ChemEng studentship growth continues

UCAS data for the 2015 student intakes show a 16.7% increase of applications, and a 5.6% increase of accepted students to UK university chemical, process and energy engineering courses.

Although the increase in acceptances is not as steep as the 26.2% peak in 2012, the 5.6% growth is still in line with the 16.7% rise in applications, showing that demand remains strong.

The number of female chemical engineering students has increased from 25% in 2014 to 27% in 2015, showing continual growth each year. This year has also seen a rise in female undergraduate students in all engineering disciplines.

Andy Furlong, IChemE director of communications said, “The discipline has never been in better shape at undergraduate level. The intake has reached a record level and we now have more than 10,000 students at various stages in their chemical engineering education in the UK. We are the fastest-growing engineering discipline by some margin.”

To cope with the increasing demand of chemical engineering, new departments have opened at Chester, Huddersfield, Hull, Lancaster and Wolverhampton universities.

Engineering courses continue to grow, with a net growth of applications of 6.3% and 7.2% increases of acceptances for all engineering subjects.