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Come along to the first RKEO coffee morning!

R & KE Operations

You said in our recent survey that you would like to see a quarterly coffee morning where you could have a chat with people from the Research and Knowledge Exchange Office. So we’ve organised some! The first event is on 22 May 2014, starting at 9.30am in the Retreat (Talbot campus). You’re welcome to come along and have a chat with us, or just to enjoy a coffee and cake. The next event (please note the change of date) will take place on 19 June in R303, Royal London House between 9am and 10am.

If you can’t make either of these dates, we have several more coffee mornings arranged for the next academic year; the first event of 2014-15 will be in the Retreat on 30 October.

We look forward to seeing you on 22 May!

Hot beverage and cupcake

Fusion – Establishment of research collaboration, student and staff exchanges with the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

 My application to the Fusion Investment Fund (FIF) has been successful.  The funds will be used to establish research collaboration, student and staff exchanges with the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), South Africa. I will be travelling to the UKZN during Easter this month for an exploratory visit. While at UKZN, I will present a paper to the School of Accounting, Economics and Finance. This will be followed by a series of meetings with students and staff. On my return, I will apply to Bournemouth University to put in place the three relationships.

 A successful establishment of the three aforesaid relationships will have many enormous benefits to the students and staff of BU and UKZN. For example, students should benefit culturally in terms of spending sometime in South Africa and UK respectively due to differences in the two countries’ cultures. In addition to cultural awareness, the staff exchange will benefit the staff involved through observing how lecturers in a different country deliver lectures. Apart from co-authoring academic journal articles, research collaboration between BU and UKZN staff should be beneficial where the research call (e.g. Horizon 2020) requires that researchers from Europe collaborate with a partner from South Africa.

 At an institution level, the relationships should help BU in two main ways. Firstly, student exchange should increase awareness of BU in Africa which may translate into increase in percentage of African students enrolled at BU. Increasing the percentage of students from Africa is important for BU because currently less than 4% of our students are from Africa compared to 8% UK universities average. Secondly, the increase in student population from Africa will also help BU achieve the strategic plan objective of increasing overseas students’ recruitment by 15% by 2015.

 UKNZ is the third largest university in South Africa and a very good university and also shares great similarities in university teaching, research and enterprise activities with those of the Business School, School of Tourism, Design, Engineering and Computing, School of Health and Social Care. Further information about the university can be found on: http://www.ukzn.ac.za/.

 Dr Ven Tauringana, Associate Professor of Accounting – The Business School

HEFCE’s Open Access Policy for the next REF Published

Guidance, Info Days, Post-award, Publishing, REF Subjects, Research assessment, Training

HEFCE and the other three UK funding bodies have published details of a new policy for open access relating to future research assessments after the current 2014 REF.

The policy describes new eligibility requirements for outputs submitted to the post-2014 REF (commonly referred to REF2020). These requirements apply to all journal articles and conference proceedings accepted for publication after 1 April 2016. They do not apply to monographs, other long-form publications, creative or non-text outputs, or data.

 open access logo, Public Library of ScienceThe requirements state that peer-reviewed manuscripts must be deposited in an institutional (BURO) or subject repository on acceptance for publication. The title and author of these deposits, and other descriptive information, must be discoverable straight away by anyone with a search engine. The manuscripts must then be accessible for anyone to read and download once any embargo period has elapsed.

There are limited exceptions to the policy, where depositing and arranging access to the manuscript is not achievable.

This policy was developed following an extensive two-stage consultation during 2013, to which they received over 460 written responses.

 To read this item in full visit: http://www.hefce.ac.uk/news/newsarchive/2014/news86805.html

If you would like to know more about Open Access, Bournemouth University are hosting asector-wide Open Access Event on the 7th May with Ben Johnson from HEFCE presenting on the policy, places are limited so if you’re interested, please register here.

In the meantime, if you would like to deposit your full text articles into BURO you can do this easily via BRIAN, full guidance can be found on the staff intranet pages. Alternatively, there are two BRIAN training sessions scheduled which you can book on to here.

 

Deadline! Panic. Click Submit: Grants Academy Diary Part 3

Grants Academy, R & KE Operations, Training

Email flurries. Cut-and-paste frenzies. Forgetting if draft v3.1.5 is most recent despite diligent attempts to effectively dropbox. Sound familiar? Grant deadline time demands we are at our sharpest, but more often finds us high on caffeine and flung headlong into chaos. Whether one clicks submit with confidence, hesitation or blind faith, when the closing hour comes, we breathe a sigh of relief. It’s out of our hands and into the 1 in 12 success rate abyss.

