Graduate surveyors demonstrate ‘high standards and integrity’

Graduate surveyors from Northumbria University, Newcastle are working to the highest standards of excellence and integrity, according to new figures from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS).

Between January and June of this year, one in every 14 surveyors in the UK to be awarded the prestigious status of Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (MRICS), studied at Northumbria. That equates to seven percent of newly registered Members, and an increase of two percent on the previous year.

MRICS status demonstrates that a surveyor works to the highest standards of excellence and integrity and these figures confirm Northumbria University as a significant national provider of high-quality graduate surveyors into the profession over the last 12 months.

To achieve MRICS status, graduates must prove their experience and competency across a range of areas and pass an Assessment of Professional Competence (APC) set by RICS. Once they pass, they can call themselves a Chartered Surveyor and put MRICS behind their name.

All of Northumbria’s undergraduate and post-graduate surveying programmes are RICS accredited, meaning Northumbria graduates can enrol on their APC to become a Member of RICS as soon as they graduate, helping to fast-track their membership status.

Dr Paul Greenhalgh, Head of Built Environment and Associate Professor of Real Estate at Northumbria University, said: “We have an excellent a long-standing formal relationship with RICS and the fact that our surveying degree programmes are already RICS accredited makes them excellent preparation for MRICS status. Our students tell us that it is the RICS accredited status of the programmes that attracts them to study at Northumbria in the first place.

“It’s fantastic that so many of our graduates go on to achieve MRICS status so shortly after graduation, which means that we are a significant national provider of graduate surveyors into the profession.”

Bikki Purewal studied on Northumbria’s RICS-accredited Real Estate course. After graduation, he passed his APC first time, achieving MRICS status within two and a half years and he is now a surveyor within Newcastle City Council’s strategic property division.

He said: “I chose Northumbria because the course was sufficiently broad to get a good understanding of the profession, plus it was accredited by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), which was really important to me.

“Becoming chartered helps you gain a greater understanding of which area you’d like to specialise in. It also opens doors for career progression and provides confidence for clients and employers. I received some great support from my former tutors at Northumbria in preparation for my APC, which really helped.”

Northumbria University is one of the largest providers of surveying education in the UK and has a long record of delivery high quality surveying education at undergraduate and post graduate levels students, with between 90 and 100 percent of graduates each year securing work shortly after graduation.

The University delivers a range of RICS accredited full-time, part-time and distance learning programmes at undergraduate and postgraduate level, across building and quantity surveying, real estate, construction and project management, and many can be studied flexibly on a part-time distance learning basis. It is also a trailblazer university for the delivery of a new Quantity Surveying Degree Apprenticeship.

Northumbria’s degree courses in Quantity Surveying and Estate Management were first accredited by RICS in 1973, since when Northumbria has maintained a strong and consistent relationship with RICS and many of its alumni are now in senior positions for major employers across the globe.