Faculty of Science

Faculty Board

SCI04-M3

Minutes of the Fortieth Meeting of the Faculty Board held on 3 November 2004.

Members: Professor K C Parsons (Chair), Dr K S F Brooke-Wavell (ab), Dr S D Brown (ab), Professor P W H Chung, Dr A C Croft (ab), R J Dawson, Professor J P Feather, Professor R H J Grimshaw (ab), J F Harper, J Harrison, Dr M C Harrison, Professor R A Haslam (ab), Dr G Havenith, Dr S N B Hodgson, Professor R S Kalawsky (ab), Dr A Kay (ab), Professor F V Kusmartsev (ab), Dr P A Lawson, Professor C M Linton, P Lund, Professor V McKee (ab), I R Murray, Dr L R Mustoe (ab), Dr K U Neumann, Professor P C B Page, Professor A C Pugh, Dr W G Salt, M Squelch (ab), Professor Sir David Wallace (ab), Professor P Warwick, Dr D R Worrall

Apologies for Absence: Dr K S F Brooke-Wavell, Dr A C Croft, Professor R A Haslam, Professor R S Kalawsky, Dr A Kay, Professor V McKee, Dr L R Mustoe, Professor Sir David Wallace

In Attendance: Miss M T Whyte (Secretary)

04/39 Minutes

SCI04:M2

The Minutes of the Thirty-ninth Meeting of the Science Faculty Board, held on 20 May 2004, were confirmed and signed.

04/40 Dean Report

04/40.1 Development Plans

Operations Sub-Committee had received and provided feedback (via the Dean) on all Departmental Development Plans. The Dean would meet with each HoD to discuss the feedback in more detail. The plans were intended to help Operations Sub-Committee to consider requests for new/replacement posts in the context of future departmental development.

04/40.2 Deanery Visits

The next round of Deanery visits was scheduled for November/December. The Secretary would circulate guidance to HoDs to help them to prepare for the meetings. ACTION: MTW

04/40.3 Research School of Informatics

LISU had re-located to the Research School of Informatics (Holywell Park). A number of staff and research students from Computer Science and Information Science would be relocating shortly. The Director post had been advertised and it was hoped that an appointment would be made shortly after Christmas. In the meantime, the Dean would provide leadership and strategic management to the initiative. An office in Holywell Park had been allocated for the Dean and he would hold regular management and strategic meetings with the staff involved.

04/40.4 Away Day – September 2004

Members of the Directorate had attended an Away Day in September at which each HoD had presented their Departmental Development Plan, and general discussions regarding the strategic direction of the Faculty took place. At the Away Day it was agreed that international recruitment should remain high priority. Initiatives to increase research income would be given higher priority than last year, primarily as an aid to increasing research vibrancy and in anticipation of RAE 2008 criteria (not yet known).

04/40.5 Prestigious Lecture Series & Events Programme

Simon Singh was visiting the University on 8 November to give a lecture as part of the Faculty’s Prestigious Lecture Series. The Faculty was organising a number of events, aimed at promoting science both within, and outside of, the University. Details of events would be published on the Faculty website.

04/40.6 Tuition Fees and Business Plan Modelling

The University was modelling various business plan scenarios following the introduction of top-up fees from 2006.

[Secretary’s Note: Top-up fees were discussed more fully at a later item. See Minute 04/45 ]

04/40.7 University Estates Strategy

Council had received a presentation on the development of the Estates Strategy at its meeting on 29 October.

04/40.8 Academic Collaboration

Discussions between Loughborough University and Leicester University were still ongoing with respect to the departments of Chemistry and Physics. Both universities were exploring the possibility of electronic transmission of Physics lectures between the two sites.

04/41 Associate Dean (Research) Report

04/41.1 RAE - 2008

Main Panel Chairs had been announced in September. Further information on the membership of sub-panels and the assessment criteria to be adopted for each UoA was awaited. The original HEFCE timetable appeared to have slipped. This was of concern as it was difficult to prepare for the exercise without knowing the assessment criteria etc.

04/41.2 Small Grants and Travel Awards

Applications for the first round of Small Grants and Travel Awards were now being invited. The closing date was 10 December 2004.

04/41.3 Research Grants and Contracts

The ADR presented figures for research grant and contract income as follows:

Faculty	2002/03	2003/04
Engineering	£12M	£15M
Science	£7.9M	£7.1M
Social Sci & Humanities	£5.6M	£5.3M

It was disappointing that the Faculty had not met its target for 2003/04 and in fact income had decreased in comparison to the previous year. All departments are strongly encouraged to increase research grant and contract applications/income in the current academic year. The Research Office had published an analysis of research grant and contract applications success rates across the three Faculties. The overall success rate for Science was 43% but for Research Council grants, the figure was only 18%.

