The Civic University Network
The Civic University Network builds on the 2018 UPP Foundation Civic University Commission which challenged universities to re-shape their role and responsibility to their communities to realise their potential as drivers of a new civic agenda. Our vision for the Civic University Network is to help make this ambition a reality – supporting universities to develop and embed civic aspirations at an institutional level, as well as working with government and strategic partners to ensure that a university’s geographic role and responsibility is used more effectively as an agent to drive positive societal change.
Our Focus
The Network will work to support the growing Civic University movement by sharing best practice between participating universities, support those HEIs who are developing Civic University Agreements (a key recommendation of the UPP Commission), develop a peer review scheme so that universities increase their civic impact, and connect universities with other sectors which are prioritising issues around ‘place’ to level up the economy and society. The civic university network is funded by the UPP foundation, Department for Education, Carnegie UK Trust and Arts Council England.
Our Ambition
The Civic University Commission challenged universities to re-shape their roles and responsibility’s to their communities to realise their potential as drivers of a new civic agenda. Our vision for the Civic University Network is to help make this ambition a reality – supporting universities to develop and embed civic aspirations at an institutional level, as well as working with government and strategic partners to ensure that a university’s geographic role and responsibility is used more effectively as an agent to drive positive societal change.
Current Context
The establishment of the network comes as we all grapple with the challenges of Covid-19, not only for our institutions, but also for our wider communities and localities. The unprecedented nature and scale of this will shape the civic agenda for the foreseeable future. The Network will be working with Universities UK, the NHS Confederation and other key sector bodies to develop a coordinated response to the challenges ahead and to support universities’ contribution to longer-term recovery from the impact of Covid-19. The thought piece prepared by Des McNulty and John Goddard is well worth a read. One of the activities of the network will be to facilitate discussions across universities on the issues raised in the paper
Follow us
Final planning meeting for our @NHSConfed @civicuniversity webinar on reimagining the relationship between universities and the NHS on 30 November. We have @Voa1234 @JackieDanielNHS @fhussain73 and @obrienpeter72 talking. Are you one of the 300 signed up? https://www.nhsconfed.org/events/2020/11/reimagining-the-relationship-between-universities-and-the-nhs
Coming soon: The Future of Devolution in the North: Power, identity and politics. Organised by @HuddersfieldUni @YorkshireUnis @IPPRNorth @PolStudiesAssoc @yorkshirepost chaired by @andymycock1 with a focus on devolution in Yorkshire. More info & booking https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-future-of-devolution-in-the-north-power-identity-and-politics-tickets-128473627077
Our latest blog is now live! In this edition we hear about the @NCCPE Engage festival 2020 and just how woven together the public engagement and civic engagement agendas are #trulycivic https://civicuniversitynetwork.co.uk/engage-festival-2020-the-overlapping-worlds-of-civic-engagement-and-public-engagement/
🗣️❓ We are inviting questions to put to our panel (Philippa Lloyd, @voa1234, @jackiedanielNHS, @fhussain73) at our 30 Nov webinar with @NHSConfed @NHSLocalGrowth - full event details below. If you have a question for a speaker please email to civicuniversity@shu.ac.uk by 26 Nov
2 weeks to go! Only 35 places left for our next webinar event in partnership with @NHSConfed - 'Reimagining the relationship between universities and the NHS'.
Find out more and book a place via the link below⬇️ https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/126774127829 #trulycivic
Come join us on 8 Dec for our workshop 'An introduction to creating a Civic University Agreement' led by Paul Manners from @NCCPE and featuring a great supporting cast of institutional speakers sharing their experiences. #trulycivic
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/an-introduction-to-creating-a-civic-university-agreement-tickets-127869632513
Civic University: A snapshot
This infographic has been created as a handy one page document summarising the network, those involved and the aims and objectives.
Design by Nifty Fox Creative, 2020
Latest Events
Universities’ role in ‘Levelling up’ and building back better
Our latest webinar was to coincide with the UPP Foundation launch of two reports on the role of Universities in the 'levelling up' agenda, and on addressing the forthcoming employment crisis. Introduced by Richard
Reimagining the relationship between universities and the NHS
Bookings are now live for the next event in our webinar series 'Reimagining the relationship between universities and the NHS' will take place on 30 November, 2:00pm - 3:00pm This joint Civic University Network
Civic Universities and Inclusive Local Economic Recovery Webinar
We were delighted to welcome almost 200 representatives from organisations across the UK to the webinar hosted by City-REDI, University of Birmingham. The focus of the webinar was on how civic universities can play