City joins together to celebrate University's 50th anniversary

The celebrations are an opportunity for contributions to be made to the University's time capsule.

The Lord Mayor will host a reception at the City Hall on Wednesday 12 October at which Chief Executive, Kersten England, will present an item for the time capsule on behalf of the city. There will be displays of artwork by children from Killinghall Primary School on the theme of education. In addition, Bradford schools have been taking part in a creative writing competition for pupils to describe a day in their lives in 25 years' time, and the winners will be announced at the reception.

The winners' entries will be among the items placed in the 50^th anniversary time capsule, which will be officially sealed at a special event at the University on Tuesday 18 October, the 50^th anniversary of the University receiving its charter. The event will also include the cutting of a special anniversary cake.

The event follows the opening of a 25^th anniversary time capsule earlier this year, which contained items such as a pipe which belonged to former Prime Minister and first Chancellor of the University, Harold Wilson, and a tie belonging to industrialist and later Chancellor, Sir John Harvey Jones.

Staff and students have been submitting ideas for items to go into the 50^th anniversary capsule and the final selection, along with items from the 25^th anniversary capsule, will be sealed and locked away.

University Vice-Chancellor, Professor Brian Cantor, said: “2016 has been a successful year for the University and one that we will look back on with great pride and satisfaction. We have continued to climb in many league tables, reflecting the high quality of our courses and our teaching, our world-leading research continues to generate global headlines, we received a Queen’s Anniversary Prize for our pioneering work on dementia, we have installed a new Chancellor, and we recently hosted the the first World Technology Universities Congress.

“We have, within 50 years, established Bradford as one of the leading technology universities. In that time, we have sent out 125,000 alumni, forces for good, who are making a difference to the world at all levels: helping to bring peace and stability to many countries; developing treatments and cures for ill health and disease; and solving problems of science and engineering to deliver wealth-creating companies. This is a great achievement of which we are immensely proud and we will continue to develop the University of Bradford as one of the UK’s, and the world’s, great centres of learning and research.”