 Coat of arms | |
| Motto | Latin:In nocte consilium |
|---|---|
Motto in English | Advice comes at night[1] |
| Type | Public research university |
| Established |
|
Parent institution | University of London |
| Endowment | £10.2 million (2022)[2] |
| Budget | £108.2 million (2021–22)[2] |
| Chancellor | The Princess Royal (University of London) |
| President | Shami Chakrabarti[3] |
| Vice-Chancellor | Sally Wheeler[3] |
| Students | 8,440 (2023/24)[4] |
| Undergraduates | 4,775 (2023/24)[4] |
| Postgraduates | 3,665 (2023/24)[4] |
| Location | London, England, United Kingdom 51°31′19″N0°07′49″W / 51.52194°N 0.13028°W /51.52194; -0.13028 |
| Colours | |
| Affiliations | ACU European University Association Royal Academy of Dramatic Art Universities UK |
| Website | bbk |
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Birkbeck College, University of London (which operates under thetrading name ofBirkbeck, University of London) is apublic research university located inLondon, England, and amember institution of theUniversity of London. Established in 1823 as theLondon Mechanics' Institute by its founderJoseph Clinton Robertson and its supportersGeorge Birkbeck,Jeremy Bentham,J. C. Hobhouse andHenry Brougham, Birkbeck is one of the few universities to specialise in eveninghigher education in the United Kingdom.
Birkbeck's main building is in Bloomsbury, in theLondon Borough of Camden in Central London. Birkbeck offers more than 200 undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. Birkbeck's academic activities are organised into five constituent faculties, which are subdivided into nineteen departments. The university is a member of academic organisations such as theAssociation of Commonwealth Universities and theEuropean University Association. The university is also a member of theScreen Studies Group, London. The university's Centre for Brain Function and Development was awarded TheQueen's Anniversary Prize for its brain research in 2005.[5]
Birkbeck's alumni and former and current staff include fiveNobel laureates, numerous political leaders, members of theParliament of the United Kingdom and aBritish prime minister.
In the 11 October 1823 issue ofMechanic's Magazine, a new weekly serial byJC Robertson andThomas Hodgskin, the editors with influence fromFrancis Place proposed a London Mechanics' Institute.[6][7][8] Their proposal referenced the work ofDr. George Birkbeck, a graduate of the University of Edinburgh and pioneer ofadult education.[9] Birkbeck soon became central to the project and, on 11 November 1823, chaired its founding meeting at theCrown and Anchor Tavern in theStrand before a crowd of two thousand people.[10] The Institute was not universally popular, with some accusing Birkbeck of "scattering the seeds of evil", yet Birkbeck fully devoted his efforts to the college as its founder and first president.[11]
The Institute moved into the Southampton Buildings onChancery Lane in 1825.[8] In 1830, it became one of the earliest colleges to admit female students.[11] Changes to theUniversity of London's structure in 1858 allowed the Institute's students to sit examinations for its degrees. The Institute became the main provider for part-time university education.[11]
In 1866 the Institute changed its name to theBirkbeck Literary and Scientific Institution.[11] In 1885 Birkbeck moved to the Breams Building onFetter Lane, where it remained for the next 67 years.[11]
In 1907 Birkbeck's name was shortened to Birkbeck College. In 1913 a review of the University of London, which had been restructured in 1900, recommended that Birkbeck become a constituent college of the University, but the outbreak of theFirst World War delayed this until 1920.[11] TheRoyal Charter was granted in 1926.[12]
In 1921 the college's first female professor, DameHelen Gwynne-Vaughan, began teachingbotany.[13] Other distinguished faculty in the years between the two world wars includedNikolaus Pevsner,J. D. Bernal andCyril Joad.[citation needed]
During theSecond World War Birkbeck was the only central University of London college not to be relocated outside the capital. In 1941 the college's library suffered a direct hit duringThe Blitz, but teaching continued. During the war the college organised lunch-time extramural lectures for the public, given by, among others, Joad, Pevsner andHarold Nicolson.[citation needed]
In 1952 the college moved to its present location in Malet Street.[11]
In 2002, the college was rebranded Birkbeck, University of London, althoughBirkbeck College, University of London remains its full legal name.[14] In 2003, following a major redevelopment, its building in Malet Street was reopened by the Chancellor of the University of London,The Princess Royal.[11]
In 2006, Birkbeck announced that it had been granted five million pounds by theHigher Education Funding Council for England to expand its provision into East London, working with theUniversity of East London.[15] The partnership, which was launched on 21 November 2006, is called Birkbeck Stratford.[16]
Birkbeck is the largest college of the University of London not to award its own degrees. Although it has held its own degree-awarding powers since 2012, Birkbeck has chosen to hold these in reserve, preferring to award University of London degrees.[17] It also offers manycontinuing education courses leading tocertificates anddiplomas,foundation degrees, and short courses.
