[HDNG]INTRODUCTION:[EHDNG][PARA][BULL] Formerly Manchester Polytechnic[EBOLD][PARA][BOLD]For general information about Manchester: [EBOLD]see [ULNE]University of [PARA]Manchester[EULNE]. Less than a mile from the city centre, and right next[PARA]door to both Manchester University and UMIST in the biggest [PARA]educational complex in Europe, the buildings of The Manchester [PARA]Metropolitan University loom large. Most of the MMU's activities [PARA]take place in this central cluster of buildings around Oxford Road,[PARA]including the main All Saints Building, the Grosvenor Building [PARA](Faculty of Art and Design) and the Ormond and Righton [PARA]Buildings among others. However, there's a spattered scattering [PARA]of sites representing the 7 faculties. There's another cluster of [PARA]buildings spread along the A34, within brisk walking distance of [PARA]the Oxford Road. There's a site 5 miles away in the Manchester [PARA]inner city village of Didsbury and 2 more even further afield in [PARA]Crewe and Stoke-on-Trent. MMU and its students in Manchester [PARA]have quite strong links, both formal and informal, with the nearby [PARA]institutions.[HDNG]ATMOSPHERE:[EHDNG][PARA][ITAL]Being so big, a bit spread out and having so many 'oldies' (well, [PARA]students of an atypical age) - it would be fair to expect MMU to [PARA]have very little identity of its own. The problems of getting any [PARA]kind of consensus between such a divergent mob would make it[PARA]impossible. However, a perpetually partying mass has mustered,[PARA]which at least provides a rule for individuals to be exceptions to. [PARA]Still, the tone is lacking in pretensions and tolerant of all sorts. [PARA]The conventionally aged students in particular are stereotypical [PARA]fun-seekers and Manchester ravers, perhaps even more so than [PARA]the students at Manchester University (which requires higher [PARA]grades and consequently less partying during A Level years).[EITAL][HDNG]LIFE IN MANCHESTER:[EHDNG][PARA][ITAL]'I'm comin' home I'm comin' home, to your house!' 'My rabbit's [PARA]dead!' 'Listen Naaaadia, you've got a duty to know about these [PARA]things!' Yes, this is the home of 'The Living Soap', the studes you[PARA]loved to loathe. Unfortunately, many people regard the show as a[PARA]depiction of an average student household, which presupposes [PARA]that Manchester is an average student city. Not likely, Mr [PARA]Holdsworth![EITAL][PARA][ITAL] Manchester students dress to thrill, if not in the classic [PARA]late-80s bags, at least in high style. Manchester is Mecca for [PARA]2nd-hand gear, especially Oldham market. The famous Afflecks[PARA]Palace, although past its best, is the place to tog up for term time,[PARA]anything from rags to records and back to rags again (although [PARA]it's quite designer grunge/nouveau 70s nowadays). Amongst the [PARA]200 or so stalls, there's usually a job going for about ú15 a day, [PARA]which keeps the landlord at bay.[EITAL][PARA][ITAL] A job's pretty handy (there are a few about but many hunters)[PARA]because life ain't cheap here. Although not on a London scale of [PARA]urban extortion, there are too many temptations to look after the [PARA]pennies and the pounds end up playing follow the leader. [PARA]However, Manchester has very little of the crowded loneliness of [PARA]London or its impersonality. The people are friendly (Paul Calf [PARA]isn't representative of all locals) and, amongst students, local [PARA]pride is a virus. At the end of term, students from the south [PARA]frequently return (to their mothers' horror) sporting 'Born in the [PARA]North - die in the North' t-shirts.