Negotiating University Growth

First, to be seen as a truly global university we need to be able to offer a full range of programmes to an excellent standard and to be recognised as a leading player in research, not just across two or three disciplines, but across all the subjects that we offered. To do this, it was essential that we invested, primarily in the very best academics available, but also in the facilities we needed to support those people and the students they attracted. To invest we needed resources, and it is still the case that the primary source of income, for all universities, especially in the current climate, and the one that we had most control over, was that which we received from student fees and particularly the income derived from international student fees.

Second, and closely related to the first reason, was that the university needed to get into a position where we were financially sustainable. At our original size we were entirely dependent on contingencies and found it difficult to release funds to invest in student support, the estate, research support and other factors to the level that we would like. If we could grow, we reasoned, and therefore in overall income, we would know where we could achieve efficiencies (both in professional services and elsewhere) and therefore we could release funds to improve the services that are available, as well as providing resources to invest in new initiatives for the future. It was essential, therefore, that this growth did not just happen in an uncontrolled fashion, but that it was carefully planned and managed. This is what we aimed to achieve through the development of a ten-year strategy, leading to financial stability and sustainability and providing us enough head room, in three, five- or seven-years’ time to do what we needed to do to be the global institution that we aspire to be. That, at least, was the plan.

Growth, however, offers many challenges, even if the students are there to be attracted. Core to these challenges was the inevitable time lag between any immediate growth in numbers and the subsequent investment needed in staff and student support. We were committed to provide the necessary investment in those areas where growth was planned and was seen to be at its strongest. However, it was not always possible to predict precisely where these were going to be. Beyond this, however, there were three other, more specific challenges that I want to recognise, and to offer some insight into what we did to meet them.

The first is that there are always limits on growth that is focused simply by doing more of the same. Many programmes across the University were already reaching the limit of the numbers they could achieve (either because of the number of students available, or because of practical limitations internally). Growth in these areas, while still possible, is always going to be marginal. We recognised, therefore, that growth demands doing new things. This may be through new programmes (new masters and undergraduate programmes within existing subject areas, linking with institutions overseas in joint or dual degree programmes, or developing whole new areas such as Chemistry and Education at Swansea). This was planned through the annual Business Planning Round and each College was asked to produce a list of new programmes that it was intending to develop over the next five years. This could never be fixed in stone, and we were always open to changes in the market and to initiatives from individuals who saw opportunities for development. It was the role of the Programme Management Board, however, of which I was chair, to manage this process and to oversee the strategy for growth through the development of new programmes.

The second challenge comes in delivery. Class sizes will inevitably grow, there is a premium on space, across both campuses in Swansea, and there is inevitably a limit to what is possible unless we begin to take significant action to plan well in advance. Building work will never keep pace with the growth in student numbers, but that is only an issue if we assume that the growth will only come through doing more of what we already do at present. Teaching is changing. New technologies are opening up new possibilities. Students are engaging in learning in very different ways to the way they did when I started out in this profession. Learning technologies, however, are not a simplistic answer to all our problems of growth.

We do need to recognise the changes that are happening and the ways in which new technologies can help to improve the learning experience of students, while also perhaps challenging our need for lots of time spent in large lecture theatres or in individual face to face interactions. There are also things can be done structurally, in terms of the academic year, changes to regulations, rethinking assessments etc. that can both bring benefits to student experiences while also enabling us to manage larger student numbers more effectively. At Swansea the Go Beyond project was aimed, in part, at looking at all these issues and we explored several of the options that were available.

The third challenge, however, is student support. We all recognise that the stresses and strains on students are probably more significant today than they have ever been. We need to be aware of the impact of all these policies on the student body, and we were always very grateful at Swansea University that we were able to work alongside the Student’s Union as we aimed to address these impacts. Student support, however, in terms of personal tutoring and fundamental welfare provision was among the first things that we reviewed during my time at Swansea. We worked with the Student’s Union, academic and professional services staff, to put forward a strategy and proposals that radically rethought this area of our work, providing a much clearer view of what academic tutors were expected to do, for example, and attempting to provide the appropriate support mechanisms in terms of both welfare and academic skills that were necessary to underpin the anticipated growth. I am not entirely sure, however, that we always got this right.

Clearing was something that Swansea University always did well, and I have great memories of the way the whole team, the whole university, pulled together to make that work. Growth in student numbers happened, practically every year, and it offered us many exciting opportunities and challenges. The whole University community was involved in, and committed to, the recruitment process and were fully behind our objectives. But this was the kind of work that never seemed to stop. Each year we all had to work together, to reflect on the challenges, and to see how the next few years could be transformed into opportunities to develop new ways of working and new opportunities for our students. Growth in student numbers never did answer all our problems, but the work we did to tackle it, and to learn how to cope with it, certainly made for a better university.