TRANSFORMING LIVES: UNIVERSITY OF SUFFOLK BUSINESS ENGAGEMENT, CAREERS AND EMPLOYABILITY FIVE-YEAR STRATEGIC PLAN
Transforming lives through education, research, knowledge exchange, innovation and entrepreneurship
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CONTENTS 1
Contents
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Introduction
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Alumni Relations and Development (ARD)
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Careers, Employability and Enterprise (CEE)
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Business Development and Knowledge Exchange (BDKE)
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Apprenticeship Hub (AH)
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Our aim
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Our approach
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Our people
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Our facilities
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Our communication
INTRODUCTION The Directorate of Business Engagement, Careers and Employability (BECE) is home to the University’s Alumni and Development activities, the provision of Careers, Employability and Enterprise support for our students and graduates; our business development and knowledge exchange activities to support local businesses; and our provision of Apprenticeships focused on employer-led education. We support the University’s mission to: ...be one of the key business support agencies in the region and the provider of choice for knowledge exchange, innovation, and entrepreneurship, and state-of-the-art training for our region. We aim to regenerate our local economy by transforming local productivity and targeted sectors, through skills and workforce development. And ensure: ...Our graduates will be confident thinkers and professionals ready for the world of work. They will have the breadth of knowledge and experience required; they will be socially conscious and value-driven individuals striving to make a positive contribution to society. In a technologically driven world, our graduates will be digitally competent, globally aware, forward looking, enterprising, enquiring and a voice of change for our future sustainable development. Our Priorities: To transform local productivity and targeted sectors through active alumni engagement and giving, skills development, business and job creation and work-based learning including Apprenticeships, student and graduate entrepreneurship and support for innovation: 1.
To transform and enhance the student and graduate experience and employment outcomes through the development of careers, employability and enterprise;
2. To transform our knowledge exchange activity and gain recognition through the Knowledge Exchange Framework (KEF) and Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF) formula, achieving recognition as a distinctive university leader in local and regional economic development.
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ALUMNI RELATIONS AND DEVELOPMENT (ARD) To create an active and engaged community of graduates, seeking to maintain lifelong relationships and build a strong society of loyal supporters and ambassadors. Our alumni will continue to benefit the institution by sharing their skills and expertise with staff, students and each other providing invaluable promotion across their personal and professional networks to become our key financial supporters of the future. Over the next five years the team will work to increase and improve communications with alumni and raise awareness of alumni relations internally and externally, with the long-term aim of securing donations of both money and time to the University.
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We will: Work directly with the Schools to ensure that alumni have a significant impact on learning and teaching, the student experience and student recruitment. Ensure that our offer is mutually beneficial and matches the needs of our diverse alumni community. Establish an Alumni Giving Campaign, aiming to embed a culture of giving in our graduates. Develop and implement an institution wide fundraising strategy, including working with regular, major gifts, corporate and legacy donors, establishing strong working relationships and adhering to a robust stewardship model. Coordinate the Annual Fund, ensuring financial monitoring and adherence to the Code of Ethical Fundraising Policy.
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CAREERS, EMPLOYABILITY AND ENTERPRISE (CEE) To provide our students with impartial and equal access to support and opportunities that will empower them to be confident in making decisions about their future and equipped to achieve graduate success. By 2026, we want to ensure that every single undergraduate and postgraduate taught student benefits from meaningful interaction with the Careers, Employability and Enterprise team and the team have established a clear, physical presence on the Ipswich campus, providing a welcoming and inspirational space for students, staff and organisations to meet and plan their future. Over the next five years the team will work to increase and improve communications with students and staff and raise awareness of Careers, Employability and Enterprise internally and externally. We will: Ensure that our service provides the support to match our diverse student community, recognising that one size does not fit all. Ensure that employability, enterprise, and entrepreneurship is embedded into all degree programmes.
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Design and deliver a suite of career development and enterprise/entrepreneurship workshops and modules that can be adapted and personalised to fit each degree subject and embedded by course teams into their programmes, to the full benefit of students. Provide opportunities for work experience appropriate to student needs. Continue to expand our offer and provide extra-curricular opportunities for students to meet organisations and inspiring alumni. Work with the wider BECE team to increase the number of internships and graduate jobs available to Suffolk students and graduates. Increase the support made available to students wishing to start, or expand, a business, or establish themselves as a freelancer, empowering them to explore ideas and consider starting up (or expanding) a business or building a freelance portfolio. By 2026, to annually support the creation of 20 academic student and/or graduate start-ups. Provide students with the skills to confidently navigate a world in which ‘career’ no longer means a job or employer for life. Establish new collaborative partnerships to benefit students/graduates, and our external stakeholders.