Like many colleagues, I’ve been on grant teams where ‘click submit’ was done with varying shades of satisfaction. But this time, something felt different. This wasn’t any ordinary bid. This was my Grants Academy bid. A bid that had gone through three days of extensive surgery via R&KE OP’s staff development programme on bid writing run by expert consultant Dr. Martin Pickard. It benefited from Martin’s expertise, as well as the critical eyes of five interdisciplinary BU colleagues also attending the workshop. Further developed by two CI collaborators,  two external peer reviewers,  BU Quality Approver Richard Berger and the devoted attention of my research officer Pengpeng Ooi, never before had I been on a grant handled with so much personalised and professional care.  This time when I clicked submit, there wasn’t a sentence worth changing.

In two earlier diary posts I discussed the daunting task of getting started with bid writing and my (somewhat unfounded) fears of impact agendas. After the first two workshops we each went off, brains buzzing with new tips and tricks, to independently work on our bid drafts. But rather than spend hours crafting confident cases for support, those two weeks during the start of spring semester saw little time to devote to redrafting. Like the students we sometimes bemoan, most of us ended up in a last minute ‘meet the deadline’ whirlwind, turning in work we were only half proud of.

Building on session one’s tips about project formulation and session two’s insights on expressing the wider value of our research, session three provided a simulated peer review process to help us better understand how bids are evaluated and scored.  This final stage of the Grants Academy began with a discussion of review criteria, followed by a tally of the scores we gave fellow academy members, and then individual rounds of feedback on each of our six draft bid submissions. While none of us broke most research funder’s thresholds of 70% approval, few of us felt we deserved to, at least not yet.

Offering a supportive environment to watch our work get torn apart — a necessary if uncomfortable part of the bid enhancement process — day three of Grants Academy proved as beneficial as the first two. Rather than disheartening, the patterns and repetition of criticism shared across our cross-disciplinary colleagues’ reviews helped us to hone in on what desperately needed fixing. This peer review process was topped off with one-to-one feedback from Martin on where to go next with our bid’s development.

After the session a few of us stayed behind, manically typing away, not wanting to forget any of our colleagues’ sage advice. I knew my deadline was only a few weeks away and I wanted that 60 up to a 90, to fill the gap of the 1 in 12 success rate with sure-fire reasons why we deserved funding. Over the next two weeks my CIs and I racked up 57 emails, 3 hours of skype meetings and 5 budget drafts — all for just a £10,000 bid. In the words of our Grants Academy Guru, “To compete, we train.”

My biggest takeaway tip for colleagues registered in an upcoming Grants Academy session, or those thinking about enrolling, would be to come with a bid in the early to mid-stages of development. (NOT something either brand new or nearly finished.) This will allow you to get the most out of the developmental process of the workshops. Attending the sessions forces you to make time for drafting by providing structured deadlines and feedback to carry forward. I chose to develop a small Fusion Funded pilot project. 

Anna Feigenbaum is a Lecturer in CMC group at the Media School. As part of her CEMP Fellowship she created this diary of her time at the Grants Academy.  You can read her Day One Diary post here and Day Two here.  

 

Research Professional – all you need to know

Funding opportunities

Every BU academic has a Research Professional account which delivers weekly emails detailing funding opportunities in their broad subject area. To really make the most of your Research Professional account, you should tailor it further by establishing additional alerts based on your specific area of expertise.

Research Professional have created several guides to help introduce users to ResearchProfessional. These can be downloaded here.

Quick Start Guide: Explains to users their first steps with the website, from creating an account to searching for content and setting up email alerts, all in the space of a single page.

User Guide: More detailed information covering all the key aspects of using ResearchProfessional.

Administrator Guide: A detailed description of the administrator functionality.

In addition to the above, there are a set of 2-3 minute videos online, designed to take a user through all the key features of ResearchProfessional.  To access the videos, please use the following link: http://www.youtube.com/researchprofessional 

Research Professional are running a series of online training broadcasts aimed at introducing users to the basics of creating and configuring their accounts on ResearchProfessional.  They are holding monthly sessions, covering everything you need to get started with ResearchProfessional.  The broadcast sessions will run for no more than 60 minutes, with the opportunity to ask questions via text chat.  Each session will cover:

  • Self registration and logging in
  • Building searches
  • Setting personalised alerts
  • Saving and bookmarking items
  • Subscribing to news alerts
  • Configuring your personal profile

Each session will run between 10.00am and 11.00am (UK) on the fourth Tuesday of each month.  You can register here for your preferred date:

22 April 2014

27 May 2014

24 June 2014

22 July 2014

26 August 2014

23 September 2014

28 October 2014

25 November 2014

These are free and comprehensive training sessions and so this is a good opportunity to get to grips with how Research Professional can work for you.

