RESEARCH AND ENTERPRISE COMMITTEE

Minutes for the first meeting of the Research & Enterprise Committee in the 2013/14 Academic Session, held on Wednesday 2nd October 2013, 2.00pm in

S309/310, Avery Hill Campus

PRESENT:

Prof T Barnes Chair

Prof A Reed Vice Chair & Director of Postgraduate Research Ms T Banton Research Support Manager/REF Manager(GRE) Prof A Benati PVC (ACH) nominee

Mrs W Curran Finance Manager (Finance)

Dr M Davies University Director of Research & Enterprise (GRE) Prof E Galea

Prof K Jones

Faculty Chair of Research & Enterprise (Architecture, Computing & Humanities) – Observer (please see minutes below)PVC (ACH) Nominee

Prof A Lambirth PVC (E&H) Nominee Ms C Nyandoro-Kunzvi Secretary (GRE) Prof P Maras ECR Director

Prof A Westby Director of NRI PVC (E&S) Nominee Mr J Wallace Administrative Secretary (Vice Chancellor’s Office) Dr S Woodhead PVC (E&S) Nominee

APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

Prof C Birch PVC (BUS) NomineeProf S Thomas PVC (BUS) NomineeProf E West PVC (E&H) Nominee

REC-13-1 MINUTES OF THE PREVIOUS MEETING

REC-13-1.1. Minutes of the Sixth Meeting of the Research and Enterprise Committee held in 2012/13 on the 10th July 2013

The minutes of the Research and Enterprise Committee held on 10th July 2013 were agreed by the Committee as a true and accurate record of the meeting.

REC-13-2 MATTERS ARISING FROM THE MINUTES

REC-12-5.1. Postgraduate Research Experience Survey

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The Director of Postgraduate Research informed the Committee that the analysis report on the Postgraduate Research Experience Survey was in progress and would be presented at a future Committee meeting.

REC-13-1 GREENWICH RESEARCH AND ENTERPRISE

REC-13-3.1 Research and Enterprise Committee Terms of Reference and Mode of Operation

The Chair welcomed members to the new Research & Enterprise Committee for the 2013/14 academic calendar year. It was noted that three representatives from the Faculty of Architecture, Computing and Humanities had attended the meeting. The Committee noted that the new R&E Committee Terms of Reference (ToR) stated that two Faculty members nominated by each Faculty PVC were required to attend, and the Pro Vice Chancellor had nominated Profs Benati and Jones. The Director of Research (CMS) had attended the meeting as the third representative following his recent appointment as the Faculty Chair of Research & Enterprise.

The Committee agreed that the Faculty Director of Research (Architecture, Computing & Humanities) attend the meeting at the Chair’s discretion as an Observer. The Faculty Director of Research (Architecture, Computing & Humanities) expressed his disappointment at the nomination process.

Future representation from the Faculty of Architecture, Computing and Humanities would be discussed with the PVC for the Faculty of Architecture, Computing and Humanities.

ACTION: Chair

The Chair brought to the Committee’s attention, the new Terms of Reference and sought the Committee’s suggestions on how the new Research & Enterprise Committee would operate in line with the Terms of Reference.

There was extensive discussion of the proposed mode of operation and it was proposed that

1. As outlined under item 1 of the Terms of Reference, the new Committee would be pivotal in informing the development of the Research & Enterprise Strategy in order to achieve the institution’s vision set out in the Corporate Plan, and this would be done through setting targets and making recommendations to stakeholders.

In line with this, it was proposed that a Research & Enterprise Implementation Strategy be developed for the next phase of the Strategic Plan of the University – looking beyond 2017. The Strategy would attempt to develop themes which are responsive to changes in the R&E market and development of the University since REF2008 and would make proposals on how the University would

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move forward from 2017 and beyond to the next REF. The Chair and the Director of NRI would work on a draft strategy which would be discussed at the December meeting of the Committee.

ACTION: Chair and Director of NRI

2. It was also noted that although the Terms of Reference did not state a reporting structure (e.g. production of summary reports) to Academic Council, the Committee would provide an annual report to Academic Council.

3. The Committee expressed concern over the level of information that would be brought forward from the Faculty Research Degrees Committees as it was felt that due to the complexity of these FRDC meetings, attention would be diverted away from the main business of the Committee. The Director of Postgraduate Research informed members that a proposal to address this concern would be discussed in more detail under item 13-5.3.

4. A revised agenda format was proposed in line with the new Committee namely; the frequency of the Financial and Bidding Activity Reports would be changed to once every two Committee meetings and the funding opportunities would be removed from the agenda.

5. In line with the introduction of Faculties, it was proposed that the content and purpose of the School reports be updated to reflect this change. The Committee members felt that the new Research & Enterprise Committee membership would create a forum where Faculties would meet and discuss common issues as well as share experiences and best practice. It was felt that the Faculty reports should be based on set targets or measures (KPIs) that could be monitored by the Committee across the year so as to assess progress.

