By Ann M. Koenig, AACRAO International Education Services
The decade-long process of reshaping the higher education landscape in Wales continues as another round of institutional mergers has been announced.
The new University of South Wales has been created by the merger of the University of Glamorgan and the University of Wales, Newport. The official merger took place in April 2013, as the next step in the Welsh Government’s plan to reconfigure the higher education sector in Wales through a process of combining existing institutions. The new university will retain the five campuses that belonged to the two merged institutions. With a total enrollment of 33,500, including 4,500 international students from over 120 countries, the University of South Wales is the sixth-largest university in the United Kingdom.
Another recent merger proposal involved the University of Wales, which historically had constituent colleges in several locations. The original plan had been to merge the University of Wales with Swansea Metropolitan University. However, this plan was modified after the 2011 BBC exposé of degree and visa fraud resulting from abuse of the University of Wales’ role as a “validating” institution for programs offered in other countries. Instead, it was decided that the merger partner would be the University of Wales: Trinity Saint David, which had been created in 2010 through the merger of two constituent colleges of the University of Wales, Trinity University College and Saint David’s University College.
Founded originally as Saint David’s College under an 1822 charter, Trinity Saint David is the oldest degree-granting institution in Wales and the third oldest in England and Wales, after Oxford and Cambridge. The 1822 charter is the legal foundation of the new institution, which is officially the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. Swansea Metropolitan University, or "Swansea Met," is now known officially as "Swansea Metropolitan University of Wales Trinity Saint David".
Cardiff Metropolitan University was to have been included in several merger plans, but has resisted the movement and remains an independent institution. Prior to November 2011, it had been a constituent college of the University of Wales, with the name University of Wales Institute Cardiff (UWIC).
The United Kingdom’s Department for Business, Education and Skills Web site “Recognised UK Degrees” provides information about the recognized institutions and other authorized education providers in the UK, as well as information about legally-authorized degrees. In response to the large number of bogus degree vendors that sell documents meant to be regarded as “British degrees” or “UK credentials," cautionary information about bogus degrees is also included. Please note that institutional mergers are not fully completed until all of the legal requirements involved have been met. Thus the list of “recognised bodies” may not fully reflect the latest institutional mergers at the time the mergers are announced.
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AACRAO Connect