There has been an art school in the Medway towns for 130 years, offering life-changing opportunities to young people in a part of the country with one of the lowest take-up rates of post-16 education. Dame Zandra Rhodes studied there, so did Karen Millen and Tracey Emin. When noted photographer James Barnor arrived in the UK from Ghana in the 1960s, he came to Rochester to develop his talents.

Over the years, Rochester School of Art became Medway College of Art and then the Kent Institute of Art and Design before joining the University for the Creative Arts (UCA). Now UCA is proposing to close the Rochester campus saying it is too expensive to maintain. It also wants to withdraw from further (16-18) education.

We are calling on UCA to maintain its art and design provision in the Medway towns, either at the existing Rochester campus or another site and to continue to provide further education.

Please sign this petition for the following reasons:

• The Medway towns need a provider of good quality creative education. Despite being in affluent Kent, some of the most deprived council wards in England are in Medway;
• The economy needs graduates educated in skills such as computer animation, games and digital fashion;
• More than 150 jobs are expected to be lost as a result of the closure;
• UCA has already closed its Maidstone campus - don't let it shut another one.

Please sign and share to save the Rochester campus of the University for the Creative Arts. Thank you.