Poppleton University

Poppleton University (founded ca.1979) is a British fictional university and formerly a polytechnic. When the government abolished polytechnics in the 1990s, Poppleton applied for and was eventually awarded university status with power to award its own degrees.

Location

Poppleton is believed to be in Yorkshire, probably the South Riding.

Ethos

Poppleton's role in life is largely to allow academics to let off steam. Regular reports apparently emanating from PU can be found throughout the internet. A column reporting events and current topics of interest appear weekly in the Times Higher Education magazine. The column, referred to as "like Nelson’s, one of the truly great columns" by author Malcolm Bradbury, and "suavely mischievous" by The Independent - satirically charts various situations at the imaginary university and is light relief from some of the more tedious, technical and academic reports in the THE.

Scenarios

• Snobbery shown by the established British universities to the cynically named "former polytechnics" an example being''

  Our Vice-Chancellor has reacted angrily to the revelation in The Sunday Times that John Denham, the Universities Secretary, is about to ask former polytechnics to revert to their previous role rather than continue with their attempt to "ape leading academic institutions". "This would be a dangerously retrograde step," he told a hastily convened press conference. "Is the minister seriously suggesting that this great university should go back to the bad old days when we were merely Poppleton Polytechnic? Back to the bad old days when there was an inadequate library, hopelessly dilapidated buildings, low-morale staff and little or no funded research? Back to the bad old days when our present SCRs were only staff rooms? Back to the days of grubby degrees in plumbing rather than our pioneering new degrees in Aromatherapy and Surfing Studies? Back to the days when we lacked our present heraldic logo, when there was no Latin used in our degree ceremonies"

  '' ...and although this is a fictional account there are real examples of use by government and academics.

• Mergers with lesser institutions verging on the ridiculous, such as plan to create the UK's first "Dancing University" by merging the University of Poppleton with the town's celebrated Gwen Holland School of Dance. These tend to "fall apart" after months of negotiation.

• Academic departments single-handedly run by secretaries taking over from incompetent academics, which may happen in real life

• Sub-standard academic courses, for example in web design

• Plausible internal reviews of doubtful courses

• Dubious academic awards

• Bureaucracy applied to trivia - in this case sickness leave

See also

• Porterhouse College