The Foundations for our Strategy

The decade to 2010 saw the University become bigger and stronger, reaching out internationally, and increasingly recognised for its success. Exeter entered the top 10 of a University league table for the first time, rising from a position in the mid-30s in just five years. Major improvements were made in research quality and income, culminating in a strong showing in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise from which Exeter emerged as one of the most research intensive universities. The advent of the National Student Survey provided hard evidence of Exeter’s tradition of strong student satisfaction – Exeter is consistently in the top 10. Undergraduate entry tariffs rose to a highly competitive level, with the University now attracting the brightest students. League table success helped generate huge increases in applications from overseas, particularly China and South Asia.

Investment in our campuses has been a central part of the University’s strategy and will continue to be so. The University’s campuses play a large part in making Exeter an outstanding place to live, work and study. Their natural advantages have been enhanced by successive generations, often with the help of our alumni and other supporters. The tradition of philanthropy that began in the 1920s is alive and well today with alumni having made major contributions to provide important buildings like the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, the Centre for Finance and Investment and most recently the Forum. Together with other sources of income the University expects to spend £425m on new facilities between 2008 and 2013. Our three campuses, two in Exeter and one in Cornwall, now offer excellent environments for learning and living. Each campus is different, with distinctive atmospheres, academic strengths and traditions. Our Streatham and St Luke’s campuses in Exeter are our oldest, blending historic buildings, modern facilities and green spaces. Our Cornwall Campus, home to 6,000 students, is still very new, having been opened in 2004, and is shared with University College Falmouth. More than £100m has already been invested in new facilities there thanks to European and UK government funding plus investments by the University and its partner University College Falmouth.

Better facilities have helped support a major growth in our research base, our annual research income now being 115% higher than in 2005, with all our disciplines having world-leading research as measured by the most recent Research Assessment Exercise. This performance has been central to our rise inside the world’s top 200 universities (Times Higher Education rankings 2010). This research, as well as the facilities, has helped us attract more and better quality students. Much of that initial growth was in UK undergraduates, followed by substantial increases in international students in 2008-2010. We will continue to grow although to a shallower curve, with an emphasis on further internationalisation and a growing postgraduate population. The University will also be exploring new markets for example via new technologies and flexible study routes.

The University’s strategic management is characterised by a strong relationship between the executive, the senior management team and governors. A determination to reduce bureaucracy has resulted in a move away from solely committee-based decisions towards empowering individual managers to make decisions on a firm evidence-base. The University now has far fewer committees than in the past, although Senate continues to play a leading role in formulating academic policy. Governors play a critical role, engaged and involved in the decision-making process through the ‘dual assurance’ model, which makes for a stronger governing body. Similarly the number of academic units has been steadily reduced by combining departments first into schools, and now six colleges. These are all roughly equal in size and have sufficient financial and academic weight behind them to manage their affairs in a more independent way than was previously possible. Similarly Professional Services staff in both the centre and the colleges have been brought more closely together to ensure more effective and joined up working practices.

The University has been through a great deal of change. One of the most important outcomes of this process has been to deliver financial stability, enabling surpluses to be generated and thus investment in new staff and facilities. Income streams have been diversified and closer relationships established with alumni have led to much greater philanthropic income. We therefore begin the new era of higher graduate contributions and less state funding in a strong financial position.

The combination of our key characteristics comprises the unique ‘Exeter Experience’. We will safeguard and develop these traits over the next five years, as they underpin our identity as an institution.