University of the Arts London's ground breaking new CCW Graduate School launches today. CCW Graduate School is based across three Colleges - Camberwell College of Arts, Chelsea College of Art and Design and Wimbledon College of Art - and will offer a radical new model of innovative learning, bringing teaching and research closer together.

Chris Wainwright, Head of Colleges, CCW says ‘This is an immensely exciting time for our postgraduate students and presents a unique opportunity to work together with like minded artists and designers from across the art Colleges of Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon. The Graduate School will play a vital role in the development of the next generation of world leading artists, designers and creative arts academics and researchers.’

Read the full press release below

Ground-breaking graduate school to open at University of the Arts London’s Colleges Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon (CCW)

New model will integrate teaching and research 9 September 2009

A pioneering art and design graduate school, which will bring teaching and research closer together, will be launched on 16 September 2009. Based across three of the University’s colleges – Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon – the CCW Graduate School will offer a radical new model of innovative learning.

The Graduate School’s unique structure will dissolve the divide between taught postgraduate courses and research degrees. For the first time at the University, world leading research staff will play an active role in postgraduate learning, their work forming a crucial part of the student experience.

Encouraging its 450 plus post graduate and research students to collaborate with staff across discipline and College boundaries, the Graduate School will create unparalleled opportunities for cutting edge research and teaching. This will be facilitated by the introduction of overarching themes that will create a common thread through all postgraduate study. These themes will act as a catalyst for debate, focusing on the key issues of Climate Change, Identities and Technologies.

The Graduate School has been developed in response to calls from the arts education sector to grow art and design research and PhD provision. It will be the UK’s first new specialist art and design graduate school for more than a century, and aims to fill a gap in the sector identified by the UK Council for Graduate Education in their publication, A Review of Graduate Schools in the UK (2004).

The CCW Graduate School, University of the Arts London, will offer:

• The largest range of postgraduate courses within the art and design sector, from fine art and design to theatre and communications

• An annual three day Graduate School Festival to explore and debate study themes and research. This year’s Festival will run from 28 – 30 October 2009

• Regular symposiums for taught and research students, creating opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration

• A virtual postgraduate network including wiki boards, open net technology and video and audio facilities

Chris Wainwright, Head of Colleges, CCW, University of the Arts London says ‘This is an immensely exciting time for our postgraduate students and presents a unique opportunity to work together with like minded artists and designers from across the art Colleges of Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon. The Graduate School will play a vital role in the development of the next generation of world leading artists, designers and creative arts academics and researchers.’

Oriana Baddeley, Director of Research, CCW Graduate School, University of the Arts London says ‘Through the combined work of the many talented and dedicated researchers within Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon Colleges, we are able to offer an exciting and rigorous experience to our students and staff alike. Working together across discipline boundaries, our research communities will identify and address some of the most important social, political, economic and cultural agendas of our times.’ Linda Drew, Dean of the CCW Graduate School, University of the Arts London says ‘When developing University of the Arts London’s CCW Graduate School we wanted to instigate a new way of linking research and teaching. It is very exciting that with this new model, we could see a textiles student collaborating with a book arts fellow, on a project exploring sustainability.’

‘Our aim is to turn postgraduate provision at the University inside out, bringing students together with internationally renowned research staff, and through this, create the brightest art and design graduate school in the world’