UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE
COURT
7 May 2004
Present:
The Chancellor (in the Chair), the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Goddard (Deputy ViceChancellor), Professor Page (Pro-Vice-Chancellor), Miss L Allason-Jones, Professor
T Anderson, Dr J C Appleby, Mr A G Balls, Professor P H Baylis,
Professor D R Charles, Dr J N Coleman, Professor A Crowe, Mr C J Davies,
Mr H Faulkner-Brown, Mr J J Fenwick, Professor A E Gillespie, Mrs M O Grant,
Dr S M Haile, Ms C M Harvey, Dr R Hawley, Miss F M Kirkby, Dr H Loebl,
Mrs S Murray, Mr S Hung Ng, Professor P J W Olive, Mr N Sherlock,
Mr H M Shukla, Mr A C Taylor, Professor J A Walker, Lord Walton of Detchant,
Councillor J Watson, Professor M J Whitaker and Mr D K Wilson.
In attendance:
Dr J V Hogan (Registrar), Mr C J Cox (Director of Development),
Mr T T McCarthy (Director, International Office), Mrs D A Michie
(Senior Assistant Registrar).
Apologies for absence: Professor M J Atkins (Pro-Vice-Chancellor), Mr W R Atkinson,
Dr E G N Cross, Mr D Davidson, His Honour Judge David Hodson,
Mr J Jeffery, Councillor L Kennedy, Professor Li Wei, Lord Bishop of
Newcastle, Dr K J Orford, Dr E Ritchie, Sir John Willis and
Professor N J Young.
MINUTES
7.
MINUTES
The Minutes of the meeting held on 15 December 2003 were approved as a correct record
and signed.
8.
MATTER ARISING FROM THE MINUTES
(Minute 5, 15.12.2003)
Court Steering Committee
Received a report from Court Steering Committee on (a) progress with the work of the
Committee to date and (b) the appointment of co-optative members of Court.
[Circulated with the Agenda as Document A. Copy filed in the Minute Book.]
Considered:
(a)
The recommendations contained in the report;
Court 7 May 2004
(b)
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The appointment of a lay member ‘by and from Court’ to serve on Court Steering
Committee from 1 August 2004 until 31 July 2007 in place of Mr Atkinson.
After noting that:
1.
Court Steering Committee had met twice and had made some progress. An initial
assessment of possible lay members of Court had been made and it had been agreed
that prospective members need not be resident in the North East but should be
supportive of the North East. A paper on progress would be presented to the
December meeting of Court;
2.
As the Statutes had not yet been amended, it was not possible to implement the
recommended changes to the membership fully. There were therefore four vacancies
in the co-opted, lay membership of Court. Mr Peter Kellner had agreed to be
nominated and there were candidates under consideration for the other three
vacancies;
3.
It was suggested that those co-opted lay members whose term was due to end on 31
July 2004 and whose names were listed in the report should be reappointed for one
year subject to their willingness to continue to serve;
4.
Although science and engineering were not listed separately in the list of sectors on
which the advice and opinions of members of Court would be particularly useful, it
was included within the Science and Health strand, was certainly being borne in mind
and would be expanded;
5.
In November 2004, HEFCE was due to publish a report on best practice in University
governance and the University would need to review how certain areas operated in
the light of this report. The draft code was available and would be made available to
the next meeting of the Steering Group so that some initial thought could be given to
how Court could contribute most effectively to the University in the future;
6.
As the members of Court Steering Committee acted as Court’s representatives on
Council Nominations Committee and were making recommendations about
University policy, it was arguable that Court Steering Committee should be
representative of Court as a whole and that an academic member of staff should be a
member. However, the original suggestion of the membership being solely lay had
been made as it was considered that lay members might have a wider knowledge of
the support which might be available and it could be argued that the presence of the
Vice-Chancellor and Registrar at meetings meant that the academic community was
represented. In addition, as Council Nominations Committee only considered the lay
membership of Council and the academic membership was appointed by a different
route, it was appropriate that lay members made the recommendations;
7.
