Institutional Context
Summary
UWE Bristol is a future-focused, engaged university, locally embedded and with global reach. We work with communities and business to shape and drive future prosperity across all parts of our region and beyond, creating opportunities for all.
Our students, relevance and impact are at the heart of everything we do. Our priority is to deliver an outstanding university experience for our students through innovative, practice-led, research-informed courses.
Our extensive network of stakeholders and partners – across high-growth companies, multi-nationals, public service providers, third-sector bodies and local communities – offers our students and staff unique opportunities to help shape the future. Engaging in a wide variety of Knowledge Exchange activities provides valuable experiences and delivers impact for our staff, students and external stakeholders.
Institutional context
The West of England region is dynamic and innovative, with sector-leading research, economic development and employment in long-standing high value manufacturing industries and innovative green, creative, digital and financial sectors. However, the area is ethnically and socioeconomically diverse; the Bristol city-region has 41 areas in the most deprived 10% in England, including 3 in the most deprived 1%.
Figure 3: The UWE Bristol Strategy
The University’s Strategy 2030 sets out the ambition and priorities for the University 2020-2030. The Strategy is based on the University’s mission and values: UWE Bristol transforms futures: powering the future workforce, supporting local economic prosperity, shaping the health and sustainability of our communities and creating solutions to global challenges. We are proud of our leading role in shaping local decisions, improving lives across our communities, boosting the economy and cultural vibrancy of the city-region.
Through our research and partnerships, we will transform the future, advance knowledge, support sustainable economic growth and development, enhance social and cultural development, promote health and wellbeing, equality and diversity, and the quality of built and natural environments. Our ambition to grow internationally excellent and world-leading research with real-world impact, building on our strengths, prioritising challenge-based research, driving innovation and enterprise, and enhancing the student experience (2030 Strategy).
UWE is a civic university with strong foundations in the regional economy this is central to UWE Bristol’s success. We are an engaged university, locally embedded with global reach, working with communities and business to shape and drive future prosperity across all parts of the region and beyond. We have a passion for transforming futures a commitment to creating an inclusive and skilled workforce for the future, with opportunities for all.
We work in partnership with our community and business partners and regional policy makers - the Local Authorities, West of England Local Enterprise Partnership and the West of England Combined Authority (WECA), to identify the skills, business, cultural and societal needs of the region. Our focus for driving innovation, growth and skills aligns with the regions strategically important sectors such as aerospace and high-value manufacturing; an internationally significant high-growth cluster of digital and creative industries; next-generation, tech-enabled financial, legal and business services; health; education; and cultural provision.
UWE has a leading role in the region’s enterprise ecosystem, driven by our growing University Enterprise Zone, currently home to over 50 fast-growing high-tech businesses and hosting hundreds of visiting entrepreneurial professionals throughout the year. Work is starting on expanding this provision for entrepreneurs and SMEs to support this core driver for economic growth in the region.
This rich ecosystem provides the University with wide-ranging opportunities for collaborative research and knowledge exchange with major businesses and SMEs, NHS partners and community organisations.
For further information, please send queries to tracey2.john@uwe.ac.uk
Local Growth and Regeneration
Summary of approach
UWE Bristol is an engaged university. We work closely with communities and businesses across the West of England and nationally. Globally we have strong levels of engagement and collaboration through international learning partnerships and with research partners.
We work in partnership with local policy makers, businesses and community organisations to meet the needs and ambitions of the regions we support, aligning our activity to local industrial strengths - advanced manufacturing, creative technologies, health, green economy and high-tech digital - and regional ambitions around inclusive and sustainable economic innovation, growth and future workforce challenges.
By responding to local regional demands and co-designing inclusive and sustainable projects and programmes with our local partners, we are driving innovation, accelerating growth and building skills.
