President's Weekly Update
16 January 2014
I was pleased to sign a strategic memorandum of understanding this week with the company Arup - a global company with a major interest in the ‘built environment’ that has had significant activities in Manchester for over 50 years. The agreement is to develop research collaborations in four key areas: energy, cities, health and advanced materials, but with potential for wider collaborations. We also discussed partnering on student placements and recruitment.
I attended some of the reception to celebrate the recent reaccreditation of the Manchester Academic Health Science Centre (MAHSC) which brings together the University and its six partners. Presentations were given by Sir Howard Bernstein (Chief Executive of Manchester City Council and Chair of MAHSC), Professor Ian Jacobs (Vice-President and Dean of the Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences and Director of MAHSC) and several others. Manchester holds the only Academic Health Science Centre outside Oxbridge and London.
I mentioned last week that I had met the renowned economist Jim O’Neill who has recently delivered a series of programmes for BBC Radio 4 on emerging economies. I am pleased to say that Jim has now accepted an honorary chair in economics at the University. You can see more at:
Last Thursday I attended the spectacular last night of this year’s Stargazing Live at Jodrell Bank, hosted by Professor Brian Cox and Dara O’Briain. It was particularly remarkable this time because members of the public reported an apparently new galaxy which was verified by our astronomers at Jodrell and many other major astronomy centres around the world.
Senior colleagues and I reviewed how we would respond to a major incident in the University led by an expert in managing major incidents. While we hope we never have to deal with such events, it was extremely helpful to consider how we would work together to deal with what could be massive events that impact on all aspects of the University and our wide base of stakeholders.
I attended part of the professorial away day for the Faculty of Life Sciences where we discussed many aspects of the Faculty and the whole University’s performance against our ambitious targets. We had interesting discussions about breadth versus focus of our research and future recruitment, enhancing quality of research, recruitment of new staff versus supporting existing staff and how we achieve goals at both Faculty and University levels.
Chris Cox (Director of the Division of Development and Alumni Relations) and I met the trustees of the Sir John Zochonis Trust. Sir John had been closely linked to the University over many years and was the former Chair of The University of Manchester Council, but sadly died before Christmas. He made major contributions to the University and was a very generous donor.
I spent two evenings in London this week - and was back in Manchester inbetween! The first was to attend a Russell Group dinner discussion on how to improve the student experience. The event at the Institute of Directors was attended by about 170, including myself, Tom Bloxham our Chancellor, Grace Skelton, General Secretary of our Students’ Union and Professor Clive Agnew, Vice-President for Teaching Learning and Students. We heard speeches from Sir Andrew Witty, CEO of GlaxoSmithKline and David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Skills. It was a good chance to catch up with many people including Chares Clarke who was Minister at the time of our merger and wanted to know how it had gone! Today I travelled back Manchester then back again to London for another dinner.
It was nice to see Colin Stirling back in Manchester this week for a visit. Some of you will remember Colin as Professor in the Faculty of Life Sciences and Vice President for Teaching, Learning and Students until he left for Curtin University in Western Australia in 2011.
I was sorry to see our University Challenge team beaten by Trinity College, Cambridge in a very high scoring match (285-205). This isn’t the end of the road for our team however, as they still have a chance to progress to the final stages of the competition.
Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor
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