UCL and IoE confirm merger date

The merger, which will create London’s largest university with about 35,000 students between the two Bloomsbury institutions, was finalised on 25 November after it was approved by the IoE’s council.

The council officially agreed to rescind the institute’s charter, granted in 1987, with effect from 2 December.

Under the new arrangements, the IoE will become a faculty of UCL and will be known as the UCL Institute of Education.

It will remain at its current premises and both institutions have confirmed there will be no redundancies at either institution as a result of the merger.

Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, welcomed the move, saying it would help the capital to “attract the brightest students from around the world” and “further reinforce London’s status as a global leader in higher education”.

Michael Arthur, UCL president and provost, called the merger “one of the most significant events in UCL’s history”.

“The driver behind this proposal is academic, prompted by the sense that the world-leading research undertaken by the IoE was highly complementary to many areas of work undertaken by UCL,” said Professor Arthur.

“There is genuine excitement within both institutions as we believe this planned merger will deliver significant advances in the fields of social science and education, whilst further advancing the work both universities undertake to develop education across London.”

Following the merger, UCL will become the UK’s largest postgraduate institution in the UK, with 19,000 postgraduate students. It will also have more than 11,000 staff and a combined income of more than £1 billion.

Chris Husbands, director of the UCL Institute of Education, said the merger will “help to secure the IoE’s lasting influence and mission”.

It would also offer the IoE “huge prizes”, such as the “opportunity to extend global influence, to work with our traditional stakeholders in schools and colleges in new and more imaginative ways, and the chance to build cross-disciplinary work across the full range of higher education”, he added.

jack.grove@tesglobal.com