CEMP Success: Three BU Colleagues approved as Higher Education Academy Associates

Fusion

Last week colleagues from BU’s Centre for Excellence in Media Practice (CEMP) and Centre for Excellence in Learning (CEL) won appointments to the newly approved Higher Education Academy (HEA) Associates programme. CEMP’s Director Julian McDougall, Head of CEMP’s Postgraduate Research Richard Berger, and CEMP Fellow Anna Feigenbaum from the Media School’s CMC will join the re-developed Academic Associates community. As Associates they will take part in research projects, event programming and developing the HEA’s UK and International consultancy.  The HEA is the UK’s main provider of resources, events and workshops relating to learning and teaching in higher education, servicing 28 different disciplines. In addition to running its professional recognition Fellowship programme–that many BU staff are a part of–the Higher Education Academy also offers a robust funding scheme for education research and practice.  Through their Academic Associate roles, Julian, Richard and Anna look forward to strengthening CEL and BU’s relationship with the HEA.  Continuing CEMP’s track record of internationally recognised higher education research, this role will enhance the centre’s engagement in media education research consultancy, shaping innovative teaching practice and influencing HE policy.

Fusion Investment Fund – Bournemouth Bio-Beach

Awarded & submitted bids, Fusion

Dr Roger Herbert from the Faculty of Science and Technology has been successfully awarded Fusion Investment Funding for the Bio-Beach project, in collaboration with Bournemouth Borough Council’s Coastal Activity Park.

The project will see academics from the Faculty of Science and Technology combining their ecological and engineering knowledge in order to pump-prime research on sustainable coastal development and improve public engagement in the marine environment. The team (made up of Dr Roger Herbert, Dr Bob Eves, Dr Ben Thomas, Dr Rick Stafford, Dr Genoveva Esteban, Dr Luciana Esteves & Ben Thornes) will be designing, making and installing novel structures to selected groynes and other structures on Boscombe Beach to provide refugia for marine organisms and to fulfil a variety of research aims.

Potentially, these structures will transform the groynes into intertidal reefs, with features designed to increase biodiversity; extending the intertidal range of marine organisms up the beach for the public to see. Next month we will be working with the AspireBU team and two local schools, Avonbourne School and Harewood College, who will be getting involved with the project. They will be designing and making their own structures to increase biodiversity on the groynes and will be monitoring their creations after installation to see how many organisms have colonised them.

How to Manage Your Research Data

Guidance, Info Days, Post-award, Training

Research Councils and funding bodies are increasingly requiring evidence of adequate and appropriate provisions for data management and curation in new grant funding applications. In July, the Digital Curation Centre (DCC) will be holding two half day workshops which will provide an introduction to research data management and curation, the range of activities and roles that should be considered when planning and implementing new projects, and an overview of tools that can assist with curation activities.

 The Learning Objectives of the workshops will be to:

  • understand funders’ requirements for data management and sharing
  • learn how research data management and curation can safeguard research outputs and increase citations
  • identify the processes and activities involved in good practice for research data management
  • be aware of the free services and tools available

 There will be two workshops each pitched to a slightly different audience on the dates below:

  • 2nd July 2014 2-5pm 
  • 3rd July 9-12pm  

Further information can be found on the Staff Intranet. If you are interested in attending, please book on by emailing staffdevelopment@bournemouth.ac.uk

 

This Wednesday 2nd April – BRAD – Networking and Collaboration Workshop and Lunchtime Horizon 2020 Session

Funding opportunities, Grants Academy, Guidance, Training

A last Reminder don’t forget to book yourself into our 2 events taking place on this Wednesday the 2nd of April.

I would like to draw your attention to:

Our BRAD (Bournemouth Research Academic Development Programme) which offers a range of additional training opportunities with helpful tools for developing your personal skills and grant proposals for UK or EU funding. We are delighted to include the following session:

At Talbot Campus, on the 2nd April, from 2.30-4:30pm (for more info click the link above or to book in send Staff Development a quick email)

This follow on BRAD session complements our previous BRAD Grant Writing Session held last week and provides an ideal opportunity for you to learn how to develop strong UK or European collaborative networks.