04/41.4 Transferable Skills Training for Research Students

It was an EPSRC requirement that EPSRC-funded students should undertake a minimum of 30 days monitored transferable skills training during their research programme. The University had decided to extend this requirement to all research students, starting with the October 2004 intake. Dr Brigette Vale was organising a meeting for all Research Co-ordinators to explain the scheme in more detail. A number of workshops for Research Student Supervisors were also being arranged. New research students had been informed of the scheme at their induction in October. The onus was on the student to complete the forms. Some monitoring would be required but the Dean had been reassured that the administrative load would fall on central support service sections and not academic departments.

04/42 Associate Dean (Teaching) Report

04/42.1 Student Recruitment

The Dean placed on record his thanks to the Admissions Tutors for all their hard work over the summer.

The ADT reported on the latest recruitment position (as at 3 November) as follows:

Undergraduate

· UK/EU: 675 against a target of 697.

· International: 56 against a target of 80.

· Chemistry, Mathematical Sciences and IPTME had all experienced an increase. Computer Science had recruited significantly below target - this was representative of national trends but presented a number of issues for the department and the Faculty.

Postgraduate

· UK/EU: 77 against a target of 110.

· International: 139 against a target of 190. This represented a decrease of 11 students (intake) compared to 2002/03 despite specific efforts to increase recruitment [NB applications had increased but intake was lower]. More realistic targets were required for future years.

International Recruitment

· International recruitment was below target across the University, reflecting the national trend. Other countries (e.g. America and Australia) had also suffered a decline. Whilst the reasons behind this were not fully known, it was believed that cheaper alternatives and visa problems were major contributing factors. There were specific problems related to postgraduate applicants from Pakistan, Nigeria and Ghana where the take-up of places was averaging at about 1/30. It was thought that this was due to individuals making multiple applications and accepting offers from more than one institution. The International Office was considering the introduction of deposits to avoid a similar situation occurring in future years. Whether or not deposits were introduced, departments would need to reassess conversion rates from these countries and make more conservative estimates of intake based on application figures.

· Computer Science commented that, in their experience, applications were held up in the central PGT Office and that this could be adversely affecting the conversion rate. Other departments had not had the same experience and it was agreed that the ADT would pursue the matter with the PGT Office and representatives from Computer Science. ACTION: ADT In the meantime it was suggested that departments should respond to applicants with a notional acceptance and communicate regularly with them to inform them of progress with their application. Dr Salt was asked to advise on an appropriate form of words. ACTION: WGS

· Dr Salt had circulated information about the University and the Faculty to International Schools and Science Specialist Schools. International Schools were an increasingly important market for international recruitment.

· A member reported that some international students appeared to have had their fee status incorrectly assessed and this was beginning to cause problems. The ADT would investigate with the Academic Registry. ACTION: ADT

Intake Quotas 2005

The intake quotas for 2005 had not yet been agreed. There was some pressure from the University to introduce quotas at departmental, rather than Faculty level. This would only succeed as intended if there were strict penalties for departments that over-recruited. If there was a move to departmental quotas, departments would need realistic targets. In the meantime, the Dean and the ADT were defending the 697 quota.

04/42.2 University Open Day

The ADT sought members’ reactions to the University’s suggestion of introducing a two-day Open Day in September 2005. Several members were in favour of the suggestion but felt that it should be split into Science & Engineering on one day and SSH on the other to reduce the administrative load on academic departments. Further comments should be forwarded to the ADT. ACTION: All

04/42.3 Institutional Audit

The full report was now available on the QAA website.

04/42.4 Academic Appeals

The ADT reported that an increasing number of project students were challenging the amount of supervision received as part of an appeal against their results. Departments needed to demonstrate that all students had had adequate access to supervisors. All contact between supervisors and students should be formally recorded.

04/43 Strategic Review Group

The Strategic Review Group (formally Moderation Working Party) continued to meet on a regular basis and had made a formal report to both Senate and Council. The recommendations contained within the first report (agreed in principle by Senate in June 2004) were now being taken forward. The main recommendations detailed in the report were as follows:

· The formation of Research Schools

· The formation of Academic Schools. There were no strong proposals at present. Faculty Board was reminded that Senate had only agreed this recommendation in principle, subject to further detailed discussion at Directorates.

· The dis-establishment of Faculty Boards. This had been referred to the Academic Registrar as part of the Review of the University Committee Structure. If Faculty Boards were abolished, there were a number of constitutional and democratic issues to be addressed.

