Current Students and Staff

Following the University's decision to pause to consider feedback on the visual identity, a wide range of staff, students, alumni and other stakeholders have sent in their ideas, concerns, and thoughts. Many also attended the open sessions last week to hear about the broader ongoing reputation strategy development and share their opinions in person.

Thank you to everyone who has taken the opportunity to get involved.

One of the most positive aspects to come from this process has been the passion our students, alumni and staff clearly have for Loughborough. It is evident that those associated with Loughborough care about the University and are proud of its heritage and achievements.

The process also raised a number of important issues for us to address and these are noted below alongside details of how we plan to respond.

Visual identity

At the open sessions last week we stressed that the key challenges facing us in terms of our visual identity related to awareness and perceptions, including the notable lack of referencing to our history heritage and achievements.

We shared the need for us to update our overall visual identity, which is almost 20 years old, to provide greater flexibility in a digital age. We will continue with this work, whilst taking on board the feedback our students, alumni and staff have given us. We emphasised the importance of ensuring that we harness the pride and passion of our community have for Loughborough to achieve the right balance in an increasingly competitive global environment.

There was support for the idea of drawing on our traditional coat of arms as it currently appears on degree certificates, and using this as the primary device or emblem where it could make a positive impact. The use of the coat of arms was broadly welcomed and this will be taken forward. It will therefore begin to appear more prominently.

We will need to explore other options for online use.

Reputation strategy

The changes to our visual identity are part of a broader piece of work to develop the University’s reputation strategy, which will seek to showcase our heritage, pedigree and quality to the wider world.

As part of this we will be looking to further enhance a number of activities through which we can raise the University’s profile, for example the events we hold, our online presence and how we publicise news and developments through the media.

We will be seeking to broaden input into the reputation strategy over coming months, and we would welcome your thoughts and ideas as to how we can raise the University’s profile and reputation both nationally and internationally.