End of degrees will 'kill glass-making' in region

Graduate Helen Gordon still uses the National Glass Centre's facilities to make her art

Dropping a university's glass-making degree programme will kill a city's cutting-edge creativity in the field, students have said.

Last year Sunderland University announced that as well as closing the National Glass Centre in 2026, it would also be ending its glass-making degrees.

Graduate Helen Gordon, from Darlington, who finished her studies in the summer, said the move was "absolutely devastating" for the region.

The university said that continuing the courses was not financially viable.

Ms Gordon, who completed her course part-time in just over six years, still uses space in the National Glass Centre to create art.

The 44-year-old said she had fallen in love with glass-making after taking a class in Darlington.

While looking for more short courses in the field, she found the degree programme at Sunderland.

"It's quite a long way to travel and I've got a young family but I was like I really, really want to do this," she said.

Helen Gordon said the loss of the degree programme was "devastating"

She said glass was "totally unique" and that unlike painting, it had its own "little quirks".

"If they don't have the degree programme then they're not going to have new artists - it's absolutely devastating, it will kill glass-making," she said.

"They're not going to have new artists exploring the medium."

She also said she had planned to do a masters degree in the field, but that had now been scuppered.

"I have a family, I'm not 18 - I can't just move down to London," she said.

Sunderland's glass degree programmes are due to end next year

Mature student Penny Riley-Smith said: "It's just very sad to feel that the university does not value us."

She said the teachers on the course were experienced and talented and them being made redundant was "sad to see".

She also said students and artists would lose out using the university's specialist equipment.

The university commissioned an external team to determine the feasibility of offering the degrees at its city campus.

However, the report found that the move would cost about £9.4m and that considering the number of students on the programme, the university's governors decided it would not be "financially viable".

It said it was still looking at how best to repurpose its glass-making equipment.