Newport and Glamorgan announce senior leadership for new University
November 22, 2012
Two South Wales universities are continuing to make swift progress towards the creation of a new 'beacon’ institution next year. The University of Glamorgan and the University of Wales, Newport announced ambitious plans to come together to create a new institution that will rival Cardiff University in terms of size and provide the scale to realise additional benefits for students, staff and the local economy whilst also developing a global profile.
Now, following a Due Diligence exercise which involved financial and legal analysis of both universities which revealed there were no barriers that could delay the process, further details about the leadership and governance of the new institution have been announced.
The current Chair of Governors at Newport, Andrew Wilkinson, is expected to take up the Chair of the new institution’s Board of Governors in July 2013 once the merger process is complete. The Vice-Chancellor of the new institution will be Professor Julie Lydon, the current Vice-Chancellor and Chief Executive of the University of Glamorgan Group.
Julie Lydon said: “Our two universities have set in train a plan to create a new and exciting institution for South Wales. While both institutions have strong histories in the communities of South Wales, together we will be stronger than the sum of our parts and have an opportunity to enhance significantly the educational and training landscape of South East Wales for the benefit of its people, communities and businesses.”
Meanwhile, independent research to analyse options for a new name for the University is almost complete with an announcement expected next month.
NOTES TO EDITORS
- The Due Diligence exercise involved each University appointing legal and financial experts to examine the other institution to identify issues that may affect the forward sustainability of the new university. Both exercises found no “show stoppers” to delay the process.
- Independent market research company, Beaufort Research is currently in the process of completing an exercise to identify a name for the new University. This has involved extensive surveying of students, prospective students, staff and stakeholders of the two universities from Wales, the rest of the UK and abroad. It is expected that a further announcement on this will be made before Christmas.
- It is hoped that the process to create the new university could be completed by Spring 2013. At that point, work will begin to integrate the work of the two universities.
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