17 March 2021
In September 1921, Hope Constance Monica Winch arrived in Sunderland with an ambitious plan to establish the finest pharmacy department in the north-east of England. She started with just three fee-paying students and 25 ex-servicemen in a teaching space equipped with only one double-sided bench.
Our history
Now, 100 years later, we have produced tens of thousands of pharmacy graduates who have gone on to offer expertise, support and assistance to people in all corners of the world.
You can find our graduates working in industry, hospital or community pharmacy; you may have even met one of them.
Today, pharmacy at the University of Sunderland continues to be at the heart of our growing health sciences and wellbeing provision, which now includes – among other subjects – nursing, paramedic science and medicine.
Hope Winch
Hope Constance Monica Winch was born in 1894. She was educated at the Clergy Daughters’ School at Casterton and in 1912 went on to spend a year at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle, training as a pharmacy dispenser. Miss Winch next attended the PSGB's School of Pharmacy in London and registered as a Chemist and Druggist on 30 June 1917. She then went on to attend the next session of the Major course, registering as a Pharmaceutical Chemist on 5 April 1918. During that time, she was awarded the Pereira Medal, making her only the fifth woman to be presented with this.
In September 1921, she finally came to Sunderland and became our first full-time pharmacy lecturer, having transferred from Rutherford College in Newcastle. With approval from the Pharmaceutical Society, all pharmacy teaching was then transferred from Newcastle to Sunderland.
Tragically, Hope Winch died in a climbing accident on 8 April 1944. Today her memory is honoured through a society for former students which bears her name and the awarding of the Hope Winch Memorial Prize to the most outstanding student in the first two years of the course.