Additionally please be aware that our Horizon 2020 (H2020) information session is also taking place prior to this and is the last of our Lunctime Info sessions (before Easter)

Horizon 2020 (H2020)

At Talbot Campus Wednesday 2nd April, 12noon-2pm  (for more info click the link above or to book in send Staff Development a quick email)

Info on H2020 can be found by clicking on the link below to access the recent Blog post detailing further resources available.

What does Horizon 2020 mean to you?

Why not come along to all the available training sessions we are running and boost your chances of being successfully funded by the UK Research Councils or the European Union?

HE in the news w/c 24 March

Monday

The sustainability of the current HE funding system is being questioned once again and has been hot news this weekend. On Friday Nick Hillman (previously Willett’s SPAD) called for a rethink of the student loans system and admitted the government got its maths wrong by overestimating the amount of graduate debt that will be repaid. David Willetts told Channel 4 news that the structure for “£9,000 and £21,000 (was) working,” however Cathy Newman tweeted that she asked Willetts the question again about the possibility of higher fees after 2015 as he was leaving the studio and the minister replied “could be”.

 

Social mobility

According to information published by the Department for Education, just 0.1 per cent of year 11 pupils who claimed free school meals who then took A levels or level 3 qualifications progressed to the universities of Oxford or Cambridge in 2010-11. Oxbridge access: DfE releases free school meal stats (THE)  

Skills

The Government is “letting down a generation” of children by failing to equip them with the skills needed to secure a good job, a former Conservative education secretary has warned. In a strongly worded intervention, Lord Baker insisted that every level of the education system was “dysfunctional” and struggled to meet the needs of modern business. Generation of children left without vital skills (Sunday Telegraph)

Scottish referendum

Universities have called on the Scottish Government to provide “legally-defensible certainty” that institutions will be able to deal with an influx of English students following independence. In a submission to the Scottish Parliament’s education committee, Universities Scotland said a yes vote would “inevitably” lead to more students heading north of the border in search of free tuition. Scottish independence: University influx fears (Scotsman)

University reform

Universities must recognise they cannot continue to operate using their current business model argues Vasant Dhar. Universities unbundled (FT)

Tuesday

The sector continues to respond to reports that the RAB nears ‘break-even point’. The letters page of the Guardian feature some interesting comments, Letters – If education is for life, perhaps repaying tuition fees could be, too, while, Andy Westwood (CEO of GuildHE) takes a look at the uproar and questions what will happen next. RAB and the wizardry of student finance (Wonkhe)

Scottish referendum

A plan to charge students from the remainder of the UK up to £36,000 to study in an independent Scotland must be revisited “as a matter of urgency”, students’ unions will tell MSPs today.

Employment

Graduates rely on the public sector when they go hunting for a job in Wales, according to a new analysis published today by the Complete University Guide. Graduate job market in Wales is dominated by the public sector, according to new analysis published today (Wales Online)

Wednesday

Ed Miliband has said that Labour wants to give voters a “radical offer” on tuition fees at the next election, a possible hint that the party could replace tuition fees with a graduate tax. “Young people feel they have no control because they are going to get into mountains of debt if they go to university,” he said during an appearance on ITV1’s The Agenda programme.

Also worth looking at this interesting piece by John Denham (Ed Miliband’s PPS). Universities need to look beyond higher tuition fees – John Denham (New Statesman)

Lib Dem Policy

In contrast, Nick Clegg has insisted there is “absolutely no need” to raise tuition fees, although he sidestepped a question on whether he would rule out such a move out altogether. Clegg insists there is no need to raise tuition fees level again (Guardian)

Immigration policy

The Conservative Party’s “obsessive” focus on immigration is destroying the party’s appeal to a growing group of voters from ethnic minorities, a Tory MP has warned. Soften immigration stance or we will lose votes, Tory MP warns his party (Times)

Regulation

Writing on a new blog launched by Hepi, Andy Westwood, CEO of GuildHE, claims universities may be moving away from their current system of self-regulation via independent peer review towards an “external model of quality and inspection”. Universities warned over ‘sleepwalking’ into Ofsted-style regime (THE)

Scottish referendum

The CBI has said it is concerned about the knock-on effect a Yes vote could have on defence; financial services; energy; food and drink and higher education. Scottish independence: Should the CBI be worried about a Yes vote? (BBC) 