In late October 2022, theUniversity and College Union published a press release in which it stated that Birkbeck was planning to significantly reduce its staff because of a multi-million-pound deficit, in a restructuring that could lead to compulsory redundancies. In the same release it was stated that the local UCU branch had passed a motion of no confidence in the senior leadership team.[18] Protests against possible job cuts took place at Birkbeck in November 2022.[19]
In 2022,Birkbeck, a history of the college, was published byOxford University Press to mark the 200th anniversary of its foundation.[20]
In 1876, the London Society for the Extension of University Education was founded with the aim of encouraging working people to undertake higher education. In 1903, it became the Department of Extra-Mural Studies of theUniversity of London, and in 1988, was integrated into Birkbeck, first as the Centre for Extramural Studies and then as the School of Continuing Education. In 2009, the Faculty of Lifelong Learning was incorporated into the main college structure.[21]
Birkbeck is principally located between Malet Street andWoburn Square inBloomsbury. The School of Arts, including the Department of English & Humanities, is housed inVirginia Woolf's former residence inGordon Square, Bloomsbury. (Other notable former residents of the house includeJohn Maynard Keynes,Vanessa Bell andLydia Lopokova.) The building includes the Birkbeck Cinema.[22] and the Peltz Gallery.[23]
Many Birkbeck classes are taught at other locations around Bloomsbury, not only because Birkbeck is committed towidening participation in higher education, but also because nearly all classes on any one day are taught at the same time, resulting in heavy competition for limited space.
Birkbeck expanded into East London[15] in November 2013.[24] TheStratford campus transferred to the adjacentUniversity of East London in July 2021.[25]
A building on Euston Road was refurbished byPenoyre & Prasad to be used by Birkbeck in 2021.[26][27][28]
In 2021 it was announced that Birkbeck would be leasingStudent Central. After refurbishment, the building reopened during the 2022-23 academic year.[29][26]
The college was previously organised into five schools comprising 19 departments, but was reorganised into three faculties comprising nine schools in 2023:
TheBirkbeck Institute for the Humanities (BIR)[30] was established in 2004, with the renowned but controversial Slovenian philosopherSlavoj Žižek appointed as International Director. According to its website, the Institute aims to "engage with important public issues of our time through a series of open debates, lectures, seminars and conferences" and to "foster and promote a climate of interdisciplinary research and collaboration among academics and researchers". The launch of the Institute was not without controversy, provoking an article inThe Observer titled "What have intellectuals ever done for the world?"[31] which criticised the ostensible irrelevance and elitism of contemporary public intellectuals. The current director of the institute isCostas Douzinas.[32]
2004 also saw Birkbeck enter into a research and teaching collaboration with theInstitute of Education, jointly founding theLondon Knowledge Lab. This interdisciplinary research institute brings together social scientists and computer scientists to address research questions about technology and learning.[33]
Meanwhile, theLondon Consortium, a graduate school that represents a collaboration between Birkbeck, theTate Galleries, theInstitute of Contemporary Arts, theArchitectural Association, and, until 1999, theBritish Film Institute, has been running since the mid-1990s, offering master's and doctoral degrees in interdisciplinary humanities and cultural studies. Its permanent and adjunct faculty has includedTom McCarthy,Colin MacCabe,Laura Mulvey,Steven Connor,Marina Warner,Juliet Mitchell,Stuart Hall, the lateRoger Scruton,Salman Rushdie,Tilda Swinton as well asSlavoj Žižek. Its current chair isAnthony Julius.