Aspect 1: Strategy
UWE’s strategic approach to local growth and regeneration
UWE Bristol’s Transforming Futures 2030 Strategy sets out the ambition and priorities for the University for 2020-2030: UWE Bristol transforms futures, powering the future workforce, supporting local economic prosperity, shaping the health and sustainability of our communities and creating solutions to global challenges.
Underpinning these ambitions, the University widely consulted and published its 2020-2030 Business and Community Strategy. It describes the University’s aim to build a new kind of future-facing university, locally embedded with global reach. A university engaged with communities, business, partners and stakeholders across the West of England to shape and drive future prosperity, health and wellbeing, equality and diversity, sustainability and cultural and community development across all parts of the region and to create opportunities for all.
Figure : Graphical user interface showing the UWE Bristol strategy
There is a strong regional focus to much of our collaboration and engagement – we are a University ‘in, of and for the West of England’. Conventionally the West of England is defined by the boundaries of the four local authorities of Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, South Gloucestershire and North Somerset.
We work closely with communities, businesses and organisations across the region. Many of our students come from this area and many secure jobs here after graduating. We also have high levels of engagement and collaboration across the wider South West of England and nationally. Globally we have strong and growing levels of engagement and collaboration through international learning partnerships and with research partners. To achieve our ambitions in terms of community and business engagement we identify our strategic priorities under each of our six axes of engagement:
Figure 2: The Engaged University
We actively engage with businesses of all sizes – from large sector leads to fast growth SMEs and innovative start-ups – to support the local economy and regeneration by driving innovation, accelerating growth and building skills.
We work in partnership with the Local Authorities, Combined Authority and Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) in the West of England, Gloucestershire, Swindon & Wiltshire, Somerset and beyond to meet the needs and ambitions of the regions we support, aligning our activity to local industrial strengths, regional ambitions and responding to cross-cutting themes around inclusive growth and environmental sustainability.
The University is well represented on regional boards and committees with members of the VC Directorate and senior staff regularly attending influential regional leadership groups e.g. Combined Authority Innovation Group; and OneCity 2030 Board. Between 2019- 2021 this included VC Prof Steve West chairing the West of England LEP. This depth and breadth of representation demonstrates the University’s commitment as a civic university.
The recognised ‘needs’ to address across our region our centred around inclusive and sustainable economic innovation, growth and future workforce challenges specifically focussed around the key sectors – advanced manufacturing, creative technologies, health, green economy and high-tech digital.
Aspect 2: Activity
Meeting the needs of the region and local growth
As set out in Aspect 1, the University works closely with local policy and decision makers to align our activity to regional needs. We design and develop programmes and interventions according to the industry, size of business and/or learner that will benefit. Our programmes are co-designed with – and co-delivered by – our strategic business and community partners. This enables us to successfully reach target groups of businesses and citizens with meaningful and evidence-based support, therefore achieving the greatest impact in terms of inclusive and sustainable economic growth.
Focus of UWE Bristol’s approach to local growth and regeneration
By responding to local regional demands and co-designing inclusive and sustainable projects and programmes with our local partners, we are driving innovation, accelerating growth and building skills. Whilst not an exhaustive list, below are some examples of this activity.
Driving innovation
UWE delivered regional innovation and economic growth support to SMEs on a range of live programmes between 2019/21 and 2021/22. This attracted £24m funding from ERDF/ESF and regional growth funding, leveraging over £18.5m private sector investment and creating 1561 new jobs.
With the end of EU structural funds, the University looked to new sources of local growth and regeneration funding, successfully bidding to the Government’s Community Renewal Fund and regional investment funds. We continued to extend our delivery beyond the West of England, supporting the growth of regional strategic priority sectors including Digital, Cyber and Health:
Figure 3: SMEs accessing support through the SABRE programme
Innovation Enterprise Programme: (2017 - 2019) R&D funding to support businesses across all sectors. 100+ SMEs and start-ups received business support, creating 130 jobs, £821k R&D grants to businesses attracting £1.5m private sector investment.
Regional Arts Incubation Network: (2017 – 2019) In partnership with The Watershed, supporting 80 creative SMEs through tailored incubation and business support.