Thursday

Design&: Creating the Future, our new report launched on Tuesday, is featured in Design Week today. It says that a, “new report is calling for a ‘revolution’ in design education while making a strong economic case to Government for backing design-led research.” BU’s IP research features on page 12 of the report. Report calls for a ‘revolution’ in design education (Design Week)

Policy and funding

Student places: Universities with lower applications this year have had their student number allocations for next year cut, despite the government making 30,000 extra places available. Figures from Hefce reveal for the first time which universities did not meet their places quotas in 2013-14, a year in which most institutions’ enrolments bounced back after the first year of higher tuition fees. No bonanza for those who left places unfilled (THE)

Funding: Universities have been forced to slash their teaching budgets in order to protect research funds in a move that Madeleine Atkins (Chief Executive of Hefce) has admitted “will hurt”. Lower government funding will hit university teaching budgets in England (THE)

Connecting research & growth

Regional growth: A study of the economic impact of graduates recommends universities should be placed at the centre of strategies to boost regional growth. ‘Invest in regional universities to rebalance UK economy’ (THE)

International

A look at Australia: Australia’s move to a demand-driven higher education system has not increased the proportion of poor students entering the system, a report has concluded. According to The Australian newspaper, the forthcoming report by Australia’s National Centre for Vocational Education Research finds that although the demand-driven system – which was fully implemented in 2012 – has led to more students entering higher education, most of the extra places have been taken up by students from relatively wealthy backgrounds. Lifting the cap ‘fails to widen access’ in Australia (THE)

Recruitment: Universities have been warned that they are not “profit-maximising corporations” and to ditch “marketing speak” when recruiting international students. Nigel Healey, pro vice-chancellor for internationalisation at Nottingham Trent University, rounded on universities that were using international students simply to increase their income. Focus on recruiting foreign students reveals ‘mission drift’ (THE)

Partnerships: A pioneering formal tie-up between a UK university and a US university promises to be much more than a “mountain that brings forward a mouse”, David Eastwood has pledged. The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Birmingham, said that the strategic alliance between his institution and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was “probably unique at the moment in terms of its breadth and depth”. UK/US institution alliance aims for collaborative growth (THE)

Student visas: The new immigration minister has said that he wants to welcome international students to the UK, in a departure from the threatening rhetoric he used earlier this month towards universities. Foreign students: a belated welcome (THE)

Friday

Research by Hefce finds that state school pupils perform better at university than privately-educated peers with the same A-level results, prompting fresh calls for a reform of the admissions system.

Retention

Figures from HESA show that 6.7 per cent of students dropped out of university after a year in 2011/12, rising to almost one-in-five at one institution. This raises fears that school leavers are being pushed into studying at an unsuitable institution.  More than 26,000 students ‘dropping out of university’ (Telegraph)

Worth a read

‘Soft Power’ – a key asset in new international order (Guardian)

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

The following opportunities have been announced. Please follow the links for more information:

The BBSRC is inviting applications for research grants from eligible researchers with a strong track record of research in their remit to purchase items of advanced research equipment via this Advanced Life Sciences Research Technology Initiative (ALERT14) call. The capital equipment budget for this call is approximately £8M. In addition, up to £2M in additional funding may be available to purchase computing equipment (hardware and software) that provides new capability or enhances capacity for the management and analysis of ‘big data’. Applications should be in the range of £250k-£750k excl. VAT. Closing date 16:00 on 13/05/14.

ERASynBio have announced the 2nd joint call for transnational research projects – Building Synthetic Biology Capacity through innovative transnational projects. Closing date 03/07/14.

The ESRC, in partnership with the Public Policy Institute for Wales, invites proposals for research on what works in tackling poverty from eligible research organisations across the UK. A briefing event will take place in Cardiff on 08/04/14. Five projects with costs up to £250,000 will be funded with 80% of costs covered by the funder. Closing date 16:00, 24/04/14.

Are you working with a company (SME) developing innovative products and is driven by research? Then EUREKA‘s Eurostars might provide the funding which they require to gain competititve advantage. Closing date 11/09/14.

The Royal Society‘s India-UK Scientific Seminars scheme is for mid-career scientists who want to organise a small three-day scientific seminar between groups of scientists from India and the UK. The meeting may take place in either the UK or India and may have up to 20 attendees (5 from the visiting country and up to 15 from the host country). The scheme is intended to encourage scientific discussion and to promote collaboration and knowledge transfer by encouraging interaction within the wide research community. Up to £12,000 is available. Closing date 10/06/14

IC tomorrow, via the Technology Strategy Board, is offering five businesses up to £25k each to encourage digital innovation in data. They are looking for innovative commercial solutions that meet broad objectives set in conjunction with industry partners – Ingram Content Group, EE Limited, Ordnance Survey, Birmingham Community Healthcare Trust and British Library. There will be a briefing event for the contest at BL-NK, London on 09/04/14. Up to £25,000 (excl. VAT) is available. Closing date 07/05/14.