[EITAL][PARA][ITAL] While the city sprawls for about 10 miles in all directions, its [PARA]centre is relatively small which makes getting out and about a [PARA]cruise. With so much to do around town, there's no excuse for a[PARA]Saturday night on the sofa. A bar or a club on the other side of [PARA]town is only 20 minutes walk and, since the student residential [PARA]areas tend to be inner-city districts, a minicab home won't be [PARA]grant-busting.[EITAL][PARA][ITAL] At the very core, indeed, the hard core of the Manchester [PARA]Scene is ecstacy ('E' or 'the dance drug'). This and other, [PARA]nastier, drugs are readily available in the clubs, pubs and on the [PARA]streets of Manchester. Manchester students' attitudes to drugs [PARA]obviously vary enormously between individuals and although use [PARA]of 'E', 'acid' (LSD) and 'dope' (cannabis) is quite widespread, the [PARA]pressure to partake is small. Fun abounds without chemical [PARA]playmates. [EITAL][PARA][ITAL] Manchester offers a student just about everything any city [PARA]can, but many find it oppressive, especially if they're not from a [PARA]big city. The bright lights invite, but they dazzle too.[EITAL][PARA][PARA][ITAL][HDNG]THE SITES:[EHDNG][EITAL][PARA]There are 7 faculties to MMU which are not only more relevant [PARA]than the details of separate sites, but also more distinct:[PARA][BOLD]Art and Design:[EBOLD] Grosvenor, Medlock, Righton, Loxford Tower, [PARA]Chatham Capitol and Cavendish sites, 2,500 students.[PARA][BOLD]Humanities and Social Science:[EBOLD] Ormond, Mabel Tylecote and [PARA]Cavendish sites, 3,326 students.[PARA][BOLD]Management and Business:[EBOLD] Aytoun site, 3,600 students. A [PARA]tower block 10mins walk from All Saints.[PARA][BOLD]Hotel Catering and Tourism Management; Food and Consumer [PARA]Technology; Clothing Design and Technology:[EBOLD] Hollings site, 1,618 [PARA]students. The Hollings site is about 3 miles out of town in [PARA]parkland [ITAL]and looks like a toast rack[EITAL].[PARA][BOLD]Business and Management; Education; Arts, Design and [PARA]Performance; Humanities and Applied Social Studies; Sport and [PARA]Environmental Science; Modular Studies:[EBOLD] Until October 1992, this [PARA]was a separate college called Crewe and Alsager College of [PARA]Higher Education. It is in itself split into 2 sites at Crewe (a [PARA]medium-sized town, 28 miles south-west of Manchester) and [PARA]Alsager in Stoke-on-Trent (another medium-sized town, 34 miles [PARA]south, see [ULNE]Staffordshire University[EULNE]). [ITAL]Being so far away, there is [PARA]no sense of feeling like a part of MMU [EITAL]which is why its 4,745 [PARA]students have not been included in figures throughout this entry.[PARA][BOLD]Community Studies, Law and Education:[EBOLD] Didsbury, All Saints [PARA]and Gaskell sites, 5,811 students.[PARA][BOLD]Science and Engineering:[EBOLD] John Dalton Building, 6,000 students.[HDNG]THE CITY:[EHDNG][PARA][STAT][BULL] Population: 2,454,800 [BULL] London: 167miles [BULL] Liverpool: [PARA]28miles [BULL] Birmingham: 72miles[ESTAT][PARA]Manchester, although it's been around since the days when [PARA]Caesar took his strolls in the forum, was really built out of cotton [PARA]during the Industrial Revolution. Out of the money from cotton, [PARA]that is. Industry flooded Manchester and the canals drained it, [PARA]making the city one of the alltime boom towns.[ITAL] But it didn't last, [PARA]and Manchester found depression pretty depressing, scarring the[PARA]city with slums and factories. Some of these, such as Moss [PARA]Side and Oxford Road (opposite the Union Building), remain [PARA]downbeat war zones, but many have been redeveloped and its [PARA]chequered history has left Manchester rich in culture. Being a [PARA]student here is to be rocking in the free world with every facility [PARA]under the sun, from theatres to Afflecks Palace, from museums[PARA](such as the University's own natural history museum) to Old [PARA]Trafford.