President's weekly update
5 November 2020
The government has announced four weeks of more stringent restrictions in England in an attempt to curb the growing number of infections. The government has been clear that universities, along with colleges and schools, should remain open, and universities should continue to deliver a blend of in-person and online teaching with agreed risk assessments. The guidance states: the government recognises the central importance of face-to-face teaching, including for the mental health and wellbeing of students, and expects this to continue where it can be done safely. Hence, we will continue our current mix of blended learning where essential teaching is delivered in person, where it is safe to do so, and with the rest online. This will be reviewed regularly.
Infection rates amongst staff and students remain low, but are still rising in Greater Manchester, particularly in older age groups. It will be some time before we see if the additional restrictions, both locally and now nationally, have an impact on infections, we all hope so such that more normal activities can resume.
In spite of COVID, staff continue to do an amazing job teaching in-person where there is no alternative, and online where this can be delivered effectively. This has been made possible by many other staff across the University.
The current year continues to carry much uncertainty due to the global pandemic and its wide impacts on all aspects of our lives, including the financial position of the University. A major concern for the whole UK and global higher education sector has been the recruitment of students, particularly international students.
Last weekend was the closing date for registration for all international students and it appears that we are just above our target numbers for full-time undergraduate and postgraduate taught students. This is obviously very welcome. We had already over recruited home/EU undergraduate students due to the change in the basis of A-level grades after we had filled our places. The recruitment for both international and home/EU students is not distributed evenly across the University, with some schools reporting that they are significantly below target and other areas well above target. The latter will put pressure on teaching and the wider student experience so we are investing as quickly as possible in additional staff.
We now know our current student numbers, but it takes a little time before we can be certain of the financial implications because of part-time students, delayed start dates for some and bursary costs, which will be significantly higher than usual because of our success in recruiting widening participation students. The current budget, which will be presented for approval by our Board later this month, indicates that we may be in a position of break even for the current year. It assumes higher than usual drop-out rates for students, markedly reduced income from catering, commercial, car parking, student residences and conferences, philanthropy and interest income. At the same time, we have higher costs due to COVID, notably additional cleaning, equipment (e.g. IT for remote working), extra staff (as noted above) and potentially hiring of teaching spaces for when we are able to increase in-person teaching again. But given uncertainties, these are all estimates.
We can no longer expect the planned government grant (which we estimated at ~£20m income) and loan, because of strong international student recruitment, though we have secured additional loan facilities from other sources because of the level of financial uncertainty we face. We will draw on these if necessary. In addition to COVID impacts in the current year and likely extending for a number of years, we face uncertain costs of the USS pension and Brexit.
Notwithstanding these major unknowns, the imminent threats of major cuts to our costs, including staff, have significantly receded.
Unfortunately, we have received escalating and very worrying reports of poor student behaviours largely in our residences from Greater Manchester Police and our security staff, and have received many complaints from other students (the vast majority of whom are behaving extremely well), their parents and local residents. Some of these behaviours are really shocking and a number of students are being suspended from the University. I want to thank again all those staff who have been on the front line of dealing with this situation.
Edward Astle, Chair of our Board of Governors, visited teaching and research labs in the Faculty of Science and Engineering and the Optometry teaching in the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health. He also visited the Library and met security and student residential staff. He wanted to get first-hand experience of staff and student activities and to thank staff on behalf of the Board for their tremendous efforts.
In other meetings this week, all by video, I joined a Universities UK discussion about the USS pension scheme, met the CEO of Elsevier. I had a call with two of our alumni Dr Victoria Coleman, Director, and Dr Peter Highnam, Deputy Director of the US funding agency DARPA, and I exchanged experiences with the relatively new Vice-Chancellor of Leeds University, Professor Simone Buitendijk.
In the latest THE World Reputation Ranking of Universities we rose to 48th position, up from 51-60th when our actual position was not known, as positions are ranked individually only up to 50.
Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor