ARCHES The Magazine of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne Issue 2 | Spring 2003 Delivering a Strategy for Success Our 40th Birthday Down on the Farm in Romania ARCHES Editorial ARCHES Contents ARCHES Features 12-13 14-15 16-17 Welcome to Issue 2 of Arches, the magazine of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne A Strategy for Success A Bright New Dawn Reunion 2003 The role of our research at the heart Looking back to becoming a Full details of the programme for of the regional economy. University in 1963. Convocation and Reunion Weekend 2003. Many of you will be aware that in January 2003 The further investment in research infrastructure would not be allowed to do this unless we were the UK government published the long-awaited is very welcome. This is principally for science. meeting an agreed target for students from White Paper on The Future of Higher Education. We have been awarded £21.45 million based on disadvantaged backgrounds. The University has As you might imagine this will have a profound our very successful recent increase in research grant had particular success with its PARTNERS effect on our life at the University so I wanted awards. However we need similar investment in widening access programme, greatly assisted by ARCHES News to share my first reactions with you. improved teaching and student facilities. donors to our alumni fund. We therefore do have concerns about the appointment of an access 11 23 All universities will be pleased that at long last On the teaching side the government plans to regulator to oversee this area, especially if it 6-7 we have a government that has recognized the expand higher education through increasing two- increases the bureaucracy of admissions. financial problems that higher educational year Foundation degrees, which currently do not institutions face. However having made a form part of our strategy. Fortunately our bid for With very best wishes diagnosis, not everyone is happy with the additional conventional student numbers has proposed therapy. On the research side the aim is been very highly rated and is likely to be funded. to have greater selectivity with the creation of a The additional income from this would be about very small group of elite universities. The golden £1 million per annum. triangle of Oxford, Cambridge and London (University College/Imperial College) is likely to We welcome the government’s recommendations get the majority of the additional money. The on building stronger partnerships between new tier of 6* research funding will be based on universities and the regional development A Harvest of Happier Lives Research News The Alumni Profile the very best of the current 5* (ie international agencies. This is already an important issue for us in the North East, as is made clear in our main quality research in more than 50 per cent of the Students and staff work to help a special Mobile phones and modern A profile of Taiwanese Museum Arches feature on the University’s active support submitted activity) but with the added proviso farming community in Romania. student life. Studies graduate Shandy Ho. that there is a critical mass of researchers. This for the regional Strategy for Success. However we big is beautiful approach militates against all but are concerned at the government’s belief that the largest research-led universities. Even though knowledge and technology transfer is the Newcastle obtained a median 5 score in the last province of the non-research intensive Research Assessment Exercise, if the Higher universities and that funding for this should be ARCHES Regulars Education Funding Council only funded grade 5 preferentially given to them. and above we would lose £4.8 million per annum. Much of the above has been obscured by the 18-19 20-22 There is considerable emphasis in the White Paper debate about ‘top up fees’. The proposal is that Events/Listings Classnotes on the need to form consortia for research. This is universities will be able to increase these from going to place increased importance on developing their current level of £1,100 per annum to a Professor Christopher Edwards Reports on past alumni activity and Catch up with the latest news from links with other strong groups within the region. maximum of £3,000 per annum. However we Vice-Chancellor notice of future events. old friends and acquaintances. 