Bristol is home to two major institutions of higher education: the University of Bristol, a “redbrick” chartered in 1909, and the University of the West of England, formerly Bristol Polytechnic, which gained university status in 1992. The city also has two dedicated further education institutions, City of Bristol College and Filton College as well as a theological college, Trinity College, Bristol. The Create centre is home to many sustainable development projects and life long learning schemes.

The city has 129 infant and primary schools, 17 secondary schools, and three city learning centres. There are also many independent schools of a high quality in the city, including Queen Elizabeth’s Hospital, an all-boys school, the only of its kind in the area and all-girls school Red Maids’ School, the oldest girl’s school in England (founded in 1634 by John Whitson).

In 2005 the Chancellor of the Exchequer recognised Bristol’s strong ties to science and technology by naming Bristol one of three “science cities”, and promising funding for further development of science in the city.[19] As well as research at the two universities and Southmead Hospital, science education is important in the city, with At-Bristol, Bristol Zoo and Bristol Festival of Nature being prominent educational organisations.

The city has a history of scientific achievement, including Sir Humphry Davy, the 19th century scientist who worked in Hotwells and discovered laughing gas. Bishopston has given the world two Nobel Prize winning physicists: Paul Dirac for crucial contributions to quantum mechanics in 1933, and Cecil Frank Powell, for a photographic method of studying nuclear processes and associated discoveries in 1950.

The city was birth place of Colin Pillinger, planetary scientist behind the Beagle 2 Mars lander project, and is home to Adam Hart-Davis, presenter of various science related television programmes, and the psychologists Susan Blackmore, Richard Gregory, and Derren Brown.