· The possible move of the School of Sport and Exercise Sciences into the Faculty of Science had been put on hold for the time being. The University did not want to disrupt academic structures in the lead-up to the RAE.

04/44 Faculty Strategic Plan 2004/05

The Dean presented the Faculty Strategic Plan. Each section (focussed on core activity) was split into objectives, key performance indicators and targets. The nature of the plan meant that targets were accumulative and assumed that underperformance in one year would be compensated for in another. In some cases the accumulative targets in a given activity were clearly beyond reach and the expectation was that, through a dynamic business plan, departments could balance the books by “over-achieving” in another activity. Virement between targets should be done in a managed and planned way, demonstrated by, and detailed in, the Departmental Development Plan. During his presentation, the Dean highlighted the following issues:

Research	· research students generally at or exceeding targets · research income significantly below targets
Widening Participation	· Aimhigher was one opportunity · what other opportunities existed?
Business Innovation & Knowledge Transfer	· missed opportunities · no current strategy: must be rectified
Human Resources	· work required on recruitment, retention & training
Short Courses & Conferences	· not taking advantage of potential – usually 0 line in business plan · should be seen as *enabling* activity

The Faculty Strategic Fund would be spent in line with supporting initiatives identified within the Strategic Plan. The Dean would revise and circulate the Strategic Plan before Christmas. ACTION: Dean

04/45 Tuition Fees and Bursaries

SCI04-P15

Following the introduction of top-up fees from 2006, the University would be introducing a bursary scheme in agreement with the Office of Fair Access (OFFA). The University would be obliged to provide means-tested assistance which would be administered centrally. In addition, departments had been asked for views of merit and subject based bursaries. The Faculty position was that merit or subject bursaries should be handled at departmental level. All departments had submitted proposals to the Tuition Fees Strategy Group. There were a number of difficulties in assessing the market and setting bursaries at an appropriate level, not least because departments did not know what competitor institutions were doing. A degree of flexibility post-2006 was required to make necessary adjustments.

Members queried where the cost of departmental bursaries would be borne. Several departments in the Faculty could suffer serious financial losses if they were to fund the bursaries necessary to attract students. The University had not yet agreed upon the proportion of additional funds that would be income streamed to academic departments. Most departments were concerned that the majority of additional income would be top sliced and that the departments who “earned” it by recruiting students would not benefit. Departments required funds to enhance the services provided to students and would be expected (by students and parents) to show how the additional income from top-up fees was being spent.

The Dean commented that the University should give more consideration to rewards in kind (e.g. free or reduced rate accommodation).

Departments needed to know the agreed position was as soon as possible so that they could publicise bursary schemes for the 2006 entry.

04/46 National Student Survey

SCI04-P16

All departments had been well briefed about the National Student Survey and were taking appropriate action to ensure the Faculty got the results that it deserved. One of the problems identified was that students did not necessarily recognise when they were receiving feedback. Some departments had come up with ideas for making feedback sessions explicit such as renaming contact with the personal tutor as feedback sessions. The PVCT was due to meet with Teaching Co-ordinators.

04/47 Award of Degrees

SCI04-P17

Faculty Board approved the award of Research Degrees to the candidates listed in the agenda paper.

04/48 Award of Degrees

SCI04-P18

Faculty Board noted degrees awarded by Senate at its 369^th (Special) meeting (23 June 2004).

04/49 Periodic Programme Reviews

Faculty Board noted dates for Periodic Programme Reviews as follows:

· Human Sciences: 10 December 2004

· Information Science: 20 April 2005.

04/50 Associate Dean (Teaching): Action Between Meetings

The Faculty Board noted the actions taken by the ADT between meetings.

04/51 Constitution and Powers of the Faculty Board

SCI04-P18 - NOTED

04/52 Membership

SCI04-P19 - NOTED

04/53 Representation on Other Bodies

SCI04-P20 - NOTED

04/54 Staff-Student Committees

The Faculty Board noted that reports of Staff-Student Committee meetings had been deposited with the Secretary as follows:

Human Sciences

Information Science

IPTME

Mathematical Sciences

Physics

Science & Engineering Foundation

11 March 2004, 20 May 2004

26 April 2004

29 April 2004

27 February 2004, 10,12,17,18 & 23 March 2004

12 May 2004

18 & 20 November 2003, 8 March 2004

04/55 Graduation Ceremony

The Faculty Board noted that degrees for programmes and research in the Faculty of Science would be awarded at the Ceremony to be held in the morning on Monday 20 December 2004.

04/56 Any Other Business

A member requested that refreshments be served in the middle of the meeting rather than at the beginning. ACTION: MTW

04/57 Date of Next Meeting

Thursday 3 February 2005

Miranda Whyte