The battle for 'New College'
Being an Australian and an alumna of neighbouring rival Magdalen College Oxford, this Kat has always wondered about the accuracy in the naming of New College Oxford (NCO). New College was founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham (1324-1404), Bishop of Winchester, as ‘The College of St Mary of Winchester at Oxford’. Almost immediately it became known as ‘New College’ to distinguish it from another Oxford college which was already dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, that is Oriel which was founded in 1326. Given that this Kat's country was only colonised in the 1780s, it feels more than a slight stretch to call something founded some 400 years before that as 'new'.
In June 2011, the philosopher AC Grayling announced the establishment of the New College of the Humanities (NCH), a private for-profit undergraduate college in London which would offer tuition in economics, English, history, law and philosophy from October 2012. Teaching will be done by a 'team of international, academic all-stars' including biologist Steve Jones, geneticist Richard Dawkins and historian Niall Ferguson. Prior to the announcement, in May 2011, NCH filed an application for the trade mark NEW COLLEGE OF THE HUMANITIES in classes 09, 16, 41 and 42. At present, the trade mark is under examination.After the announcement by NCH, Curtis Price of NCO said he was 'not very pleased' by NCH's choice of name -- which had been widely abbreviated to New College in the press and online. He added:
'It is an ill-chosen title for this venture in Bloomsbury, because it is setting out to provide an education similar to a college in Oxford or Cambridge ... I am trying to persuade him to use another name ... if [NCH] is a farce, a joke, then our name is tainted ... I can't think of any reason in the world why anyone who could pay £9,000 and come here [to NCO] and enjoy a further £9,000 subsidy, would rather go to the New College of the Humanities and pay £18,000.'
Until this point, NCO had not sought to register its name as a trade mark. However, it seems to have been spured into doing so by the actions of NCH. NCO filed an application for the trade mark NEW COLLEGE OXFORD in classes July 2011 in 06, 09, 14, 16, 18, 21, 25, 35, 41, 42, 43 and 45 [Merpel excitedly notes that class 45 includes 'licensing of intellectual property' ...]. The mark received an expedited examination in August 2011, was advertised in September 2011 and registered last Friday, 9 December 2011.
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| A. C. Grayling, apparently biting a book .. |
'There's nothing to worry about ... There's already a New College in Swindon and Nottingham. I take it it as a compliment'.The IPKat wonders how this will play out. New College Swindon was
founded as Sixth-Form College in 1984 and later added a number of specialist vocational courses and degree courses. New College Nottingham is an amalgamation in 1999 of education establishments in the City of Nottingham 
and caters for school students from the age of 14 through to degree level. Neither of these colleges has sought to register its name as a trade mark their and neither offers an educational programme comparable with that of Oxford or Cambridge.Merpel wonders which side of the fence Richard Dawkins will sit on this one: although being touted as part of the 'team of international, academic all-stars' at NCH, since 2008 he has also been an Emeritus Professor at NCO. The IPKat, noting that NCH proposes to offer Intellectual Property Law as one of its course options, wonders who might be invited to teach it ...