[EITAL][PARA][PARA][ITAL][HDNG]TRAVEL:[EHDNG][EITAL][PARA][BOLD]Trains:[EBOLD] Not 1 but 2 mainline stations, Manchester Piccadilly for [PARA]London and the South, and Manchester Victoria for just about [PARA]everywhere else. Routes go all over, including London (2:30hrs, [PARA]1/hr); Birmingham, Edinburgh and Bristol.[PARA][BOLD]Coaches:[EBOLD] All sorts of coach services, including, of course, [PARA]National Express to, among most other places, London (ú16.00, [PARA]3:30hrs, 7/day), Birmngham (ú7.50, 2:20hrs, 8/day), Edinburgh [PARA](ú13.75, 5:55hrs, 2/day)[PARA][BOLD]Car:[EBOLD] From the north, M6 (then M61 or M62), A6 or M66; from the [PARA]east, M62, A58, A62; from the South, M6, A6, A523, A34; and [PARA]from Wales, the M56. Parking may well be a problem in central [PARA]Manchester,[ITAL] but, for the lazy or environmentally carefree, a car [PARA]doesn't go amiss.[EITAL][PARA][BOLD]Air:[EBOLD] Manchester Airport is one of the UK's big ones - flights all [PARA]over the world as well as inland.[PARA][BOLD]Hitching:[EBOLD] [ITAL]Not possible from central Manchester, but quite good on[PARA]arterial routes out of the city.[EITAL][PARA][BOLD]Local:[EBOLD] Manchester has a major bus network, running all over [PARA]town, especially up and down Oxford Road[ITAL].[EITAL] Trains are a [ITAL]quicker[EITAL][PARA]alternative, especially for the outskirts. The spanking new Metro [PARA]Link tram service is now up and trundling.[PARA][BOLD]Taxis:[EBOLD][ITAL] Manchester's centre, being relatively small, means taxi [PARA]trips are a viable resort. The black cabs which screech to a halt [PARA]as you hail them are a lot more expensive than the private traders[PARA]who are only supposed to pick up phone callers and drop ins. [EITAL][PARA][ITAL][BOLD]Bicycles: [EBOLD]Manchester's quite bike-friendly (flat with a fair few [PARA]bicycle lanes), but theft is rife. A mountain bike will identify you [PARA]as a drug pusher, especially if you're about 12.[EITAL][PARA][PARA]Frequent buses run into the centre from Didsbury (85p) and right [PARA]up to the doorstep of the main site, [ITAL]although the trains are [PARA]cheaper and just as reliable.[EITAL][HDNG]FACULTIES and STUDENT NOS:[EHDNG][PARA][BOLD]Art[EBOLD] 1,392[BOLD][PARA]Comm Studs[EBOLD] 1,959[BOLD][PARA]Humanities[EBOLD] 2,418[BOLD][PARA]Management[EBOLD] 1,535[BOLD][PARA]Science[EBOLD] 2,587[HDNG]LIBRARIES and COMPUTERS:[EHDNG][PARA][STAT][BULL] Books: 955,000 [BULL] Periodicals: 4,722 [BULL] Study places: [PARA]2,096 [BULL] Computer workstations: 2,242[ESTAT][PARA]There are 8 libraries spread around the sites, relating to the [PARA]subject areas based there. The main one is in the All Saints [PARA]Building where there are 370,000 books and seats for 750 [PARA]students. There are a further 200,000 at Didsbury and 120,000 at[PARA]Elizabeth Gaskell.[HDNG]CAREER PROSPECTS:[EHDNG][PARA][STAT][BULL] Careers Service [BULL] No of staff: 6full/3part [BULL] Unemployed [PARA]after 6mths (1992): 14.7%[ESTAT][HDNG]SPECIAL FEATURES:[EHDNG][PARA][BULL]In July 1993, the Duke of Westminster was installed as MMU's[PARA]Chancellor.[HDNG]FAMOUS ALUMNI:[EHDNG][PARA]Gary Bailey (former Man Utd goalkeeper); Terry Christian [PARA]('presenter' of The Word); George Costigan (actor); Steve [PARA]Coogan (comedian/impressionist); Richard Griffiths (actor); David[PARA]Grindley (Olympic athlete); Emma Harris ('Living Soap' single [PARA]mum); Bernard Hill (actor); Mick Hucknall (lead singer of Simply [PARA]Red and striker for Fulchester United in Viz's Billy the Fish strip); [PARA]L S Lowry (painter, before several colleges got together and [PARA]became Manchester Poly and later, MMU); Bob Mortimer [PARA](comedian); Bryan Robson (footballer); Umberto Saoncella (TV [PARA]presenter); John Thompson (comedian); David Threlfall (actor); [PARA]Julie Walters (actress).[HDNG]FURTHER INFO:[EHDNG][PARA]Prospectuses and/or handbooks for undergrads, postgrads, [PARA]part-timers, overseas and mature students.[PARA][PARA]