The Chair agreed with the member’s suggestions and proposed that a Research & Enterprise Working Group be set up with a member from each Faculty draw up a draft template of what the Faculties would report at the Committee meetings. The nominated members of the Research & Enterprise Working Group are;

Prof Ed Galea (nominated by the Chair to lead the Group)

(Faculty of Architecture, Computing & Humanities)

Dr Steve Woodhead (Faculty of Science & Engineering)

Prof Andrew Lambirth (Faculty of Education & Health)

Representative from the Faculty of Business

To be advised

Dr Martin Davies (as Observer)

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The outcome of the Working Group meeting would be presented at the December Committee meeting.

ACTION: Research & Enterprise Working Group

REC-13-3.2 Research and Enterprise Financial Activity Report

The Committee noted the Annual Research and Enterprise Financial Activity report to the end of July 2013.

Revenues for the year ending July 2013 were £15.6m (including NRI). NRI revenue figures were at £7.4.m and Schools at £8.2m, an overall increase of £1.5m (11%) compared with the same period last year.

Contracting for the year ending July 2013 was at £16.4m, of which NRI was at £7.8m and the Schools at £8.6m, an increase of £390K (2%) compared with the same period last year.

Contracting compared to money burn for the year ending July 2013 was recorded at £16.4m (including NRI). GUEL revenues to end July 2013 were £1.5m.

REC-13-3.3 Research and Enterprise Bidding Activity Report

The Committee noted the Annual Research and Enterprise Bidding Activity report to the end of July 2013.

Bidding totals to the end of July 2013 (including NRI) were £33.8m. NRI bidding totals were at £11.8m and Schools at £21.9m. The average bidding values for 336 bids was reported as £100k for 2012/13, in comparison to the same period last year where the average value of 324 bids was £96k.

Awarded totals to the end of July 2013 were recorded at £15.4m (including NRI) of which £9.6m was for bids that had been submitted in 2011/12. Annual awards by funding source were 34% from the EU, 35% from the overseas funders, 5% from the UK Centre Government & TSB, 6% from the UK Industry, 8% from UK Research Councils, 8% from European Research councils and 3% from Charities.

REC-13-3.4 REF 2014 Update

The Committee noted the following REF update.

The Research Support Manager informed members that the REF team was now validating outputs on the live system and UoAs were asked to finalise staff under the ‘pending’ category so as to ascertain whether staff would be included or not included in the REF submission.

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The REF team had also started the collection of physical outputs that would be submitted after the 29th November REF deadline. The physical outputs were accepted as a published pdf version typeset or as a hard copy book version.

A REF3 writing workshop had been scheduled for the 3rd October 2013 at Hamilton House. Nine people had registered to attend the workshop. The Chair informed members that an email would be circulated to all UoA’s seeking further information or clarification with regards to the REF3 statements.

UoAs were asked to continue forwarding corroborating statements to the GRE REF team. The Research Support Manager informed members that the contact details in the statements would be extracted and uploaded to a separate REF 5 database.

It was noted that where 100 word summaries are required, these could not be made available for all outputs as there were some outputs that are of a confidential nature. The Research Support Manager informed members that outputs marked as classified would be accessible to ‘cleared’ REF panel members only.

The REF 4 data was now available on the live system and all REF 5 data (of which three were outstanding) had been returned to the REF team by the editor.

UoAs were also asked to encourage colleagues to upload up to date items into the repository as outputs on GALA would feed into the researcher profiles. Stephen Phipps was leading on the researcher profile updates. Members were asked to email the Chair if they had any issues or concerns with the researcher profile update process.

A streamlined process had been implemented with HR to assist in the staff contract update issue reported at the last Committee meeting.

REC-13-4 FACULTY REPORTS

REC-13-4.1 Faculty Reports

The Committee noted the Faculty reports.

REC-13-5 POSTGRADUATE RESEARCH MATTERS

REC-13-5.1 Doctoral Completions Information – 2012-13

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The Director of Postgraduate Research provided an update report on doctoral completions from 1st August 2012 to 31st July 2013.

57 MPhil, PhD and EdD completions had been awarded across Faculties during this period compared with 63 completions in 2011-12. These student completions had all been signed off for inclusion in the REF2014 submission.

REC-13-5.2 Update on Vice-Chancellor’s Phd Scholarships –2013

The Director of Postgraduate Research informed the members that 20 scholarships had been offered this year of which

10 had completed registration 1 registration was being processed 2 registrations were pending and expected to start in

November and December respectively 5 students were awaiting CAS statements 2 had been re-advertised, one of which has been recently

been interviewed.An additional scholarship had been made available to the School of Pharmacy and had completed the registration process.

REC-13-5.3 Update Report on Faculty Research Degrees Committees and Interface with the Research & Enterprise Committee

The Director of Postgraduate Research proposed that in order to streamline the amount of information that would be brought forward to the Committee, no Faculty Research Degrees Committee minutes be brought forward to the Research & Enterprise Committee, but instead presented a draft summary report template for approval by the Committee.

The draft report would be in a tabular format recording key RDC matters and be reported at the Research & Enterprise Committee. The reports would have a cumulative total that would be updated at each meeting and the PGR Office would generate additional statistics and information that would assist Faculties with their annual reports.

