page_title: University of Sunderland
section_title: University status
hierarchical_section_title: University of Sunderland / History / University status
caption_attribution_description: English: Steve Cram at Freshers Week, 2018
context_page_description: The University of Sunderland is a public research university located in Sunderland in the North East of England. Its predecessor, Sunderland Technical College, was established as a municipal training college in 1901. It gained university status in 1992. It now has campuses in Sunderland, London and Hong Kong, and has about 20,000 students.
context_section_description: After the passage of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992, the polytechnic gained university status.
  Lord Puttnam became the university's first Chancellor in 1998. The Sunderland Empire Theatre was the regular venue for the graduation ceremonies, although they have been hosted at the Stadium of Light since 2004.  In July 2007, he stepped down to become the Chancellor of the Open University.
  On 23 May 2008 the University announced that former Olympic athlete Steve Cram had been appointed as Chancellor and would be officially installed at a ceremony on 27 June 2008. Singer and songwriter, Emeli Sandé was officially installed as the University of Sunderland's new Chancellor on 10 July 2019 during the university's summer Academic Awards.
  In 2018, it was announced that Sunderland was to host one of five new medical schools established under a UK government initiative to increase the number of training places for doctors. The medical school opened in September 2019.
  On 24 September 2018, Sir David Bell became Vice-Chancellor and Chief Executive of the University of Sunderland.
caption: Steve Cram at Freshers Week, 2018
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