Marlborough court
The University of Bath is a campus university located in Bath, United Kingdom. It received its Royal Charter in 1966. According to The Sunday Times University Guide, Bath is ranked as the 3rd best University in the United Kingdom behind only Cambridge and Oxford. Bath was also awarded the title of ‘University of the Year 2011/12’. In the latest Research Assessment Exercise released in December 2008, two thirds of Bath's individual subject submissions are ranked in the top ten nationally, including over a third in the top five.The university is a member of the Association of Commonwealth Universities, the Association of MBAs, the European Quality Improvement System, the European University Association, and Universities UK. Until 30 October 2012, it was also a member of the 1994 Group.HistoryThe University of Bath can trace its roots to a technical school established in Bristol 100 years earlier, the Bristol Trade School of 1856. In 1885 the school became part of the Society of Merchant Venturers and was renamed the Merchant Venturers' Technical College (whose alumni include the physicists Paul Dirac and Peter Higgs), an institution founded as a school in 1595. Meanwhile, in the neighbouring city of Bath, a pharmaceutical school, the Bath School of Pharmacy, was founded in 1907. This became part of the Technical College in 1929.
