology and religious studies producing the best of a consistently good set of results published in 2008.

Multimedia

• The Times University Guide table

Related Links

• University of Hull

Multimedia

• University of Hull official site

Loyalty

The university and the city have always commanded loyalty among students, who appreciate the modest cost of living and ready availability of accommodation, as well as the quality of courses. Research plaudits have been more elusive, however. No subject was rated internationally outstanding in the 2001 assessments and Hull had the lowest proportion of ‘world-leading’ research among England’s older universities the 2008 exercise.

Health subjects, geography and environmental science, and drama, dance and performance achieved the best grades. An Institute for Learning encourages academics to put research findings into practice, developing training courses and developing the university’s interest in lifelong learning.

A longstanding focus on Europe shows in the wide range of languages available at degree level, with the purpose-built Language Institute heavily used by students of all subjects. Strength in politics – confirmed by one of three grade 5 assessments for research, as well as the teaching quality success – is reflected in a steady flow of graduates into the House of Commons. The Westminster Hull Internship Programme (WHIP) offers a year-long placement and month-long internships for British politics and legislative studies students.

However, the university was criticised for deciding to close mathematics following poor recruitment to the honours degree.

Development

After years of relative stability, Hull expanded rapidly, both on its spacious home campus and through mergers. First it added nursing to its portfolio of courses with the acquisition of the former Humberside College of Health, then it took in University College Scarborough and finally the university bought the adjacent campus of the former Humberside (now Lincoln) University. There are now nearly 20,000 undergraduates, including part-timers. The main academic development has been the establishment of a medical school in conjunction with York University, which takes 150 students a year. Hull’s patient development, in collaboration with the local health authority, of a postgraduate medical school was rewarded with the award of a traditional school housed in a landmark building on the former Humberside (West) campus. The West Campus also contains a Business Quarter, incorporating the Business School and a new Enterprise Centre to support local business.

The original 94-acre main campus has also seen considerable development, with improvements to social facilities, new buildings for languages and chemistry, a Graduate Research Institute and a state-of-the-art sport, health and exercise science laboratory. The campus, with its art gallery and highly automated library, is less than three miles from the centre of Hull.

The Scarborough campus has also seen investment, with new laboratories for music technology and digital arts, and a renovated café bar. Hull has always maintained a roughly equal balance between science and technology and the arts and social sciences, but the Scarborough campus has tipped the scales towards the arts.

More than 90 per cent of the undergraduates are state-educated – one of the highest proportions at any pre-1992 university – while three in ten are from working-class homes. The projected dropout rate had improved in the latest survey: at 10 per cent, it was below average for the university’s courses and entry qualifications.

Leisure

Student leisure facilities, which were always good but becoming crowded, have been upgraded as part of the campus building programme. The students’ union, which was rated the second best in Britain in a new awards scheme in 2008, has been refurbished and features the popular “Asylum” nightclub. New football pitches have been added recently on campus and the Sports and Fitness Centre has been attracting praise.

Times recommends

• Students face big rise in university fees
• Students to rate lecturers online
• Lord heads team to look at raising tuition fees