West of England (UWE) surprised the university world by attracting Sir Howard Newby, chief executive of the Higher Education Funding Council for England, to be its Vice-Chancellor. But UWE boasted the best teaching quality record in the new universities and has always been regarded among the leaders in its peer group. Perfect scores for education and in the joint assessment for biology and biomedical sciences represented the best results, but every subject assessed from 1995 was given at least 20 out of 24 points. Business and management, the university’s biggest subject area, and economics also scored well at the end of the cycle of assessments.

This record and a popular location is highly attractive to students. Applications rose by close to the national average at the official deadline for entry this year, recovering from a drop of nearly 9 per cent a year earlier with the advent of top-up fees. The university has sometimes found itself in trouble with the funding council for missing its benchmarks for extending access to under-represented groups in higher education. Almost one undergraduate in seven attends a fee-paying school, a proportion exceeded by only one other new university. More than a quarter of places now go to working-class students, but both this and the proportion of students from areas without a history of higher education are still well below the national average for the subjects offered. UWE has one of the largest bursary schemes in the country, with its top rate of £1,250 going to more than a third of its students

The projected dropout rate had been falling, but was back above 20 per cent in the latest national statistics. More than half of the students come from the West Country and there are close links with local business and industry. A network of 15 colleges stretches into Somerset and Wiltshire, offering UWE programmes. Hartpury College, near Gloucester, has become an associate faculty of the university, specialising in agriculture, equine studies and other land-based courses.

A tradition of vocational education regularly helps the university to a healthy graduate employment record. The entrance system credits vocational qualifications and practical experience equally with traditional academic results. Law received a commendation from the Legal Practice Board and the degree in Architecture and Planning won a similar accolade from the Royal Town Planning Institute for bringing together the two disciplines in one joint-honours course giving dual professional qualifications. UWE is one of just four universities recognised by the Forensic Science Society for the quality of courses in the subject.

Among the new universities only Oxford Brookes entered a larger proportion of academics than UWE’s 40 per cent in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise. The results were an improvement on 1996, with accounting and finance rated nationally outstanding with much work of international standards. However, the scale of the entry also produced more low grades than the university would have wished.

There are four sites in Bristol itself, mainly around the north of the city, with regional centres in Bath, and Swindon concentrating on the growth area of nursing. Only Bower Ashton, which houses art, media and design, is in the south. The main campus at Frenchay, close to Bristol Parkway station but four miles out of the city centre, has by far the largest number of students and includes the Centre for Student Affairs, which brings together the various non-academic services. The St Matthias site (for social sciences and humanities) and Glenside (for midwifery, nursing, physiotherapy and radiography) are more attractive but less lively. Education has moved from the Redland campus, near the city centre, to a £16 million headquarters at Frenchay.

Bristol is a hugely popular student centre: an attractive and lively city, but not cheap. University accommodation has become more plentiful in recent years, with almost 4,500 places available, including nearly 2,000 in a new £80 million student village on the Frenchay campus. Sports facilities were a bone of contention for students, but a new sports complex opened in 2006 as part of a £200 million investment programme, which is one of the largest in UK higher education.

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