Scale Up 4 Growth: (2018 – 2021) Supporting the region’s high growth businesses with grants and workshops. A collaboration between UWE Bristol, NatWest Bank and Foot Anstey LLP, supporting 80 SMEs, awarding £850k of funding to 27 businesses. S4G created 150+ jobs and raised £1.3m in private investment.
Digital Innovation Fund: (2019 – 2023) Providing £1m of R&D grant funding, workshops and hackathons to 100 SMEs around digital innovation in all sectors. The project created 85+ jobs and raised £2.3m in private investment.
Health Technologies Accelerator Programme: (2018 – 2022) Supporting 50+ regional SMEs develop and accelerate advancements in health technologies through specialist academic support and access to state-of-the-art facilities.
SABRE: (2018 – 2023) Providing 80 SMEs access to explore the benefits aof robots and automation for improved efficiencies and productivity in their products and services.
ERHT: (2020 – 2023) enabling rapid HealthTech product development in the Heart of the South West, supporting 70 businesses.
Scale-Up 4 Growth Gloucestershire: (2020 – 2023) In partnership with NatWest Bank and Gloucestershire College, delivering £1m Scale-Up funding and cyber workshops to 70 SMEs.
Swindon & Wiltshire I4G: (2020 – 2023) Providing £500k R&D funding and support for 48 businesses in the Swindon & Wiltshire Region.
Made Smarter: (developed and launched in 2021) In partnership with the National Composites Centre, supporting 80 manufacturing organisations to digitise their processes through R+D, leadership and management training and expert student internships.
Somerset Innovation Audits – (2022) delivering Knowledge Transfer and innovation support to SMEs in partnership with Somerset Council.
During the reporting period, UWE gained significant success in Expanding Excellence in England, securing a £7m programme of research and KE over 5 (+2) years. A new team was established, and significant research and KE was developed, increasing bidding and new industrial partnerships.
Continued growth of KTPs took place, supporting 16 projects during this period and moving the University into the top 10 universities for delivery of KTPs for a period.
Accelerating growth
UWE Bristol’s University Enterprise Zone (UEZ) is one of four University Enterprise Zones in the UK originally commissioned by central government. The facility brings together the whole innovation pipeline, creating unique opportunities to drive forward innovation and enterprise, supporting the growth of new and scaling businesses. It includes:
Future Space - an innovation hub for start-ups and fast-growth businesses. It has created 504 jobs through 107 high growth businesses, generating £19.8m GVA. Residents have raised £48m investment creating 51 product/service launches, 305 new/improved products, and 35 patents/IPR devices.
Launch Space, an incubator for early-stage and graduate start-ups. It has supported nearly 150 founders, creating 274 jobs and raising £60m in investment.
Robotics Hardware Incubator - a start-up space for hardware development. It has supported 30 founders, creating 144 jobs and raising £25.5m in investment.
Health Tech Hub - lab space and facilities for collaborative university/business R&D. It has supported 150 businesses, creating 77 jobs and attracting £500k of private sector investment.
Robotics Innovation Facility - a Digital Innovation Hub, promoting the adoption of robotics and automation. It has delivered robotics training workshops to 124 learners, supporting 130 businesses with their R&I activities and realising a 25% average increase in production efficiency.
Based in the UEZ, the University funds an Entrepreneur in Residence, who delivers 1-2-1 investment and business support to start-ups and growing businesses and Innovation Manager who develops and delivers KE opportunities between UEZ businesses and UWE Bristol researchers and students. This includes live KTPs and a highly successful student internship programme.
In 2021, UWE successfully co-developed a £900k proposal with the region’s four universities to establish a regional pre-incubator, designed to take individuals from across the region, from idea to starting and scaling a tech company.
Building skills
Building skills within the region’s workforce forms an important part of the University’s approach to local growth and regeneration. We have a passion for transforming futures and are committed to creating an inclusive workforce for the future, with opportunities for all. We recognise barriers to upskilling and reskilling persist for some communities and have actively developed opportunities to address this.