Court Steering Committee had been established to help achieve the effective
undertaking of business by Court. One of its main tasks was to advise the Chancellor
on appropriate items for Court agenda to ensure that it was of interest to members and
contained matters to which members could usefully contribute. If the membership
was increased it would be difficult to arrange meetings and agree agenda items,
however any member of Court could feed items and suggestions to the Committee.
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Court 7 May 2004
Resolved that:
9.
(i)
The membership and terms of reference of Court Steering Committee should be
reviewed at the December meeting in order to take into account any implications of
the HEFCE report on governance;
(ii)
The recommendations in the report from Court Steering Committee be approved;
(iii)
A letter inviting nominations for a lay member ‘by and from Court’ to serve on Court
Steering Committee be sent to all members of Court but that the appointment be
limited to one year in the first instance in the light of the discussion on membership
and the forthcoming publication of the HEFCE report on best practice in governance.
MEMBERSHIP
Reported that Dr Ella Ritchie had been appointed Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Teaching and
Learning) with immediate effect until 31 July 2007 and would be an ex officio member of
Court for that period.
The Chancellor congratulated Dr Ritchie and welcomed her to her first meeting of Court in
this capacity.
10.
PRESENTATION BY THE VICE-CHANCELLOR
Received an oral presentation by the Vice-Chancellor on planned future international
developments.
[A copy of the slides which the Vice-Chancellor used in his presentation were circulated with the
Agenda as Document B. Copy filed in the Minute Book.]
After noting that:
1.
The University’s mission was to be world-class University with teaching informed by
research. It also wished to play a leading role in the economic, social and cultural
development of the North East of England;
2.
In order to achieve this mission, the University needed to attract and retain the best
staff and the best students, which meant that the University had to provide excellent
facilities. This process had begun with the opening of the Northern Cancer Research
and Devonshire buildings. These buildings allowed critical mass to be created and
helped to enable people to come together and work in a synergistic way on different
aspects of a subject;
3.
The University’s total income had grown significantly since 1995-99 and in the
period 1999-02 it had grown by 24.3%, which placed it at the top of a table of
comparator universities. In addition, the University had done well in the recent
HEFCE funding allocation. This University was now the 11th most highly funded
university by HEFCE;
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4.
A project was underway under which Manchester University and UMIST would
merge, so creating an institution with 9,000 staff, 30,000 students and a combined
income of £420m. This would establish a very strong institution in the North West
which could not be ignored and, if this University was to compete, consideration
would need to be given to changing the way it operated;
5.
The University had several major growth projects in hand, such as the development of
the Business School and the Technology Village. It was also planning to build a
series of bridges between the University and the National Health Service, not just in
the clinical area, as there were enormous opportunities here for growth and
collaboration;
6.
The United Kingdom had 16% of the world market of international students, which
was an amazing success story. This was both very important for the economy and
produced a large network of friends of this country. This University had had a
significant growth in the numbers of international students, had invested in
international recruitment and worked to change people’s perceptions in this area, and
the outcome had been a quite spectacular growth in income. This additional income
had allowed the University to invest and also create a wide variety of links around the
world. However, the ratio of income from international students to total income had
not changed and so there was capacity for further growth;
7.
If the University decided to go ahead with the proposed international development,
which had been supported by Strategy Board, it would need to invest so that
international students had a quality experience while they were here, but it would also
need to consider carefully the implications of greatly increasing the numbers, either
here or by developments within countries. Problems could be caused if classes were
dominated by a group from another country and the University would need to bear
this in mind;
8.
Consideration had been given to a merger with Durham University, particularly as
both Vice-Chancellors were due to retire in the same year which would overcome the
usual difficulty of who should lead the combined institution. However there were a
series of issues involved which was currently preventing this moving ahead despite
there being several collaborative projects already in place. One issue was that if they
merged the University would have three separate campuses, the capital costs of
remerger would be high and the challenges posed would be great. However, it was
important that the North East had world class higher education provision and any
assistance members of Court could give in taking discussions forward would be
welcomed;
9.
