Professor Michael Gunn Vice Chancellor

Items covered Vision, values, mission statement Implementation The University Plan 2012-7 Implementation League Tables Complete University Guide The Guardian Staffordshire Graduate Student achievement NSS University Plan Issue re plan on FTUG numbers – way government has gone about the scheme – no realistic chance of increase in FTUG numbers as we first envisaged. League Tables Disappointing that went down 5 in Complete Guide – largely owing to graduate employablity. That improves for the subsequent year back to where it was. We need to do much better – Staffordshire Graduate will make a difference and our working with potential employers and impact on curriculum is already occurring But good news that we have gone up 4 places in the Guardian League Table, which is the one of significance that we have identified in the University Plan. Why includes NSS (teaching 83-3->86), overall (80-> 85) and feedback (68.3 -> 72)), Student achievement (though not value added), increase in entry tariff, and improved student:staff ratio Student achievement – important that we continue to recognise excellent work wherever it occurs. We have been reluctant to award 2.1/1 in the past, but there was a noticeable and important shift last year when 56% achieve such a result. Given that the average is over60% and the bottom decile of institutions award <50%, this is an important position at least to maintain NSS – we are now seeing improvement in our NSS results, with particular successes in many areas. Whatever we think about NSS, it is an important and permanent measure used to identify quality of provision – so we need to continue to have this as a key focus. We can all contribute positively by ensuring that our engagement with students is positive (even if challenging), that we always seek to improve, that we communicate well and effectively and that we tell them what we have done in response to their feedback. Such initiatives as the feedback academy remain a real priority for continued improvement.

Student recruitment 2013 - FTUG SNC/Recruitment Finance Student recruitment 2013 PTUG; PG; International Estates Strategy Focus for development: process & timeline for decision by Board Need to reduce amount of estate Student Systems Project SNC down – opportunities to recruit above SNC plus ABB+ but these changes are not in favour of institutions like ours. Recruitment – the real issue – importance of on-going activity in raising profile and sharing what we do and do well – open days – clearing PT going well when through partnerships with employers, eg armed services. More difficult where more traditional. PG is a challenge. International –recruited to target this year and exploring ways of exceeding target for 2014 with new head of international starting with us soon. Note there was a reduction nationally in new international student entrants this year and a sector wide concern about the adverse impact of government immigration policy and statements on the attractiveness of the UK to international students Financial consequence is that we clearly have to make savings next year; we need to keep our commitments to staff and students and we need to be able to invest in the future, so a delicate balance to be achieved. Costs savings being looked for for next year. Any contributions would be well received. And we will need to reflect on the movement of our Student Number Control for 2014 and beyond and its impact as Government policy becomes clearer. The more successful we can be this year, the better our long term position as a university of choice for students will be. Estates strategy Whatever you hear from anyone else, whatever rumours are going around, no decision has been made about the estates strategy. A decision on where the focus of development should be will be made by the Governors, and can only be made by the Governors, towards the end of this year or early next year. At the same time, we know that we have too much estate so we will be looking to reduce that, and that is an approach whatever turns out to be our focus for investment. So another plea, if we manage to divest ourselves of any estate, do not leap to any conclusions about the focus of development – we are always looking to do this and it is entirely consistent with whatever is our focus for development. Role of Governors – indicated by this and more generally SSP - importance to get involved - we have released the survey to support staff re what amount of time they spend on different activities so this may come up - we have said this is to understand the current situation on which to assess benefits of going live, but undoubtedly it also show who does what for when we come to downsize

Staff – IiP; Employee Engagement Survey; CPD Arrangements once Paul Richards has moved on Student outcomes – awards week And finally, ongoing – VC’s blog, etc You are our key asset. Clearly we are doing some good things, given the focus on CPD and StaffFest , as evidence through achieving Gold in IiP. But we know that we have key challenges as reflected in EES. Let me also say that we are facing the challenges of austerity and the new approach to funding HE that are mirrored in similar institutions across the country, we do not find ourselves in a dramatically different position from other similar institutions. ome wer emore ready, further out for 2012 than were we, so we need to catch up and even faster than we have been doing.