UWE’s CPD and skills provision grew significantly over the reporting period to ~£15m during 2021/22. We successfully accessed new regional and national skills funding, working with local partners to co-create and deliver an innovative skills programme addressing evidenced skills gaps and post Covid-19 economic recovery. This included the following UWE Bristol-led activity:
Leveraging the success of the Small Business Leadership Programme, Bristol Business School became one of the UK’s first universities to deliver the Government’s flagship Help to Grow: Management programme. Since launch, UWE has supported 8 cohorts of 140+ SME leaders to boost performance and long-term growth. 10 further cohorts are planned.
Digital Future Factory: breaking stereotypes and challenging perceptions about STEM careers for under-represented groups. In partnership with Digital Engineering Technology and Innovation (DETI) - a collaboration of industry and academic partners to develop and accelerate digital engineering across multiple industry sectors
Digital Skills Workforce for the Future, a £430k programme (part of an £8m regional skills programme) engaging 80 SMEs to enhance and improve digital skills provision.
Skills bootcamps: delivery of higher-level technical education in Commercial Games Development, Cyber Security and Digital Engineering to 60+ learners as anchor partner of Institutes of Technology and of Coding, funded by Department for Education.
Inclusive digital bootcamps: development and delivery of training to disabled learners and women in UX design and data science, funded by the Combined Authority.
A bespoke 2-day training programme for 350+ volunteers in the University-hosted Nightingale Hospital.
Creative Workforce for the Future - £600k of ESF funding supporting the region’s creative businesses by offering a flexible and bespoke programme of professional development in inclusive recruitment for companies and placements for young people from diverse backgrounds.
OfS HE Short Course Trial – Part of a national pilot of the Lifelong Loan Entitlement (a student loan offer expected in 2025 for flexible adult learning), UWE developed credit bearing short courses on Zero Carbon and Sustainable Built Environment with industry partners Arup and NatWest
Skills for Clean Growth Workforce for the Future: £480k programme led by UWE on behalf of WECA, providing Clean Growth training to 100 businesses across the region.
Green Skills for Jobs and Entrepreneurship: Ground-breaking positive action programme, delivering green skills training; paid internships; and start-up support to minoritised 18-28-year-olds disproportionately affected by the pandemic (£750k Community Renewal Fund).
Aspect 3: Results
The University monitors and reports on the quality and impact of our key programmes of activity to ensure they meet their objectives. We provide quarterly project updates - including both qualitative and quantitative data (e.g. feedback from businesses attending workshops, numbers of new jobs created, value of innovation grants awarded) - to our funders and appoint independent assessors to review the overall impact of each individual programme (‘summative assessments’).
This information is reported internally to the Vice Chancellor’s Directorate, Research and Knowledge Exchange Committee, Employability and Enterprise Committee and University Enterprise Zone Executive. It enables the University to monitor progress on achieving its 2030 Strategic ambitions for business and community engagement and helps drives best practice and improvement across delivery of activity.
Qualitative data is reported through HEBCIS and qualitative feedback is published in case studies, marketing collateral and university web pages to raise the profile and grow university-business collaboration.
Delivering the needs of the region
Our portfolio of activity has delivered several millions of pounds of funding to the region (including ERDF, ESIF and local investment funds), leveraging significant private investment, and supporting hundreds of businesses to create new jobs, products and services. Data for individual projects is set out in Aspect 2.
Feedback from stakeholders
As a university, we have won praise from the UK’s City Growth Commission for fuelling economic growth by ‘pioneering progressive practices’. The Commission highlighted in particular the way we encourage entrepreneurialism among our students and how we work with employers to embed job-ready skills and internships into our curricula (see UWE Bristol 2020-2030 Strategy).