Although there could be great benefits derived from merging with Durham there were
also risks. Only 10% of mergers in the last 10 years had been to the benefit of the
workers and shareholders and so it was clear that mergers did not always contribute to
success. The creation of the two separate universities had partly come about because
of the difficulties caused by one half being collegiate and the other not, and so careful
consideration should be given to any proposal to remerge in order not to fall into the
same situation as before;
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Court 7 May 2004
10.
An alternative to a merger could be to establish a more iterative relationship with
Durham and develop more joint initiatives. This had already started with the
rationalisation of linguistics and religious studies which had created critical mass in
these subjects, so allowing each grouping to perform better. In this way it would be
possible to create world class centres which would bring practical benefits to both
Universities;
11.
Applications were increasing from the whole of the Middle East and a recent study
had stated that Asia was the main source of international students. Another study had
found that business studies was the most popular subject for students from this part of
the world. At Newcastle, international student numbers were highly concentrated in
certain subjects, for example in the Business School and Electrical and Electronic
Engineering, with very few in certain areas, such as Medical Sciences. If the
University wished to achieve further growth in international student numbers, it
would need to be demand driven, not supply driven as now.
Resolved that the Vice-Chancellor be thanked for his helpful presentation.
11.
TOP-UP FEES
Received an oral report from the Vice-Chancellor on the University’s position regarding topup fees.
Noted that:
1.
The University’s position regarding top-up fees had been debated by both Senate and
Council and it had been agreed that the University should charge £3,000 for all
courses, since it would be difficult to claim to be a top university and then give the
impression that some courses were not worth £3,000;
2.
The House of Lords had been debating the issue and it was virtually universally
recognised that universities desperately needed more money and that the proposed
fees would only address approximately 50% of the deficit. The House objected most
to the proposal to establish the Office for Fair Access (OfFA) as, although the
government claimed it would not interfere with universities’ policies on admissions, it
was not clear why OfFA was being proposed if this was not the case. There would
therefore be a few amendments proposed to reduce the effect of OfFA. The debate
would be continuing;
3.
In relation to certain benchmarks the University was significantly adrift and, if OfFA
was established as proposed, discussions would have to be held. If the University
was not allowed to charge fees because of this position there could be an adverse
effect on its financial stability;
4.
A matter of major concern was that, if fees were introduced, postgraduates would be
deterred from applying by the prospect of a huge debt at the end of the programme.
There was already a decline in interest, however the University could be doing more
in part-time postgraduate study opportunities and work based learning and was falling
behind some comparator universities. Consideration needed to be given to
Court 7 May 2004
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developing different ways of delivering programmes in the light of the falling
numbers of traditional postgraduate students;
5.
12.
All of the Russell Group universities supported the proposal to introduce fees, as all
of them needed the additional funds.
LAY MEMBERS OF COUNCIL
Members of Court were invited to suggest candidates for consideration for appointment to
the lay category of membership of the University Council. Members in this category shall
not be members of staff or salaried officers of the University. Since the number of vacancies
in any one year is limited, suggestions should be submitted in confidence and no
communication should be entered into with prospective candidates at this stage.
Nominations should be submitted in writing, in an envelope marked ‘Confidential – Council
nomination’, to Mrs Dinah Michie, Senior Assistant Registrar, Executive Office (Committee
and Governance), by not later than noon on Friday 14 May 2004.
13.
TERM NAMES
Reported that Senate had resolved that the names of terms be changed from Epiphany, Easter
and Michaelmas to Autumn, Spring and Summer, with effect from the beginning of the 200405 academic year.
14.
MEETINGS 2004-05
Reported that meetings of Court in the forthcoming academic year would be held on:
13 December 2004 at 11.30 am
6 May 2005 at 11.30 am