The Technology Strategy Board is investing up to £3.5m in collaborative R&D that can help businesses establish secure, resilient and reliable connections with staff who need to work remotely. They are looking for novel proposals that address the challenge of integrating different technologies to make remote working easier and more cost-effective while sharing data securely with employees operating in the field.  There is a briefing event on 08/04/14. Applicants must register by 30/04/14. Expressions of Interest must be submitted by noon 07/05/14, with successful applicants invited to submit a full proposal by noon on 10/07/14.

SMART 2014-15 Round 1 from the Technology Strategy Board is now open. Smart is a grant scheme which offers funding to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to engage in R&D projects in the strategically important areas of science, engineering and technology, from which successful new products, processes and services could emerge. The scheme supports SMEs carrying out R&D which offers potentially significant rewards and that could stimulate UK economic growth. Three types of grant are available: Proof of Market, Proof of Concept and Development of Prototype. A brouchure for businesses is available on the webiste or hard copies can be requested from Emily Cieciura (ecieciura@bournemouth.ac.uk) The batch assessment date for Round 1 of the current financial year 2014/15 is noon on 22/05/14.

Please note that some funders specify a time for submission as well as a date. Please confirm this with your RKE Support Officer.

You can set up your own personalised alerts on ResearchProfessional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s RKE Officer in RKE Operations or see the recent post on this topic, which includes forthcoming training dates up to November 2014.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on ResearchProfessional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

Congratulations to Dr. Joyce Miller (PhD by Publication)

PG research, Publishing

Congratulations to HSC postgraduate student Joyce Miller who has just completed her PhD by Publication.  Joyce Miller is a chiropractic practitioner and lecturer with over 25 years private practice experience. She is Associate Professor at Anglo-European Chiropractic College in Bournemouth.  Her thesis Effects of Musculoskeletal Dysfunction in Excessive Crying Syndromes of Infancy presents research spanning more than a decade.  Joyce studied the relevance of chiropractic manual therapy to excessive crying in infancy through a unique series of eight clinical academic papers.

 

The eight separate studies used a range of different research methods:

  1. a demographic survey of paediatric patients attending a chiropractic clinic;
  2. a record study to determine the prevalence of side effects or adverse events;
  3. a cohort study to substantiate sub-groups of excessively crying infants;
  4. a prospective observational study to develop a predictive model using likelihood ratios to forecast the presence of infant colic in a clinical population;
  5. validation of a one-page instrument to assess clinical outcomes against the gold standard crying diary;
  6. a randomised comparison trial of two types of chiropractic manual therapy for infant colic;
  7. a randomised controlled single blind trial to determine efficacy of blinding as well as chiropractic manual therapy in management of infant colic;
  8. a case-control study to investigate  long-term effects of chiropractic manual therapy into toddlerhood.

Well done!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

HSC

Money Available for Open Access Publishing

Post-award, Publishing

Back in April 2011 we launched the BU Open Access Publication Fund. This is a dedicated central budget that has been launched in response to, and in support of, developments in research communication and publication trends. The fund is also to support research in complying with some of the major funding bodies who have introduced open access publishing requirements as a condition of their grants.

The fund is available for use by any BU author ready to submit a completed article for publication who wishes to make their output freely and openly accessible.

If you are interested in applying to the fund then you need to email the BU Open Access mailbox with the following information:

  • Name of the open access publication
  • Confirmation this will be a peer reviewed paper
  • A short justification (1 paragraph) of why it is beneficial for your research to be published in this particular open access publication
  • The cost of the open access publication
  • Likely publication date
  • Likely REF Unit of Assessment (UOA)
  • A copy of the paper

If you have any questions about the Fund then please direct them to Shelly via email.

Further information: BU Open Access Fund policy

Low-Power High-Quality Interactive Digital Media: The Challenges

PG research

Dear all,

We would like to invite you to an additional guest talk for the Creative Technology Research Centre that will be delivered by Professor Edmond C. Prakash from the University of Bedfordshire.