As set out in Aspect 1 we seek feedback from our local policy, community and large business partners by consulting on our strategic priorities and by sharing data on how we have met individual project objectives. We have a strong track record for successfully meeting the objectives of our funded activity and are therefore a trusted partner in the region for the delivery of innovation, growth and skills programmes that support local growth and regeneration.
Figure 4: Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees commenting on UWE’s Green Skills programme
We regularly seek feedback from SMEs and individuals engaging with our support and use this to improve our service, market university-business opportunities and access further funding. Examples of this include:
Figure 5: Testimonial from a Help to Grow participant
“Green Skills has undoubtedly elevated me into a new level of self-confidence. I once had doubt in my abilities, but now I am coordinating over 200 volunteers in which delivers surplus food to 400 members across the southwest region. I would not have been able to secure such a role without the support and opportunities given to me by the Green Skills Programme”. Green Skills for Jobs and Entrepreneurship learner
Figure 6: The Skills for Clean Growth team at a business event
“What a brilliant free resource this has been. And it had exactly the right tone and atmosphere - knowledgeable but informal and friendly.” Clean Growth Workforce for the Future skills workshop attendee - Claire Harris, Great Western Air Ambulance Charity
Figure 7: One of our Digital Skills workshops
"We engaged with Workforce for the Future primarily to build our own skills in the short-term, to fill in those gaps where we didn't feel as confident, but really going forward as we aim to grow the company and employ more staff, we see it as a great resource as an SME to support our new members of staff and offer them development opportunities which we just couldn't resource any other way" Andrew Lindsay - Managing Director at Cerberus Security Laboratories (Digital Skills Workforce for the Future)
“We used the grant to build a minimum viable product model and other IT infrastructure, which probably enable us to secure a pre-seed investment up to £500,000. Thank you!” Digital I4G grant beneficiary survey respondent
“It was the ideal blend of practical hands-on information and out-of-the-box thinking. I definitely felt that I left the workshop armed with the tools to take our business to the next level!” Swindon and Wiltshire I4G workshop attendee
Figure 8: Two Launch Space residents
Figure 9: Testimonial from a Skills Bootcamp learner
Public & Community Engagement
Summary of approach
UWE Bristol has a strong record of public and community engagement that spans the widest range of activities. We are a future-facing university, locally embedded, with global reach. We take a whole university approach to public engagement, with strong leadership, governance and resource to deliver activity across the institution.
We share our knowledge, resources and skills, listening to and learning from the expertise and insight of the different communities with which we engage. We work in partnership with communities, business and policy makers to shape and drive future prosperity, health and wellbeing, equality and diversity, sustainability and cultural and community development across all parts of the region and to create opportunities for all.
Aspect 1: Strategy
Our strategic approach, priorities, and goals
UWE Bristol’s Transforming Futures Strategy sets the ambition and priorities for the University for 2020-2030: UWE Bristol transforms futures, powering the future workforce, supporting local economic prosperity, shaping the health and sustainability of our communities and creating solutions to global challenges.
Underpinning this, our Business and Community Engagement 2030 Strategy establishes UWE Bristol’s ambition to build a new kind of future-facing university, locally embedded with global reach. Equality, diversity and inclusion are at the core of our ambitions and values and embedded across all our activity. To this end, the University aims to be engaged with communities, business, partners and stakeholders across the West of England to shape and drive future prosperity, health and wellbeing, equality and diversity, sustainability and cultural and community development across all parts of the region and to create opportunities for all.
We work closely with communities, businesses and organisations across this broadly-defined ‘city-region’. Many of our students come from this area and many secure jobs here after graduating. Globally, we have strong and growing levels of engagement and collaboration through international learning partnerships and with research partners.
To achieve our ambitions for community and business engagement the University developed ‘The Engaged University’ model for our 2030 Strategy, identifying our strategic priorities under six axes of engagement which include Public and Community Engagement, and Civic Engagement.
