Scotland's Rural College

Overview

Scotland's Rural College

Scotland's Rural College (SRUC) is a private research university located in Scotland, United Kingdom. It was established in 2012 through the merger of the Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) with Barony, Elmwood, and Oatridge Colleges. The university is recognized for its contributions in the fields of agriculture and life sciences.

Scotland's Rural College Key Statistics

SRUC is composed of six campuses. It has three faculty hubs in North, Central, and South West Scotland. Specialist subject areas include biological sciences, forestry and engineering, animal and equine, horticulture and landscaping, and agriculture.

The undergraduate and graduate degree programs at Scotland’s Rural College are grouped into six main departments: sports and tourism, environment and countryside, agriculture and business management, engineering, animal and equine, science and technology, and horticulture and landscape.

There are 5,000 students enrolled across six campuses and a total of 1,300 staff all over the U.K. The Aberdeen campus is located in Craibstone Estate while the Ayr campus is shared with the University of the West of Scotland students. The Barony campus can be found in Dumfries and Galloway. The King’s Buildings campus is based on the south side of Edinburgh. SRUC’s Elmwood campus is located in Cupar. Lastly, its Oatridge campus is set on a large estate in West Lothian.

SRUC facilities include a rural policy center, which focuses on research and knowledge exchange work in rural policy and dairy research and innovation center, which focuses on the development, implementation, and giving out of information for sustainable breeding and management systems for dairy cows.

Due to its close proximity and links with Edinburgh University, sports facilities of all campuses are run by the Edinburgh Students’ Union (EUSA). Facilities include the Centre for Sports Exercise (CSE) and playing fields.

Other Scotland's Rural College key statistics worth mentioning are its notable alumni, which include Alex Ferguson, presiding officer of the Scottish Parliament, and Roisin McLaren, spokesperson of the Socialist party.

Scotland's Rural College Research

The institution’s researchers work locally and internationally to address some of the world’s important challenges. SRUC’s top three fields of research are biology, environmental science, and agriculture.

Their research works have been featured in major scholarly conferences such as BIBM: Bioinformatics and Biomedicine, ICIC: International Conference on Intelligent Computing, and RA: Robotics and Applications.

The most cited articles from SRUC include Dobbie et al.'s (1999) “Nitrous oxide emissions from intensive agricultural systems: Variations between crops and seasons, key driving variables, and mean emission factors,” published in the Journal of Geophysical Research with 953 citations, “Improving intercropping: a synthesis of research in agronomy, plant physiology and ecology” by Brooker et al. (2015) published in the New Phytologist, which received 581 citations, and “Controlling crop diseases using induced resistance: challenges for the future” by Walters et al.'s (2013) was published in the Journal of Experimental Botany and received 512 citations.

Scotland's Rural College research consulting division, SAC consulting, works with over 12,000 clients in both rural and associated industries. It has 26 offices based in Scotland and in the north of England, and eight veterinary surveillance centers. SRUC’s research division has six research centers, as well as eight farms for research and educational purposes.