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Contributors
The Converge Challenge is joint initiative funded by the following organisations.
Scottish Funding Council
The Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council, more commonly known as the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), is the public body that distributes funding from the Scottish Government to the country's colleges and universities. It was set up by the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Act 2005, when the Scottish Further Education Funding Council and the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council merged. The Council’s main role is to distribute funding to colleges and universities in Scotland.
Royal Society of Edinburgh
The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity, operating on a wholly independent and non-party-political basis and providing public benefit throughout Scotland. Established in 1783, it has since then drawn upon the strengths and expertise of its Fellows, of which there are currently more than 1500.
The Society covers a broader selection of fields than the Royal Society of London including literature and history. Unlike similar organisations in the rest of the UK, the Fellowship includes people from a wide range of disciplines - science & technology, arts, humanities, medicine, social science, business and public service. This breadth of expertise makes the Royal Society of Edinburgh unique in the UK.
University of Aberdeen
The University of Aberdeen is an ancient university founded in 1495 making it Scotland's third-oldest university and fifth-oldest in the English-speaking world.
The University has approximately 13,500 students from undergraduate to doctoral level, including many international students. There are also large numbers of Masters and PhD students. In addition, the university's Centre for Lifelong Learning acts as an extension college, offering higher education courses to the local community even for those without the usual qualifications for admission to degree-level study. A full range of disciplines are offered, including the liberal arts, science, social sciences, psychology, mathematics, engineering, law, medicine, education, computing science, music, divinity, theology and religious studies. In 2012, the university offered over 650 undergraduate degree programmes.
University of Dundee
Founded in 1881 the University of Dundee was, for most of its early existence, a constituent college of the University of St Andrews alongside United College and St Mary's College located in the town of St Andrews itself. Following significant expansion, the University of Dundee became an independent body in 1967 whilst retaining much of its ancient heritage and governance structure. Since its independence, the university has grown to become an internationally recognised centre for research.
Dundee has developed a significant reputation for students entering the traditional professions most notably law, medicine and dentistry as well as emerging areas such as life sciences and art.
University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, receives approximately 47,000 applications every year, making it the third most popular university in the UK by volume of applicants.
The university played an important role in leading Edinburgh to its reputation as a chief intellectual centre during the Age of Enlightenment, and helped give the city the nickname of the Athens of the north.
University of Glasgow
The University of Glasgow was founded in 1451 and is often ranked in the world's top 100 universities in tables compiled by various bodies.
Glasgow has departments of Law, Medicine, Veterinary Medicine, and Dentistry, a provision unique amongst universities in Scotland. Its submission to the most recent UK university research assessment was thus the broadest in Scotland, and one of the broadest in the UK.
Heriot-Watt University
Heriot-Watt University was established in 1821 as the world's first mechanics' institute. One of the oldest higher education institutions in the United Kingdom, it has been a university by Royal Charter since 1966. It has branch campuses in the Scottish Borders, Orkney, Dubai, and Putrajaya in Malaysia.
University of St. Andrews
The University of St Andrews is the oldest university in Scotland and the third oldest in the English-speaking world. It was founded between 1410 and 1413, when a Papal Bull was issued by the Avignon Antipope Benedict XIII to a school of higher learning formed by a small group of Augustinian clergy.
St Andrews has a diverse student body with over 30% of its intake consisting of international students from well over 100 countries, and with 15% of the student body coming from North America.
University of Stirling
The University of Stirling is a campus university founded by Royal charter in 1967.
As well as the main campus in Stirling, the University also has campuses in Inverness and Stornoway which specialise in Nursing and Midwifery. The Highland site is on the outskirts of Inverness and within the grounds of Raigmore Hospital. The site has purpose-built teaching facilities and student accommodation, recently benefiting from its relocation to the new Centre for Health Science, officially opened in January 2007.
University of Strathclyde
The University of Strathclyde was named UK University of the Year in the 2012 Times Higher Education Awards. In particular, the University earned praise for its close links with business and industry, and commitment to making an impact on the global economy. The University’s long-standing commitment to and support of the formation of spin-out companies is a significant contributor towards making this impact.
The next stage in the University’s development will see the launch of the Technology and Innovation Centre, revolutionising the way researchers in academia and industry collaborate and innovate together. Up to 1200 researchers, engineers and project managers from academia and industry will work side-by-side in a state of the art building in the heart of Glasgow.
The University of Strathclyde has formed over 50 spin-out companies, of which around 40 are still trading in some form, making sales of approximately £80m per annum and employing around 700 people. Strathclyde spin-outs include winners of the Queen’s Award for Enterprise and the Converge Challenge. Strathclyde was ranked 2nd in Scotland and 7th in the UK in terms of spin-out formation between 2001 and 2011. See here for more details.