The University continues to take a whole university approach to public and community engagement, with strong leadership, governance and resource to deliver activity throughout the Colleges and Professional Services. During the reporting period, leadership was provided by the PVC Research and Enterprise, with the PVC Learning and Teaching leading on student-based community engagement alongside UWE Students’ Union activities. In 2020, a new senior role – PVC for Equalities and Civic Engagement – was created and recruited to, demonstrating and harnessing the University’s commitment to inclusivity and civic leadership.
UWE Bristol was one of the first UK universities to sign the Public Engagement Manifesto and is host to the National Coordinating Centre for Public Engagement, in partnership with the University of Bristol.
Aligning our engagement to regional needs
We work closely with local civic, public and community groups, aligning our engagement and activity with regional needs at an institutional level. We share our knowledge, resources and skills with the public, and listen to and learn from the expertise and insight of the different communities with which we engage. We collaborate with and support communities based on common interest to develop social, cultural, and economic benefit and opportunity and promote equality, diversity and inclusivity.
We promote strong civic engagement, working in partnership with the four Local Authorities across the city-region, City Mayor’s Office, the Combined Authority, the Local Enterprise Partnership, third-sector organisations, local representative bodies, government departments and agencies, to enhance prosperity, wellbeing, cultural and community development across the whole of the West of England. We work with civic partners to develop ‘joined-up’ leadership, and policy formation and implementation, taking a collaborative approach through which to address key challenges, sharing resources, expertise and influence.
Aspect 2: Support
Participation in public and community engagement (PCE) is recognised and highly valued by UWE Bristol. The University has invested significant resource and time to establish practical support and recognition for staff and students actively delivering public and community engagement.
Infrastructure, support and resourcing for PCE
The University facilitates engagement with public and community groups through a variety of ways.
Supporting and enabling students and staff to engage and contribute locally and globally through volunteering, roles and membership in stakeholder and community organisations, drawing on their skills and experience.
Employing staff to deliver outreach for schools and colleges.
Using HEIF to fund roles which support the research community to participate in local and regional festivals.
Ensuring senior staff members are actively engaged board members on civic and community leadership groups.
Our resourcing and support infrastructure enables public and community engagement to happen across the institution and takes the following forms:
provision of direct services – student volunteers, student placements/internships, provision of specialist advice (e.g. legal advice) by academics, provision of specialist skills (animation, ICT, group work), mentoring, life-long learning, free consultancy and other support, contribution to governance via board membership, trusteeships, etc.
development work – contributing to capacity building work with neighbourhood, faith and other communities, business and social enterprise, work with service user and special interest groups, civic partnerships with schools and voluntary organisations.
engagement in policy and product development and social innovation – through research and KE contributing to policy development in local and national government, public services, social enterprises.
disseminating information and knowledge to non-specialist audiences, such as public lectures, science cafes, public conferences and debates as well as more informal two-way interactions through public events such as the Festival of Nature, Festival of Ideas etc.
producing works to be seen by large audiences, such as Centre for Music concerts, visual art, performance and digital media outputs
mobilizing the university’s physical infrastructure as a public resource – Spike Island, Centre for Sport, Transport
supporting government agendas, such as engaging young people with STEM subjects, widening participation and enterprise.
Reward, recognition and professional development
There are clear career pathways and opportunities for promotion for academic staff taking a public engagement route with Associate Professor and Professor roles in KE and Innovation across Colleges and Schools. UWE Bristol’s Science Communication Unit delivers intensive masterclasses in science communication which cover a range of topics: face to face science communication, science writing, social media and visual media for science communication and thinking strategically about science communication and engagement.
The University celebrates the achievements of academic and professional services staff at a Staff Awards event. Categories include Community Impact Award for developing strong connections that are making a real difference in the region; Speak Up Award for demonstrating a commitment to equality, diversity and inclusivity; and Outstanding Research Award for developing research with impact and/or communicating research results in an innovative and imaginative way.