20 Wanted Can you help us to locate lost alumni? The University of Newcastle upon Tyne Magazine | Issue 2 Spring 2003 | www.ncl.ac.uk | 3 ARCHES News Twenty intrepid rowers from the University’s Boat Club are Our involvement in the Capital of Culture bid is providing local employers with a larger pool of ROWERS TRIUMPH celebrating a unique victory after challenging the DFDS Newcastle Gateshead enabling the University to draw upon the wealth top-quality, skilled graduates’. Seaways ship, the ms Prince of Scandinavia to a race across the of creativity which exists in the institution. North Sea from Newcastle to Ijmuiden, Amsterdam. joins the Projects already under discussion include an With the final decision due to be announced in IN RACE AGAINST exhibition/installation by film director Peter June, the Newcastle Gateshead Initiative is stepping The rowers, working in two teams of 10, completed the 492 km Capital of Culture Greenaway, an international literary festival and a up its campaign to get everyone in the NORTH SEA voyage 18 minutes and 57 seconds ahead of the ship after a City of Culture CD featuring selected musical North East region to ‘Back the Buzz’. marathon 16-hour row through the night, using twin ergo machines Shortlist performances from the year’s events. PASSENGER FERRY aboard the passenger cruise ferry. Find out about the latest developments at Shortly after the first edition of Arches was Dr Eric Cross, Dean of Cultural Affairs, welcomed www.visitnewcastlegateshead.com Boat Club Sponsorship Officer, Gill Harris, who organized the published in October 2002, the University was the news. He said: ‘Winning the bid would be an event nicknamed ‘Operation Amsterdam’ by the rowers, said: able to join in the celebrations which followed important attraction to the best students from all ‘At one stage we were only 1,500 metres ahead of the ship, and the announcement that Newcastle Gateshead over Britain, encouraging them to come to the it looked like touch and go as to whether we were going to be has won a place on the government’s shortlist region and then remain here after graduation, able to do it. We didn’t realize how hard it would be to keep to be named European Capital of Culture 2008. which in turn would boost the economy by going right through the night, and when we were nearing the finish it was quite tense, but really exciting at the same time’. The exhausted but ecstatic rowers arrived in Amsterdam at 10 am after having rowed non-stop from 5.30 pm the previous evening, when the ship left Newcastle. Throughout the challenge, they kept their energy levels up by eating pasta and drinking energy drinks. The principal aim of the challenge was to raise the profile of the Boat Club to help obtain the sponsorship needed to engage the services of a full-time coach to enable them to build on their strengths and compete at the highest level nationally. As exhibitions go, ‘Are you sitting comfortably’ – Paul Scott, a former Norma Lipman Research SANITARY a collection of some 40 WCs, sinks and assorted Fellow in Fine Art at the University, who, with * This year’s Northumbrian Water University Boat Race between sculptural pieces made from sanitaryware – which fellow artist–curator Lillemor Petersson collaborated Newcastle and Durham takes place on the River Tyne on had its first UK showing in the Hatton Gallery at on the exhibition with the Hatton Gallery, added: Preparing for ‘Operation Amsterdam’, from left to right, Sunday 18 May. SCULPTURES the end of 2002, certainly could not be described ‘Artists have used industrial processes creatively, are Gill Harris, Peter Tappin, Tom Earnshaw and Rob Ferry. www.societies.ncl.ac.uk/nubc/ as ‘bog standard’. and not for the purpose they were originally GRAB THE intended, for centuries. As well as drawing the crowds the exhibition, HEADLINES which was produced during the ‘WC Workshop’ – ‘Artist printmakers are perhaps the most obvious an artists’ residency project held at the premises example, using etching, engraving, lithography and of AB Gustavsberg Sanitaryware factory in the screen printing – all reprographic techniques Värmdo district of Stockholm, Sweden, in 2000 – developed for the mass dissemination of imagery Centre - a central suite of meeting rooms, Sustainability, Cancer Research and Ageing sent pun-seeking journalists into overdrive. – and adapting them for creative expression. Like Beehive Project library and social facilities where staff and and Health, will be housed in new buildings print, ceramic production through the centuries postgraduate students can exchange ideas costing over £30 million which are now ‘It’s the Loo-vre’, screamed the headline in has been largely an industrial process, but artists and develop new research concepts. under construction. Newcastle’s Evening Chronicle; while the Northern have long been employed as painters, modellers or Takes Off Echo fought back with ‘Guaranteed to inspire a designers’, he said. The rest of the money will be spent on a Other institutes to be based in existing chain reaction’. Even the national press joined in: variety of projects including the new buildings, are Informatics; Public Policy ‘Round the bend?’ said The Independent – but still If you missed the WC Workshop at the Hatton The University has been awarded Stephenson Engineering Outreach Centre, and Practice; Nanoscale Science and included the show in it’s ‘Don’t miss’ selection.