Title: Low-Power High-Quality Interactive Digital Media: The Challenges

Time: 2:00PM-3:00PM

Date: Thursday 3rd April 2014

Room: P302 (Poole House, Talbot Campus)

Abstract: Traditional GPUs have super graphics performance and have been extremely utilised for media rich applications. However, they are not suitable for low-power mobile devices. Digital media research and development are at the crossroads. This talk looks at some of the key challenges faced in Embedded GPUs for next generation media rich applications (interactive 3D graphics and games) on low-power mobile devices. Graphics programmers, 3D modellers, animators and game developers will benefit from this talk.

Biography:  Edmond is a Professor in Computer Games Technology and the Director for the Institute for Research in Applicable Computing at the University of Bedfordshire. He is the founding editor of the International Journal of Computer Games Technology.  Edmond has worked at top institutions across the globe including MIT, UIUC, BNU, NTU, MMU, PUJ and IISc. Edmond’s research interests are in volume graphics, real-time visualisation, game based learning and game engines.

We hope to see you there,

Dr. David John

Last week’s HE in the news…

As ever, thanks to colleagues at University Alliance for the content of this post.

Monday

Sir Andrew Witty called for the boost in innovation funding in his review of universities and growth issued last year. But in its response to the Witty review, published on 14 March, the government has said it was unable to commit to raising the level of Heif in the “current tight fiscal environment”. University innovation fund will not be increased, says government (THE)

Funding

Teaching grants for universities in England are to fall by more than the £45 million announced last month, Hefce has said. Universities to get near 6 per cent cut to ‘most teaching budgets’ (THE)

Employability

A growing shortage of engineering skills threatens to hold back industry’s nascent recovery and wreck efforts to rebalance the UK economy, industrialists and politicians have said. Vince Cable told the Financial Times that skills shortages were “a massively serious problem” that could disrupt the recovery “unless we get this right”. Lack of engineers threatens UK recovery, say industrialists (FT)

Widening participation

A study has found that there is some evidence that state school students are getting more 2:1s and first class degrees. The research into 132,000 students, over three years, found state school pupils were up to 8% more likely to get a 2:1 or first-class degree than their private school counterparts with the same A-level results.

Scottish referendum

A Westminster committee has said independence would have a damaging effect on higher education and research in Scotland. Scottish independence: MPs claim Yes vote would damage education (BBC)

Women in science

Tuesday

The “hidden talent” of 2.5 million young adults is being wasted because they are unemployed, working part-time or in jobs for which they are over-qualified, the Government is warned today. A report for the LGA says 40 per cent of 16-to-24-year-olds are failing to make the most of their abilities in the workplace, with nearly 1.3 million not working at all and another 1.2 million who are “underemployed or overqualified”. In some areas the proportion is close to 50 per cent. Fall in jobless hides plight of 2.5m young adults whose talents go to waste (Independent)

Gender disparities

There is concern over female participation rates in science, but gender disparities need to be addressed in many subjects argues Laura McInerney. Education: Only 29% of English A-level students are boys. Why don’t we think that’s a problem? (Guardian)

Wednesday

A letter from a group of academics in the Guardian argues that prior to 1970 science was led by mavericks with limited funding but much more academic freedom, this led to huge scientific discoveries that have enriched our lives and driven the economy. They argue that the HE system must find a way to support blue-sky thinking. We need more scientific mavericks.

Social work

A discussion piece in the Guardian examines the quality of teaching of social work courses in response to the release of two books which are critical of the preparation courses give to students. Social work training courses need to offer high quality work placements.

Thursday

The government “will not have saved any money” by trebling fees to £9,000 and scrapping nearly all direct grants to universities, a senior sector figure has said in response to data showing the “break-even point” for the new system could be rapidly approaching. Cost of new fee regime may soon exceed the old (THE)

Politics

Universities returning to Department for Education?: Asked in an interview with the FT what he would like to do next, Mr Gove replied: “What I’d really like to do is this job, plus universities.” He added: “I think that universities and science should be in this department.” The week in higher education (THE)

Research and growth

Budget 2014: George Osborne announced that £106 million will be spent over five years in 20 new centres for doctoral training, to strengthen Britain’s science, maths and engineering capabilities. It will help to train about 750 post-doctoral students to prepare them for the demands of industry. A new Alan Turing Institute is also to be built, costing £42 million over five years, to specialise in the analysis and application of “big data”.