Excellent engagement practice
Effective mechanisms to support and enable public and community organisations to engage with staff, students and our research are available:
a Volunteering Service helps not-for-profit organisations and charities recruit student and staff volunteers (over 1500 students every year provide longer-term regular support, or act as a short-term ‘task force’ team to achieve a specific goal).
Aspect 3: Activity
UWE Bristol has a strong record of engagement, exchange and partnership that spans the widest range of activities with over 1000 external collaborators, partners and stakeholders.
Included below are examples of CPE that demonstrate the breadth and depth of our activity, aligned to the University’s research strengths: Creative Industries and Technologies; Digital Futures; Health and Wellbeing; and Sustainability and Climate Change Resilience. Research undertaken in these areas is promoted and shared publicly via the University’s Breaking Research boundaries web pages.
Figure 3: UWE Bristol robotics research
Creative industries and technologies
Resilience Toolkit for post COVID recovery for the Creative Industries: UWE researchers demonstrated and used this resilience toolkit with a wide range of businesses, creative hubs and districts through online and in person workshops across the UK, Central Asia and South America. 250+ people attended and viewed information about the toolkit delivered through Guest Speaker slots at conferences and seminars
Digital Futures
Safeguarding the Metaverse: UWE researchers worked closely with NSPCC to consider impact for children, and with the BBC and Sunday Times to support investigative journalism into 'metaverse' activity, resulting in high-profile exposés of abuses taking place in social VR. The report was discussed in Parliament and in multiple media outlets including features on Good Morning Britain, BBC R4's Women's Hour and the Daily Mail. Researchers discussed future safety recommendations based on findings of the report at the first ever EU Parliamentary roundtable on the metaverse, giving evidence to a UK House of Lords Select committee on the future of the creative industries and to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe discussing risks and opportunities.
Health and Wellbeing
In 2020, UWE Bristol worked with the NHS to convert our Exhibition and Conference Centre into a 300-bed NHS Nightingale Hospital Bristol. UWE staff helped upskill and train thousands of volunteers to work as frontline staff at the Nightingale Hospital. The facility was converted into a COVID-19 vaccination centre in July 2021, with capacity of up to 1,000 vaccinations daily.
The Centre for Appearance Research (CAR) hosts a podcast that investigates body image and appearance psychology research. There have been 116 episodes of the ‘Appearance Matters’ podcast, which has had over 150,000 downloads (https://soundcloud.com/appearance-matters)
Sustainability and Climate Change Resilience
Digital Engineering Technology & Innovation (DETI) Inspire Programme: DETI Inspire catalyses green career accessibility and progression through enhanced STEM outreach. From 2020 to 2022, the UWE team engaged over 20,206 children, 469 teachers, and 218 schools, with over 117,000 additional children reached through indirect dissemination. 483 engineers were part of the outreach, across 17 industry partners and 3 charities.
The Festival of Nature is the UK’s largest free celebration of the natural world. In 2021 the Festival developed a new on-line hub and delivered over 125 pieces of content over eight days of remote activity. This included 10 bookable on-line events, 19 podcast episodes, 42 pre-recorded films and 36 community content pieces. Attendees had the chance to get involved in co-creation of school activities as part of homes HOMEs under the Microscope, a UKRI funded citizen science project investigating airborne microplastics in the home.
Aspect 4: Enhancing practice
A granular, individualised approach to evaluating community and public engagement
UWE Bristol organises and supports evaluation of PCE based on the individual circumstances, impacts and benefits of each intervention. The University takes and applies learning across the breadth and depth of engagement activity across the whole institution, recognising that a granular, individualised approach to evaluating impact and benefits is the most effective way to measure value.
Each activity’s impact and benefits are assessed through regular interactions with our partners and stakeholders, and through the performance of the University and the region’s economic, cultural and societal success. Future impact is measured against the objectives of the Community and Business Engagement Strategy, University’s Access and Participation Plan, Widening Participation targets and Equalities, Diversity, and Inclusion Strategy.
