ID184 Research Specialisation and Reduction of our Research Funding Deficit

The Idea

Keele University has a financial deficit on our research activities of £27m per year (TRAC-R) (calculated as £33m of research income and £60m of research cost). This deficit is funded through a cross subsidy from student fees and commercial activities. We have a small international student population compared to other research-intensive Universities and therefore, the burden of cross-subsidy falls on home students. 

A research deficit is to be expected in the current UK funding model but our recovery of costs has deteriorated from 65% to 55% over the last 3 years. In parallel, UK Research & Investment (UKRI) are strongly signalling that research funding from taxation will be focussed on the Modern Industrial Strategy with the expectation of fewer grant awards but more funding per award. Therefore, competition for external awards is going to intensify. If Keele does not respond then we will suffer a reduction in external funding for research and our research deficit position will deteriorate further. 

In response, we should restructure our research to focus on key specialities and to provide support for staff to work in interdisciplinary teams to create critical mass in the areas we decide to focus on. We also need a mechanism to find and nurture the next generation of researchers and research ideas. Overall, this idea involves Keele reducing the number of research areas we work on but internally providing better support for the areas of focus. 

Why This Idea Should Be Considered

The motivation for this radical change in our University research structure is wanting to remain a research intensive institution that makes a local and global impact. We cannot maintain a thinly spread research structure as we will not be able to compete for external research funding and will be unable to compensate by maintaining a large cross-subsidy from teaching income. 

The danger of the status quo is that we fail to demonstrate that we are nationally leading in a sufficient body of research to maintain our status as a highly research active University. On the positive side, if we draw on Keele’s historical strengths as a collaborative environment we can create outward facing interdisciplinary teams that are the match of the very best across the world. 

By reducing our TRAC-R deficit we will also be able to enhance Faculty budgets and allow them to invest more in teaching innovations. This will provide scholarship opportunities for staff and lead to more active use of promotion pathways founded on excellent teaching. 

How We Would Implement This Idea

Most of our research would be organised within a small number of research institutes. These institutes would buy staff time from Faculties using QR, internally allocated funds (surplus from international and commercial activities) and margin from external grants. Staff would join institutes, if selected, for blocks of time (perhaps 5 years) giving Faculties clarity over funding contributions for staff. 

Institute Directors would be expected to achieve financial goals alongside research and knowledge exchange goals. 

Faculties’ role would focus on excellent teaching, scholarship, student experience and nurturing pre-competitive research. Faculty budgets would include funding for some pump-priming projects that allow staff to build a portfolio of research to strengthen applications to join an institute. 

Institutes would be formed by a competitive process to identify themes. Innovative leadership structures would be created to ensure opportunities for many staff with co-directorship expected. 

What Success Would Look Like

1. Increased research income for focuses areas 
2. Improved REF (or its replacement) outcome leading to more QR funding. 
3. Increased international co-authorship of research publications. 
4. Higher citations for Keele publications in targeted areas. 
5. Securing major research and impact funding awards from UKRI 
6. Increased industrial funding. 
7. Reduce TRAC-R deficit to an agreed target (eg £15m). This will release funding for teaching within Faculties.