·         Alan Turing Institute to be set up to research big data (BBC)

·         Research centre to honour Turing (Telegraph)

·         Millions to boost training and enhance research (Independent)

·         Budget 2014: Osborne seeks to boost UK’s scientific credentials (FT)

Research funding: The UK’s research councils will look at tying funding to membership of schemes such as Athena SWAN, which promotes good employment practices for women in science, if they decide universities are failing to improve gender and ethnic diversity among academic staff. Research councils may tie funding to diversity accreditation (THE)

University-business collaboration: Universities are now “hungrier” to work with industry than they have been in the past, according to a man who builds links between academia and industry for a major pharmaceutical company. Malcolm Skingle, director of academic liaison at GlaxoSmithKline, said that the change has been helped along by the research excellence framework’s impact agenda. Growing appetite for university-industry collaborations (THE)

Social mobility

Career guidance: Improving career guidance before students apply to university would significantly cut dropout rates, analysis suggests. According to a BIS research paper, those who consulted only a few sources of advice when picking their degree course were far more likely to drop out by the end of their first year. Better careers guidance ‘will reduce dropout rates’ (THE)

International

Reputation: The UK’s reputation in higher education is being tarnished by an overseas student recruitment process that is full of pitfalls, says Zakaria Mahmood. Blog: ‘The access labyrinth for foreign students’  (Daily Telegraph)

Universities

Student numbers and marketing: Does an increase in marketing spend result in an increase in student numbers? Marketing spend up, but applications fail to follow suit (THE)

Student accommodation: More than three-quarters of students live in poor accommodation, says NUS. It also claims many struggle to get help from landlords. The NUS wants tougher regulation for letting agents, like there is in Scotland, to help stop “exploitation of students”. Many students living in poor accommodation, says NUS (BBC Radio)

Friday

It is a very quiet HE news day today but one story that may be of interest. John Raftery, who has served as pro vice-chancellor at Oxford Brookes University for nine years covering areas including student experience and international strategy, will succeed current London Met vice-chancellor Malcolm Gillies later this year. London Met appoints next vice-chancellor (THE)  

 

BRITISH INVENTION: GLOBAL IMPACT – The Government’s Response to Sir Andrew Witty’s Review of Universities and Growth

This is the Government’s response to the 2013 Witty review of universities and growth. The response sets out what the Government will do to build on our outstanding global reputation for science and research. It is quite long, so I am just going to highlight the key points that I think are of interest for BU’s activities:

  • UUK to convene an annual university stakeholder event to consider the successes of HE third mission activity as well as the impediments.
  • The commitment to invest £15m in establishing 3-4 pilot University Enterprise Zones was reiterated.
  • They will seek to further develop the indicators described in the Witty review such as citation-based measures of research strength by sector, and consider whether there is value in regularly updating the heat maps created for the Witty Review. This is important for BU’s desire to establish a creative and digital industries hub in the region.
  • NCUB, working with the Research Councils, HEFCE and the Technology Strategy Board are developing a collaborative online platform, which joins up university research and expertise with the needs of business.
  • The Centre for Cities has been commissioned by Lord Sainsbury to map the whereabouts of knowledge-based clusters in the UK, and will report in September 2014. Again, important that our region is seen as a creative and digital industries knowledge hub.
  • They will try and simplify the funding arrangements for business and innovation, and HEFCE will look at further options for supporting SMEs.
  • HEFCE will also consider providing long-term fixed allocations for HEIF funding to universities that allows stability in institutional planning.
  • All four UK Funding Bodies are considering carefully the recommendation to increase the contribution of the impact element in future iterations of the Research Excellence Framework to 25%.
  • Universities are encouraged to develop a single point of entry for SMEs involving their Business Schools.
  • They have provided seed funding to the Association of Business Schools to deliver the Small Business Charter, which will be launched in early 2014. Those business schools in receipt of a Charter Award should gain a role in the delivery of Government support schemes such as Growth Vouchers and Start-Up Loans.
  • They will propose to LEPs that innovation is a central theme at the next LEP Network Conference, at end March 2014.
  • Universities will be asked to take a leadership role in identifying areas of comparative advantage and embedding these appropriately within LEP strategies to maximise their impact.
  • They will encourage LEPs and Universities to together champion arrow projects, and work with the Technology Strategy Board, UKTI and other key stakeholders.
  • They will create an Advisory Hub for Smart Specialisation, which will share and disseminate best practice, improve alignment connections between different partners and support LEPs in delivering stronger collaborative propositions through a better coordinated and informed capacity.
  • The Technology Strategy Board will work in collaboration with LEPs and the Devolved Administrations to maximise the UK’s EU funding opportunities for innovation including ESIF and Horizon 2020.

 If you would like further information I’d recommend the table at the end of the document.