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President's weekly update

12 November 2020

We have been in detailed discussions about offering asymptomatic testing to students in early December to allow them to travel home for Christmas if they wish to do so. We have now received government guidance on this which indicates that there will be a ‘travel window’ between 3 and 9 December when students can return home provided they have not tested positive or been exposed to COVID-19. All universities must stop in person teaching from 9 December but we will continue all teaching online until the end of term, and healthcare students on placements are exempt. We are now establishing the logistics of offering tests to a large number of students in quite a short time window and developing guidance to students on travel arrangements. Of course many, particularly those from overseas, may wish to remain in Manchester over Christmas. We are also awaiting details of the return of students after Christmas and have published our plans for Semester 2 teaching which of course depend on infections and government regulations.

There has been widespread media coverage about the erection of fences around our Fallowfield residences complex. The intent of the fencing was to prevent entry to the site from people who were not resident, but it is clear we didn’t communicate or engage with our students in the way we should have done, and we are looking in to the reasons for this and what lessons we learn to avoid something similar happening again. I have written to all the students in the residences to apologise.

To give a little background, over recent weeks we have received many complaints from students and members of the local community and reports from our security staff of non-residents entering our halls of residences to attend large parties, and of criminal and other unacceptable behaviour.  This has caused distress to many of our students, the vast majority of whom have behaved in an exemplary manner. The fencing, which met full health and safety and fire requirements, was to prevent or limit such entry and behaviours. There was never any intent to prevent students from entering or leaving their halls of residence and there is no plan to implement such restrictions. The fences have all now been removed.

I took part in a live interview with the Mancunion and took questions from students on the day after the protest. I have asked students to come forward with suggestions about how we can improve safety and security, which is still a concern.  We are in discussion with Greater Manchester Police about how they can help to ensure the safety of our students.

On more normal business this week, we held meetings of our Board Finance and Audit Committees and the annual meeting of the two committees to agree the final accounts and financial statements for the past academic year and to hear the report of our external auditors. These will now be considered by our full Board later this month. We generated a surplus last year, in large part due to stopping many activities during lockdown and deferring costs such as maintenance of our buildings and much research activity. As I reported last week, we are expecting a close to break-even outcome in the current year but with many uncertainties, almost all of which would worsen the position. We also had a Board briefing on issues at our student residences at Fallowfield.

At an open staff meeting with my senior colleagues, many of the questions were about our financial position, student recruitment and future planning. We also discussed online versus in-person teaching, concerns about the major deficit in our main pension fund, USS, the potential for mass testing in Greater Manchester and the safety of our staff and students.

We held the first of this year’s Annual Performance Reviews on the Professional Services (PS), in a new lighter touch format. We discussed the challenges and pressures on PS staff, not least because of the pandemic and recent staff losses through voluntary severance, and also the opportunities of the major transformational change programmes that are ongoing or planned, including the Student Experience Programme.

Professor Graham Lord, Vice-President and Dean of the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, and I took part in an event organised by Coutts and National Westminster banks. We spoke about the University’s response to COVID-19 and our research in this area and took questions from some of the many attendees on vaccines. It was very timely that the news of the reported success of the Pfizer vaccine came through during our discussion.

Graham and I, and a number of other colleagues, took part in a very productive meeting with UK Biobank to discuss how we can further develop our collaboration and potentially share resources and expertise.

At a meeting of the Russell Group we shared positive experiences of international student recruitment, and our major concerns about the USS pension scheme, in particular its affordability for both employers and employees.

Our response to the consultation on USS has been quite limited because we feel we need more information and should consider a more holistic view of the pension.  We recognise the importance of pensions to our staff and the need to offer an attractive and affordable scheme.

Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor

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