Skip to main content

ICMA Centre gains SII Centre of Excellence designation

The ICMA Centre, University of Reading is delighted to announce it has been officially designated a Securities & Investment Institute (SII) Centre of Excellence.

SII Centres of Excellence are a small group of universities, including Cass Business School and Edinburgh University, selected by the SII as offering leadership in academic education focused on financial markets.

To confirm this new agreement, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the University and SII on Monday 10 March (picture above, left to right: Professor John Board, Director, ICMA Centre; Simon Culhane, CEO, SII; Professor Rob Robson, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, University of Reading).

The Centre of Excellence designation means that graduates from the ICMA Centre's Masters programmes in International Securities, Investment and Banking (ISIB) and Investment Management, will also be eligible for the SII Diploma, therefore receiving both a full Masters degree and the type of professionally significant certification usually only obtained after graduation.

Simon Culhane, Chief Executive of SII, who ratified the SII/ICMA agreement this week, said: "We are delighted to have appointed the ICMA Centre a Centre of Excellence. The designation will offer ICMA Centre graduates a significant headstart when progressing their financial services careers, with SII membership supporting their continuing professional development throughout their careers in the industry to ensure their skills are kept up to date and relevant."

Memorandum signing

The ICMA Centre will also be accredited to directly prepare students on its other degrees, including BSc Finance and Investment Banking, for the relevant SII examinations and SII will proactively consider exemption on a module by module basis on the Centre's undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. The aim is to help as many of the Centre's students as possible, to achieve SII recognition in a cost-effective and efficient manner.

Its undergraduate students already compete for the SII's Stephen Cooke Award and this designation further enhances the Centre's relationship with the SII.

Professor John Board, Director of the ICMA Centre, said: "I am delighted that the ICMA Centre, with its long record of academic and professional excellence, will be able to collaborate further with the SII and its widely known and accepted market-based qualifications. I am sure that this association will have long lasting benefits for our students and future alumni."

Published 10 March 2008

You might also like

Talk on “Steve Jobs’ last gift and yoga meditation”

1 November 2013
What does yoga meditation have to do with the late Steve Jobs, former CEO of Apple and one of the most creative and innovative entrepreneurs of our time? Before his passing in 2011 he made arrangements that all those attending his memorial service at Stanford University should receive a copy of “Autobiography of a Yogi” by Paramahansa Yogananda, a spiritual classic which he said he had read once a year since he had first become acquainted with the book. “There has been nothing before, written in English or in any other European language, like this presentation of Yoga” writes Columbia University Press, while the New York Times defines it “A rare account”.

The Future of Energy: Are political parties thinking far enough ahead?

5 June 2017
Energy bills represent one of the top costs for businesses and households, so it’s no surprise the major parties are making pledges in their manifestos. The Conservative party wants an independent review of the cost of energy and Labour want to transition to publicly owned energy firms; but are they thinking far enough ahead?

DIIS Conference: Central Banking in the Context of the European Crisis

15 January 2013
Senior Visiting Fellow at the ICMA Centre, Richard Comotto, will be speaking at the upcoming conference organised by the Danish Institute for International Studies, titled Central Banking at a Crossroads: Europe and Beyond. The Conference will focus on the future of Central Banking in the post-crisis period and look at how to restore stability to financial systems.