UHI Millennium Institute

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UHI Millennium Institute


Motto:	Foghlam aig ìre Oilthigh air a' Ghaidhealtachd is anns na h-Eileanan University-level study in the Highlands and Islands
Established:	1992
Type:	federal, public
Rector:	Dr Val MacIver
Principal:	Professor Robert Cormack^[1]
Students:	5,220^[2]
Location:	Inverness (Executive Office), Scotland
Website:	http://www.uhi.ac.uk/

The UHI Millennium Institute is a federation of 15 colleges and research institutions in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland delivering higher education. It is incorporated as a charity and limited company and its Executive Office is in the city of Inverness, capital of the Scottish Highlands.

In April 2001 the Scottish Parliament awarded UHI Higher Education Institute status, and it now provides university level courses. UHI degrees are authenticated by the Open University Validation Service, the University of Strathclyde and the University of Aberdeen; Higher National Certificate and Higher National Diploma courses are awarded by the Scottish Qualifications Authority.

It is hoped that within the next few years the body will be able to validate its own degree courses as a University of the Highlands and Islands. This is alluded to in "UHI" but remains unofficial until the Institute gets Privy Council-approved university status.

The UHI logo in Gaelic

UHI has a number of distinctive undergraduate, Masters and research programmes. All use the Highlands and Islands as the starting point to look to the wider world and most can be studied at a range of locations across the area.

In the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, courses such as MSc Interpretation: Management and Practice,^[3] BA (Hons) Child & Youth Studies, ^[4] BA (Hons) Gaelic & Related Studies, ^[5], BA (Hons) Theological Studies ^[6], BA (Hons) Scottish History ^[7] and BA (Hons) Culture Studies ^[8] all reflect the distinctive nature of the region, its past, present and future. This last course, BA (Hons) Culture Studies is a groundbreaking interdisciplinary programme which has been internationally recognised by receiving the 2005 Times Higher Education Supplement Award for Most Imaginative Use of Distance Learning.

UHI Millennium Institute Executive Office

The Faculty of Business and Leisure offers distinctive programmes in Golf Management^[9] - Scotland's only degree of this kind - Outdoor Adventure Management^[10] - using Lochaber, the UK's Outdoor Capital as a living research laboratory - as well as popular courses in Business, Accounting, Hospitality, Computing, Sports Coaching and Tourism.

The Faculty of Science has a strong research dimension with high-quality work in Renewables, Marine Science, Sustainable Rural Development and Environmental Issues. A fully online Honours degree programme is available across the UK from this faculty. The BSc(Hons) Sustainable Rural Development ^[11] is an example of a multi-disciplinary programme from this Faculty and due to its flexible delivery options is popular with practitioners and adult returners to education.The programme has professional accreditation from the Institution of Economic Development. The Faculty of Science also offers postgraduate studies too. For example the MSc in Managing Sustainable Development^[12] is a popular online option available across the UK. This Masters programme also has professional accreditation from the Institution of Economic Development.

Through its Faculty of Health, UHI has strong links with the new Centre for Health Sciences located behind Raigmore Hospital. This is being funded by Highlands and Islands Enterprise, the Scottish Executive and Johnson and Johnson. Phase I of this opened in early 2007, phase II is under construction and phase III has been funded. The University of Stirling is moving its operations from Raigmore Hospital to the CHS.