David Latchman, who became Master of the Birkbeck in 2003, forged closer relations between Birkbeck andUniversity College London (UCL). Joint research centres include the UCL/Birkbeck Institute for Earth and Planetary Sciences, UCL/Birkbeck/IoE Centre for Educational Neuroscience, the UCL/Birkbeck Institute of Structural and Molecular Biology, and the Birkbeck-UCL Centre for Neuroimaging.[citation needed]
Science research at Birkbeck has a notable tradition.David Bohm, who made notable contributions to the theory ofquantum mechanics, was Professor ofTheoretical Physics from 1961 to 1987, and other distinguished Birkbeck scientists includeAaron Klug in the Department ofcrystallography,Derek Barton in the Department of Chemistry, andRoger Penrose andDavid Bohm in the Department of Physics.Kathleen Booth wrote the first computer assembly language. Birkbeck is part of the Institute of Structural Molecular Biology, which includes the Bloomsbury Centre forStructural biology, established in 1998. This is a collaborative venture between Birkbeck and UCL, and is a leading academic centre for translating gene sequences and determiningprotein structure and function. It also includes the Bloomsbury Centre for Bioinformatics, a collaborative venture also between Birkbeck College and University College London for research intoBioinformatics,Genomics,Systems Biology,Grid computing andText mining.
Birkbeck was ranked 13th inThe Guardian's 2001Research Assessment Exercise and 26th in theTimes Higher Education's equivalent table. In the 2008 RAE results, Birkbeck ranked in the top 25% of UK multi-faculty Higher Education Institutions. The RAE rated the quality of research in a range of subjects at 159 Higher Education Institutions in the UK. Birkbeck submissions from Earth Sciences, Psychology, History, Classics and Archaeology and History of Art, Film and Visual Media were rated in the top five nationally. In REF2014, half of Birkbeck's submissions were rated in the top 20 nationally, and eight submissions received 100% ranking for Research Environment. 73% of Birkbeck's research was rated "world-leading" (4*) or "internationally excellent" (3*).[34] In the 2021 REF exercise, Birkbeck performed very well throughout, with notable success in English Language & Literature,[35] where Birkbeck was second nationally, and Art and Design,[36] where Birkbeck was fourth nationally.
| National rankings | |
|---|---|
| Complete (2026)[37] | N/A |
| Guardian (2026)[38] | N/A |
| Times / Sunday Times (2026)[39] | N/A |
| Global rankings | |
| ARWU (2025)[40] | 801–900 |
| QS (2026)[41] | 388= |
| THE (2026)[42] | 301–350 |
Birkbeck's Centre for Brain Function and Development was awarded TheQueen's Anniversary Prize for its brain research in 2005. In 2010, Birkbeck was shortlisted for theTimes Higher Education University of the Year Award.[43]
In 2021 theTimes Higher Education World University Rankings ranked Birkbeck 95th in the world for Psychology. The university is consistently ranked in the top 100 in the world byQS World University Rankings for English Language & Literature and Philosophy.[44] Internationally, Birkbeck was ranked within the top 400 universities in the world by theTimes Higher Education World University Rankings 2020 andQS World University Rankings 2020.
In 2018 Birkbeck announced that it would withdraw from UK university rankings because their methodologies unfairly penalise it, since "despite having highly rated teaching and research, other factors caused by its unique teaching model and unrelated to its performance push it significantly down the ratings".[45]
TheBirkbeck Students' Union (BBKSU) was founded in 1904 and was one of the founding members of theNational Union of Students.[46]
Initially governed by a Council, elected from and responsible to the students, today it is governed jointly by a Student Council, Executive Committee and Board of Trustees.[47][48]
Students initially paid an annual membership fee to join, but students are now automatically registered as members when they enrol onto a course at the college.
Birkbeck Students' Union offers a number of student groups for students, as well as a various sports clubs that compete in the LUSL. It also provides student representation, support and advice services, as well as volunteer and employment opportunities.
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