Midlands Campus and Community Roundtable

Insider Media

Insider brought together a group of leaders from higher education to look at the challenges, responsibilities and opportunities that universities face in building a greater civic role.

Transcript

00:00Hi, I'm Kurt Jacobs, the editor of Midlands Business Insider, and I've just

00:14chaired a debate here at 103 Colmall Row on the 15th floor of Brown Jacobson's

00:20offices on the role of university both in business and in society. I mean what's

00:27their role in helping drive skills, in driving innovation, as being cheerleaders

00:33and centres for civic life. Here's some of the thoughts of the people who took

00:37part. Andrew Todd from the University of Warwick. I think the takeaway thought I've

00:41had today is the connections between the different universities so particularly in

00:45the civic space you know we all have responsibilities but we have different

00:48approaches and the ways that we can build on some of those collaborations I think

00:52is really important. Zoe Hoider from Brown Jacobson. The takeaway from today's

00:58roundtable for me is how much universities are already doing and see their role as

01:03civic leaders, how much they want to get involved in regeneration in their local

01:08places, but that there is some challenge around structural change of political and

01:15other civic leadership that presents a challenge to that but they are doing

01:21things and they want to do more. I'm Bec Riley. I'm from the University of

01:25Birmingham. My entire career has been about place-based investment and my takeaway

01:31from today, I think it's important to work in partnership with our local

01:36organisations and look at what the strategic direction for place is and share

01:42that and work towards achieving new visions for places and there needs to be new

01:47structures, new funding and new opportunities created to do that. I'm

01:52Professor Carlton Reeve from the University of Staffordshire. I guess the key

01:56takeaway for me from today's meeting is that sense that universities should be

02:00focal points for their local communities. They should be these points of

02:04continuity across generations from cradle to grave being instrumental in a sense of

02:10civic pride and growth, not just economically but culturally and societally as well.

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