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University just keeps on growing!

09 October 2007

 

The footprint of the University of Teesside is spreading further across Middlesbrough with the opening of several new developments for the bulging student population.

One of the most impressive is the Athena Centre for Creative Technologies on the corner of Southfield Road and Woodlands Road.

The £10m new building, on the site of the former YMCA, will be shared by over 1,000 undergraduates studying Art, Design, Media and Computing and encourage collaboration across different academic disciplines.

Exciting new courses are in the pipeline to combine the University’s academic strengths in areas like digital media with computer games and animation now that many of these students are studying under the same roof.

Among the first to benefit are BA (Hons) Multimedia Journalism Professional Practice students who have their own high-tech multimedia convergent news rooms. This will enable them to learn traditional journalistic skills alongside audio and video editing using an editorial system networked to the Evening Gazette’s.

The course content has been developed in co-operation with the Gazette which has won several national awards for its Gazettelive.co.uk website and the new degree is accredited by the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) and approved by Trinity Mirror, Britain's biggest regional newspaper publisher.

Joanne Butcher, Chief Executive of the NCTJ, was ‘hugely impressed’ when she visited the University, saying: ‘It is a very innovative course and has strong links with local employers. There is a real genuine understanding about how the media industry is changing and how this impacts on journalism skills.’

Also impressed is Emma Walton, 18, a former student of Prior Pursglove College, Guisborough. She is one of 12 students on the first year and said: ‘I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to study computing or journalism, but now I can do both.’

Journalism and other students from the School of Arts & Media will also benefit from other new developments on the expanding campus, including the University’s acquisition of part of the Evening Gazette offices on Borough Road.

Now known as the Cook Building after Captain James Cook, the interior in the University half has been transformed with workshops for wood, metal, plaster, resin and glass on the lower floors and the first and second floors having two large customised design studios and an IT suite for computer-aided design. A smaller convergent newsroom will enable the University to run professional training courses for journalists.

The fourth floor and terraced area will be occupied by the Drawing Centre for Fine Art which relocated from Cleveland College of Art & Design to join the University this year.

And that’s not all! For the oldest building on campus – the original Constantine Building facing Borough Road - has also undergone a transformation inside to provide more studios for the Fine Art students.

Professor Gerda Roper, Dean of the School of Arts & Media, said: ‘We’re delighted the University is making such a large scale investment in art, design and media. The new facilities will enable us to diversify our provision while providing our students with a more interactive creative environment. Coupled with the expertise of our staff, we will be offering one of the best teaching environments in the country.’

The investment comes hot on the heels of the University of Teesside securing one of the best ratings for its art and design courses in the annual student satisfaction National Student Survey. It gained a top four position in the country and the best score in the North East for art and design.

Meanwhile developments are moving apace as the School of Computing transfers its main provision in important niche areas such as computer games design and animation into the Athena Building and looks forward to some of its researchers and postgraduate students relocating to the adjoining Phoenix Building which is opening later this autumn.

Dr Derek Simpson, Dean of the School of Computing, said: ‘We’re looking forward to co-operating with other schools across the University on innovative developments such as web journalism, digital music and film production.

‘The new buildings will help us to take another step forward and build on Teesside’s excellent reputation for being at the leading edge of digital developments and open up new possibilities of collaboration on both undergraduate and postgraduate provision across a range of disciplines.’

His colleague, Dr Matthew Holton, who helped pioneer and build Teesside’s reputation as a leading university for computer graphical applications said: ‘The great thing about the Athena Centre for Creative Technologies is the lay-out. Life drawing and the wet room for clay modeling are right next to the motion capture facility. This is the ideal arrangement as animators need to develop their artistic skills and often use clay models to create their weird and wonderful creatures such as in the case of Walking with Dinosaurs.

So, as the University looks forward to next opening the Institute of Digital Innovation and the Phoenix Building, the campus is buzzing with young creative minds who will help to build the DigitalCity of the future right here in the Tees Valley.


 
 
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