UCF improves student satisfaction
Friday, 18 September 2009
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In the Sunday Times University Guide 2009 published last weekend, University College Falmouth (UCF) ranked 47th out of 123 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) across the country for student satisfaction.
Ahead of most of the UK's new universities, Falmouth is still one of very few specialist institutions to gain entry into the guide. The full listing is available on: http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/stug/universityguide.php
To compile the guide, the Sunday Times takes into account a number of factors voted by teachers and students which include: teaching excellence, research quality, student/staff ratio and student satisfaction figures. These figures are gained from the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) 2008, the Higher Education Statistics Agency and recently published 2008 National Student Survey (NSS). Falmouth significantly improved its performance across the board in this year's NSS results, and outperformed the national average in four out of seven areas - assessment and feedback, academic support, learning resources and personal development - whilst the remaining three areas improved significantly in comparison to the previous year's survey.
University College Falmouth entered the Sunday Times University Guide for the first time last year and the results from this year's guide show a favourable staff to student ratio in comparison with its closest competitors, offering students more one-to-one time with academic staff.
In line with other specialist art institutions, Falmouth's graduates appear to attract the lowest graduate salaries with a decreased number of graduates entering graduate level employment. However, with Falmouth's focus on preparing graduates for the creative industries and embedding entrepreneurialism into the curriculum, many graduates establish their own successful enterprises or win commissions, contracts and lead projects in the fields of art, design, media and performance.
University College Falmouth is the only independent Higher Education institution in Cornwall with the powers to award degrees in its own name. It has two campuses in Cornwall - at Woodlane in Falmouth and Tremough in Penryn (which it owns, and jointly manages with the University of Exeter) - and a third campus at Totnes in Devon, following its merger with Dartington College of Arts in 2008.
This merger created a new institution focusing on the expansion of Falmouth's expertise in Art, Design and Media and Dartington's expertise in Choreography, Music, Theatre, Art and Writing. The Devon-based courses will relocate to a new, high-specification Performance Centre at Tremough in 2010, paving the way for a new specialist Arts University in Cornwall by 2012/2013 that will be unique to the South West.
The College is a founding partner in the Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC), a unique initiative to promote regional economic regeneration through Higher Education, funded mainly by the European Union (Objective One), the South West Regional Development Agency, and the Higher Education Funding Council for England, with support from Cornwall Council.
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For further information about University College Falmouth, please contact Jilly Easterby MCIPR, Head of Public Affairs, Telephone: 01326 213792, or email: jilly.easterby@falmouth.ac.uk
Media relations contact
Sally Grint - Communications & PR
Manager
University College Falmouth, Woodlane, Falmouth, Cornwall TR11 4RH
Tel: 01326 255854
Mobile: 07780 565552
Email: sally.grint@falmouth.ac.uk
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