Examples of this approach include:
Green Skills for Jobs and Entrepreneurship
UWE Bristol’s Green Skills for Jobs and Entrepreneurship appointed an external evaluator to undertake evaluation of our programme. This real time evaluation enabled the programme team to modify and improve delivery to meet the needs of learners and improve outreach for each cohort that was recruited. This resulted in changes to marketing and recruitment, leading to more young people from deprived neighbourhoods accessing the programme as well as ex-offenders through a new relationship with the Probation Service.
Start School and Launch Space
Start School is a new initiative, led by the University of the West of England (UWE Bristol), that will provide support for 150 pre-start and early formation tech/digital businesses across the WECA region. During the co-creation of the programme, the team took significant learnings from the project evaluation and stakeholder feedback of other UWE-led programmes. Resulting in a programme that would reach individuals in underrepresented communities and those living in rural areas – groups who have not traditionally benefitted from start-up support.
Figure 4: Start School
Volunteering
Every year, UWE staff and students actively engage in volunteering, supporting the third sector and community organisations. The UWE Volunteering Team regularly reviews incoming student queries to identify demand and address gaps in provision. Students have talked in depth about the positive impact of volunteering to their wellbeing, sense of belonging and confidence. As a result, volunteering has become a strand of the UWE Social Prescribing Programme, whereby students are encouraged to engage with local volunteering activity.
Future Quest
Future Quest is a UWE Bristol led programme which delivers in 75+ schools and colleges in the Bristol and South Gloucestershire region. We work with school and college communities to understand the needs of young people and use our creative framework to select and slot together activities across four themes: strengths, skills, pathways and encounters to build progressive and connected packages of outreach which can be timetabled into the academic year.
Events and festivals
Each year, UWE Bristol co-designs and co-delivers large festivals that provide significant opportunities to engage the public in our research. This includes the Festival of Ideas (150+ events across the city each year) and Festival of Nature (3,000+ visitors). In 2022, 90% of Festival of Ideas attendees responded ‘good’ or ‘very good’. This feedback is used to inform our research, to test new thinking and ideas, and to help hone and improve our public engagement at future festivals.
Figure 5: The Festival of Nature
Aspect 5: Building on success
Governance and accountability
The development of the UWE 2030 Strategy took place over a period of time, during which multiple strategy engagement and consultation meetings happened with a range of stakeholders. This included senior meetings with city leaders and consultation with community organisations, as well as direction, leadership and input from the LEP, city mayor, and local authority leaders.
Within the University, monitoring and evaluation of our strategic approach to PCE is undertaken as part of the University’s governance and management framework which is arranged into three separate but connected elements; the Board of Governors, the Academic Board and the Vice-Chancellor's Executive. The University's framework is set out as part of the University's Articles of Government (PDF).
All PCE activity links directly back to the college or professional service where activity takes place (e.g. publicly engaged researchers within a College or School; the Volunteering Team in the Library Careers and Inclusivity department; Future Quest in the Student Journey Team). At an institutional level, activity is reported and monitored through the University’s Research and Knowledge Exchange Committee, Employability and Enterprise Committee and Wellbeing and EDI Executive Committee.
External oversight
Members of the University’s Vice Chancellor’s Directorate and Senior Management Team are board members and attend steering groups for many key regional leadership groups. This includes the West of England Combined Authority’s monthly PVC and Regional Innovation groups; Bristol City Council; Bristol One City; and Bristol Green Capital Partnership. This representation delivers significant opportunity for our partners to provide external scrutiny and oversight of our activity and help shape our engagement. The appointment of Professor Paul Olomolaiye to the new role of PVC, Equalities & Civic Engagement demonstrates UWE Bristol’s serious commitment to civic engagement and EDI.
Our externally funded work is measured through the University’s HEBCIS metrics. These and other methods of evaluation, including data from the Research Excellence Framework (REF), Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), National Student Survey (NSS), projects outputs and staff time data, feed into the University’s overarching metrics. This comprises both quantitative and qualitative measures.
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