Wolverhampton’s student boom: 20,000 could live in city centre under plans by university

And Ebrahim Adia, vice-chancellor and chief executive, has spoke of his plans to transform the University of Wolverhampton into an international institution, with up to 10,000 overseas students - twice that initially forecast - alongside its traditional role in upskilling the Black Country.

Mr Adia, who came to the university 18 months ago, has launched an ambitious project to transform it. 

A major part of the project is to have far more of its student population living in the city centre. Currently, most commute in from the Black Country and wider West Midlands. 

The plans are to have halls of residence for up to 5,000 students, Insider Media reported.

Mr Adia said they were already in advanced conversations with a private provider looking to have rooms for more than 900 students by September next year.

"But that's just the year one market," he added. "All those students will then need to move into private sector accommodation in years two and three. So the cumulative impact could be up to 15,000 to 20,000 students living in the city centre. 

"We're in conversations with a number of people who own significant buildings in the city centre to discuss that years two and three student market.

"The impacts on the city's economy, on accommodation, on businesses will be big. It will transform the economy of the city centre. 

"Wolverhampton is a university city, but so far it has been without the benefits of having a university because so many of our students commute in. 

"So all the benefits that normally accrue from lots of people living in the city, drawing on student accommodation, halls of residence, spending, have not been there."

Mr Adia also spoke about the strategy to put the university on an international level. Up to now much of its work has been upskilling students from the Black Country - more than 70 per cent of its students come from homes whose parents have not been through higher education. 

A few months ago the university revealed its ambitions to eventually have  about 5,000 international students by 2030. 

Mr Adia said that figure now looked "very conservative" and he predicted the number of overseas students in Wolverhampton could eventually be twice that.

"We've already delivered an extra 1,500 just this January and March," he added. "So we're going to get to 5,000 probably within three years, rather than five, and could easily be at the 10,000 mark in about seven to eight years."

The first phase of the University of Wolverhampton’s development plans will come to about £12 million, paid from its resources. 

They include demolishing the Arts building, establishing a medical school, and moving 700 staff into the city council's Civic Centre. 

A longer term project which Adia says will need public funding is to "drop"  the underpass which runs from the university, beneath the ring road, to Wolverhampton FC's Molineux Stadium and create a plaza.

"We're on it in terms of delivery plans, timelines, business cases," said Mr Adia. "It's all comfortably within our reach. It's all perfectly affordable, all perfectly doable, all nicely phased in terms of timelines. My board is very happy we can do this without borrowing. None of it is super difficult."