The Director of Postgraduate Research proposed that a small group be formed to discuss these important issues and advise the Research & Enterprise Committee on recommendations for addressing such issues

The Committee welcomed the draft summary report template and made the following suggestions;

It was proposed that the Faculty Research Degrees Committee summary reports be presented to Research & Enterprise three times a year summarising activities on a termly basis. The report presented at Committee would be

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the most recent.

To include information relating to the total number of research students in each Faculty as a measure of workload in this area

To include a running total of completions

The Director of Postgraduate Research thanked the members for their input and suggested that the Research & Enterprise Working Group chaired by the Faculty Director of Research & Enterprise (Architecture, Computing & Humanities) consider the draft report and make recommendations on how the template could be improved in order to allow members to use the report as a useful management tool.

ACTION: Research & Enterprise Working Group

Following the work of the Research & Enterprise Working Group, an updated summary report template would be presented at the next Committee meeting for approval

ACTION: Director of Postgraduate Research

With regard to the ‘major issues arising’ section of the summary report, it was proposed that a Postgraduate Research Sub- Group be formed to discuss the pan-University issues and inform on recommendations to address such issues to the Research & Enterprise Committee.

The Postgraduate Research Sub-Group would have the following members;

Chair (the Director of Postgraduate Research) Faculty Research Degrees Committee Chairs (x4) REC member (x1-TBA)

The group could, on behalf of the REC, seek advice on pan-University issues at the meetings of the Faculty Research Degrees Committee.

ACTION: Director of Postgraduate Research

REC-13-6. ITEMS FOR INFORMATION

REC-13-6.1 Research and Enterprise Funding OpportunitiesThe Committee noted the following funding calls for information:

REC-13-6.1.1 The Royal SocietyResearch Grants

REC-13-6.1.2 BA/Leverhulme:Small Research Grants

REC-13-6.1.3 The National Maritime MuseumThe Caird Senior Research Fellowship

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REC-13-6.1.4 European Commission Framework Programme 7Provision of support to the ex post evaluation of information and communications technology research in FP7

REC-13-6.1.5 European Commission Framework Programme 7Capacities: FP7-INFRASTRUCTURES- 2013-2 call

REC-13-7. ANY OTHER BUSINESS

REC-13-8.1 Research & Enterprise Committee Ref Sign-Off Meeting

The Chair bought to the Committee’s attention a scheduled meeting to sign off the REF submission on the 19th November 2013, at 10am at the Medway Campus. A working lunch would be included.

Members were asked to inform UoA leads to be available on this day so as to answer by telephone on any questions raised by the Committee at the sign-off meeting.

REC-13-8.2 Research & Enterprise Investment Programme 2013/14

The Chair informed the Committee that a Research & Enterprise Investment Programme 2013/14 proposal selection meeting had been scheduled for October 4th, 2013. Outcomes of the meeting would be fed back to staff from week commencing 7th October 2013.

REC-13-8.3 HORIZON 2020 – The University going Forward

The University Director of Research & Enterprise informed members that the Annual UKRO conference would be held in January 2013 to provide more detailed information on the Horizon 2020 calls. In preparation for Horizon 2020 and in line with increasing the quality of successful bids across the institution, GRE was proposing to run Faculty Awareness Seminars to engage with potential interested research groups and assist them with proposal development, identify potential partners as well as offer mentorship throughout the process. Two Faculty awareness days would be set up before the end of December and the remaining two would be run in January.

REC-13-8.4 Vice-Chancellor’s Scholarships

The Faculty Director of Research & Enterprise (Architecture, Computing & Humanities) sought the Chair’s advice concerning the Vice-Chancellor’s Scholarships.

It was felt that the University was not attracting top students as the University’s scholarships were not competitive with studentships offered by the Research Councils. The University was offering 3 year scholarships whereas the Research Councils were offering scholarships in line with of 3.5 to 4 years. Advice was sought as to whether this issue could be addressed. The Chair informed the

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Committee that he would inform the Vice Chancellor of the issue and update members at the next Committee meeting.

ACTION: Chair

REC-13-8.5 Fee Exemption Issue of Ph.D. Students

The Faculty Director of Research & Enterprise (Architecture, Computing & Humanities) bought to the attention of the Committee issues arising with students holding fee waiver bursaries. A few students were not registered because of the change in the university’s approach to payment of tuition fees and were seeking clarification of this position.

The Chair asked the University Secretary to seek advice on behalf of the University and update him so that appropriate action would be taken to resolve this issue

ACTION: University Secretary & Chair

REC-13-8.6 Dates Of 2013/14 Research & Enterprise Committee Meetings

Special Meeting to sign off the University REF Submission19th November 2013, 10am, Room B028, Medway Campus (incl. working lunch)

2013/14 Future Meeting Dates

Meeting Papers Received by11th December 2013, 2pm, Room QA075, Greenwich Campus 18th November 201312th February 2014, 2pm, Room QA075, Greenwich Campus 20th January 201416th April 2014, 2pm, Room S309/310, Avery Hill Campus 24th March 201428th May 2014, 2pm, Room B028, Medway Campus 5th May 20149th July 2014, 2pm, Room QA075, Greenwich Campus 16th June 2014

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