About us

Location	Derby, United Kingdom	Funding Type	Public
No of Students	34000	Establishment	University
Founded In	1992	Estimated Cost of Living	9207 GBP
Address	Kedleston Rd, Derby DE22 1GB, United Kingdom

We are a University of first choice for students who want a caring, aspirational environment where they can equip themselves for the career they choose.

With our reputation for industry-relevant degree programmes, we offer you, our students, unparalleled opportunities to gain professional work experience alongside your studies. That’s why we’ve invested £200 million over the past ten years in some of the best university facilities you’ll find in the UK to ensure you get the hands-on practical skills and experience employers are looking for.

We are part of a thriving multicultural region that is renowned for technology and innovation, and is home to a wide range of industries, with many global companies based here, including Rolls-Royce, Toyota and Bombardier. It’s an exciting place to learn and experience university life, providing you with many opportunities to gain real world experience through placements and internships.

The University of Derby has continued to extend its global reach over the past 12 months, forging exciting new partnerships with universities and colleges overseas and attracting students from around the world to study here.

That strategy is paying dividends with an increase in our international student population, who are also benefitting from the first class support that the University provides to help them feel at home in Derby.

The creation of opportunities to work with fellow academics around the world is hugely important to our teaching and research staff.

Over the years, we have cultivated a number of international partnerships with institutions in Europe, Asia, and Africa, which now deliver University of Derby-accredited programmes.

We have continued to expand our network of collaborations throughout a year in which Jiangxi University of Technology (JXUT), in China, and Domain Academy, in Malta, enrolled their first University of Derby students.

The agreement with JXUT will see its students progress to the University of Derby to Level 6 for their final year, while the Domain Academy will deliver a Derby-accredited MBA course.

A strategic alliance with Botswana Accountancy College will create exchange and research collaboration opportunities, while the University is also applying through the Chinese Ministry of Education to work with Shenyang University of Technology in China to provide a joint computer science programme.

A new progression agreement has been developed with Pearl Academy in India, one of the country’s leading design, fashion, business and media institutes. Under the terms of the agreement, the Academy’s students will progress to study BA Media Production, BA Interior Design and BA Fashion Design at Derby.

The University also signed a friendship agreement with Beihai College of Art and Design, in Guangxi, China, which will pave the way for collaboration opportunities in future. A delegation from the College visited Derby early in 2019.

The Hague Network, a collaboration of seven European universities, met in Derby in March 2019 to discuss potential initiatives, with a number of University of Derby students spending time on exchange with Hague University of Applied Sciences.

The opportunities have not just been limited to our Derby Campus sites, however. In Buxton, our Centre for Contemporary Hospitality and Tourism (CCHT) delivered a two-week winter school in January 2019 to 20 students of the Beijing Hospitality Institute, prompting a number of confirmed applications for CCHT programmes beginning in September 2019.

And the University was represented at the SPARK Higher Education Conference in Hong Kong, helping to open doors to more potential business and academic partnership opportunities.

Professor Judith Lamie said: “Working collaboratively with leading institutions in countries such as China is a key element of our international strategy, positioning the University of Derby on a wider global stage and providing a range of opportunities for our students to study, work or volunteer overseas.”

The University’s national and international profile has risen during the past academic year, boosted in part by climbing a number of key higher education league tables.

This has prompted an increase in applications from China and India in particular, as well as from a number of European Union countries, in spite of the uncertainty surrounding the UK’s withdrawal from the union.We were very pleased to see the number of students from China and India who have enrolled at Derby double during 2018/19, compared with the previous year.

Our Chinese student community is expected to grow again in 2019/20 to more than 200.The launch of a Derby English Language Centre in China has contributed to an increase in applications from Chinese students to our College of Business, Law and Social Sciences, while our English language summer schools in Derby have attracted more than 133 students from China.

We have also been very encouraged to see that applications from students from a number of EU member states, including Spain, Portugal, the Czech Republic and Lithuania, have increased.

The wellbeing of all of our students is paramount, and it is particularly important that those who come to us from overseas have the best support they could wish for to help them settle in to life in the UK. Therefore, we were delighted that the University’s

International Student Centre was rated Number 1 in the UK in the International Student Barometer Survey, which measures overseas students’ experiences of higher education in the UK.

The opportunity for the chance for our UK students to study or take up work placements abroad is also invaluable, and our Student Experience Framework has a commitment to “broaden your world view and expand your global thinking”.

As part of this commitment, the University is looking to promote student mobility, including longer-term study abroad and opportunities through the Erasmus scheme, to all students.