In memory of Bill Greig

The founding father of Computer Science at the University of Teesside is to be honoured by the renaming of the Computer and Mathematical Sciences Building on the campus as The Greig Building on Wednesday 14 November, 2001.

There will be a photo-call prior to the formal ceremony. The photo-call will take place in front of the building, which is on the corner of Southfield Road and Woodlands Road, Middlesbrough between 1.30pm and 1.55pm on 14 November. This will be followed by the formal ceremony in the Europa Building/University Cinema at 2pm.

Past and present members of the Computing and Mathematics departments at the University - and its predecessors, Teesside Polytechnic and Constantine College, have been invited together with Bill’s family.

Bill, who lived in Cotherstone, near Barnard Castle until his death in 2001, was presented with an honorary degree of Doctor of Science by the University in 1993. He joined what was then Constantine College in 1956. He was Head of Department of Mathematics and Computing and one of the architects of developments in higher education for several decades, including launching Teesside’s first degree in Computer Science in 1966, and was largely responsible for Teesside’s excellent reputation for Computing from the 1960s onwards.

Professor Jim Yip, Director of the School of Computing and Mathematics, said: “Bill played such a significant part in the development of computing into a leading academic discipline, both at Teesside and nationally, that we thought it appropriate to name one of our main buildings on the campus after him.

“When Bill launched what was one of the first Computer Science degrees in the 1960s, the academic discipline was very new. But the foundations he laid were so strong that Teesside now has one of the largest Schools of Computing and Mathematics in the country. Nearly 4,000 people are currently studying Computing at the university today. We, Bill’s successors, are really standing on the shoulder of a giant.”

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