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President's weekly update

5 March 2020

The outbreak of coronavirus (Covid-19) is causing increasing concern globally. We have a contingency group that is meeting regularly to consider potential actions in the event of local cases of infection or a significant change in government advice. Meanwhile there are actions that we can all take to limit the chances of infection which are outlined by the NHS. We have also established a StaffNet site with specific information for colleagues and a comprehensive FAQs for students.

In the short term this is already impacting on some of our Executive Education courses and on teaching in our University of Manchester Worldwide Global Centres.  Our Dubai UMW Centre is closed for the time being and some teaching at our other Centres in Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai has been cancelled due to restrictions on educational activity.  In the medium to longer term there is much greater worry if international students are unable to travel to the UK. We are considering a number of mitigating actions - most notably this puts much greater urgency on development of online and blended courses and teaching material, which is, in any case, an important part of our strategic plan.

The Industrial Strategy Council, of which I am a member, provides independent advice to government on progress in delivering the Industrial Strategy and its impact on the economy. At a recent meeting we updated on our main projects on skills, regional inequalities and sectors. I have been leading the latter strand with Charlie Mayfield (recent chairman of John Lewis). The Council is now publishing a number of its reports.

I attended an event at the Science Museum in London to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Royal Society of Biology, of which I was the founding President. The two speakers at the original event, Sir Paul Nurse and Sir David Attenborough, also spoke at this event along with Amanda Solloway, the Under Secretary of State for Science, Research and Innovation (Science Minister). I was honoured to receive a ‘President’s Medal’ and it was lovely to chat to Sir David.

In London, I hosted a lunch for alumni and donors to our University, met Professor Richard Clegg, Director of Lloyd’s Register Foundation that has supported a number of our students, and had meetings with Neil O’Brien MP, who I worked with when he was in the Treasury, and Amanda Solloway.

The Council for Science and Technology,which I co-chair with Sir Patrick Vallance, was held at 10 Downing Street. The Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, attended part of the meeting. We were also joined for various discussions by Kwasi Kwarteng, Minister of State for Business, Energy and Clean Growth, the Science Minister, government advisors Dominic Cummings and Ben Warner, and several Chief Scientific Advisors.

The Council of the Medical Research Council (MRC) visited the University. I hosted an evening event at which Rowena Burns, Chair of Health Innovation Manchester, and Professor Graham Lord, Vice-President and Dean of the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, spoke about health research and delivery in Greater Manchester.

The following day they had a tour of our Stoller Biomarker Discovery Centre. Graham and I both addressed the Council and they heard presentations from Professor David Brough from Manchester on immunology, and researchers from Sheffield and Newcastle. Professor Fiona Watt, Executive Chair of the MRC, spoke about their strategic priorities. In parallel with their private Council meeting, one of the MRC programme managers ran a workshop for early career researchers and PhD students on grant writing.

In the School of Health Sciences, we discussed ongoing industrial action and its impact on students, online/blended learning and our new vision and strategic plan Our future. Students were very positive about their ability to feedback to staff on areas of concern and wanted more events with other healthcare students in the Faculty. Staff talked about engagement with local schools in Greater Manchester, suggested a major set of events for our 200th anniversary in 2024 and expressed concerns about integration between IT systems and in signing external contracts. 

Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor

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