Broadcast: News items

Today, 26 March, the Vice-Chancellor wrote to all staff. You can read his email in full:

Yesterday evening, I was made aware of some potentially extreme incidents involving the police on campus. Very disturbing footage has been shared appearing to involve a young woman of colour, and I have written to all students today to let them know that I have urgently raised our concerns at the most senior level with Sussex Police. It is important that they have acted quickly and are now reviewing the incident, alongside additional video footage from the incident. We need to let that review take place. We remain in close contact with the Police about this and it will be important to understand the full circumstances.

I am genuinely very concerned about this incident, both in terms of the welfare of our students and the effect on good community relations. We are working closely with the Student Union today regarding this incident and I am grateful that the Officers shared the video with us yesterday, so we were able to immediately discuss with Sussex Police.

Meanwhile, a number of developments in the coming days and weeks will have a significant bearing on the University’s medium- to long-term future.

A key component of this is the 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF), to which we will finally make our submission next week. We should not underestimate the huge amount of work that has gone into preparing this submission and I would like to record my sincere thanks to the RQI team led by Dominic Dean in Research & Enterprise and the hundreds of other colleagues who have got us into what I am confident is the best possible shape. Of course, the work of the RQI team would not even be possible without the work carried out by our researchers. I’m proud of our submission and you should be too. The results, released in 2022, will affect our rankings, reputation and attractiveness for funding for years to come.

Few researchers relish tasks that take them away from their research – although, of course, some ‘red tape’ is in place for very good reasons, to ensure strong governance and ethics, for example. Nevertheless, it is widely accepted that such tasks have proliferated in recent years. I am pleased, therefore, to have been asked by the Government to lead a review into research bureaucracy in the UK. In carrying out this review, I will be listening to people involved in research at all levels and from across the country. I know that some of the common frustrations are shared by our own researchers, so I hope that I can help make a real difference.

Back at Sussex, our research and enterprise successes continue to roll in. This week saw the launch of a new University spin-out company, Stingray Bio, that will develop new therapies for breast cancer and potentially other cancers. Building on fundamental research by John Spencer and Georgios Giamas in Life Sciences, it is another exciting development in our increasing drive to bring our research out of the lab and into the wider world.

In this vein, it is fantastic to see that Sussex’s ground-breaking research into consciousness science, led by Anil Seth, has been chosen as one of the top commissions for Festival UK* 2022, a new showcase of the country’s creativity and innovation. Anil and his team will be working with an accomplished team, including the Turner Prize-winning collective Assemble, to produce what I am sure will be an extraordinary spectacle. We’ll hear more about this later in the year.

Alongside all this, we continue to actively manage the Covid situation on campus. We will be sharing our current thinking with students and staff this afternoon, while we wait on further government guidance about when more students can return to campus. This is expected shortly after the Easter break and we will be monitoring closely and keeping students and staff informed at every turn.

It is also welcome news that the temporary facility for the deceased is no longer in use. It will remain in place on campus for now, in case it is needed again, but city officials are currently able to manage using their normal facilities. For obvious reasons, this is an important milestone in the battle against Covid and coincides with national data released this week showing that the current period of excess deaths has come to an end.

Thank you to everybody from the University and the medical school who have been involved in running this operation. Led by Head of Anatomy and Pro-Vice Chancellor for Education and Innovation, Claire Smith, the team have worked tirelessly and with the utmost professionalism and I’m sure we are all proud that through their work the University has been able to support the national effort in this way.

Our governing body, Council, meets today and there is a busy agenda. Most importantly, we are looking forward to updating them on the development of the proposals for our Size and Shape programme. I know that many colleagues will be taking additional leave in the coming two weeks, making the most of extending the extra-long Easter break this year. Because of the importance of Size and Shape, I want to update you when people are back from their leave, so I will write to you during the week beginning 12 April to bring you up to speed and I will also share information on how all staff can get involved with shaping the proposals next term.

Together with Sarah Hardman, Assistant Director in the Student Experience Division, I held a drop-in session on Zoom for students this week to replace my normal face-to-face sessions. Given the pandemic, and that people are always more motivated to complain than praise, I expected a good smattering of grumbles. Although we did hear some concerns, we also heard about how strongly appreciated the efforts that staff have put in during the past year. Whilst dealing with the impact of the pandemic has been far from easy, it has brought out the very best of our University. Thank-you, again.

Finally, this just leave me to say I hope you all manage to have a very well-deserved break over the next two weeks. Many will be working on campus and taking time off later (my sincere thanks goes to those of you who are in this position). I hope you can switch off – and that very soon we’ll be back on this beautiful campus in larger numbers once again.

With best wishes

Adam