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BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT AND KNOWLEDGE EXCHANGE (BDKE) Knowledge Exchange (KE), innovation and entrepreneurship are fundamental activities for the University of Suffolk. Working with public, private and third sector organisations we will tackle current and future challenges (both commercial and societal), horizon scanning to ensure we meet future skills gaps and retain talent in Suffolk. We will co-design solutions to meet the needs of individual enterprises, from sole trader start-ups to large, established companies and build long-term partnerships, providing access to our academic expertise and student talent, and our world-class facilities and resources. We search for funding opportunities to make ideas happen. Over the next five years we will use our areas of distinctiveness to drive innovation and increase productivity collaboratively, making Suffolk a competitive force within the UK.
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We will: Generate £10M of enterprise/KE income, ensuring the University can design and deliver projects to support the local business community. Be recognised as the leading university in our KEF cluster ensuring significant progress and impact achieved in 50% of the priority areas. Collaborate with 250 organisations through a range of KE projects. By 2024, be a top 20 KTP provider university. By 2023, achieve national (external) recognition for our KE activity. Create a portfolio of services/programmes to meet the needs of the levelling up agenda, transforming local productivity through skills development, business and job creation. Be an integral part of the regional business support network and the location of choice for start-ups in Ipswich.
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APPRENTICESHIP HUB (AH)
Apprenticeships provide an opportunity for the University to offer employerfocused education to boost business performance and provide work-based learning opportunities as part of the University’s portfolio. The apprenticeship objectives which will be met over our five-year plan, have been developed to fulfil our vision of becoming an outstanding apprenticeship training provider of choice and the strategies outlined for each objective are designed to continue our journey of development and deliver our vision.
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We will: Focus on learners by providing them with an outstanding experience, delivering an accessible curriculum where delivery is creative, flexible, and responsive to the ever-changing apprenticeship reforms. Work in partnership with employers to improve the quality and efficiency of our curriculum to achieve outstanding results, ensuring there is active involvement from our employers in the decision-making process of curriculum planning to help shape our curriculum offer. Grow our business through an innovative curriculum, developed in partnership with employers and the communities we work within to ensure we meet their needs, with particular emphasis on the digital, health, supply chain, leadership and management skills gaps.
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OUR AIM
The Business Engagement, Careers and Employability Directorate will achieve this through: Our Approach, Our People, Our Facilities and Our Communications.
Our approach We will work with our external stakeholders to understand their requirements, developing interventions and programmes to meet their needs. Through this work, we will develop and strengthen high value commercial and public sector collaborative partnerships to deliver local economic development and strengthen the regional development of the East of England. We will engage with our internal community, ensuring every student and graduate is supported to achieve their future ambitions, whether that be employment, launching their own venture or further study. Similarly, academics, researchers and PhD students will be supported to engage with, and deliver, knowledge exchange opportunities to enhance their teaching and learning, support their career development and increase income diversification.
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Our people We will enhance our capacity to deliver alumni engagement, employability and enterprise, knowledge exchange and apprenticeships, by offering a portfolio of training opportunities that enable all of our staff to have a deeper understanding of the requirements, potential impact, and their role in driving this forward. We will raise the profile of BECE activities with people case studies and awards that recognise individual and team contribution in delivering impact. As our activity and impact grow, we will continue to invest in the BECE team and academic community to ensure we have the right expertise to deliver our ambitions.
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Our facilities We will build engagement with our existing facilities, bringing together businesses, students, alumni and the wider community, designing and delivering training and community building events based on stakeholder feedback, engaging with partners to increase their use of the facilities. We will explore the potential for, and secure, a larger scale business incubation centre, offering grow-on space for the local business community. Through events, such as the Festival of Suffolk, we will play a leading role in opening our campus to the local community, enhancing opportunities for collaboration. This will be further supported by the promotion of our world class facilities available at the DigiTech Centre and the soon to be established EcoLab, delivering events and CPD sessions onsite.
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Our communication We will create an engaging BECE brand and show our stakeholders that we are serious about collaboration. We will create marketing materials that are suitable for our audience and share them through relevant channels. To support this, we will invest in a Customer Relationship Management tool (CRM), to ensure regular engagement with our collaborators and updates on items of specific interest to them. We will exhibit and/or present at relevant stakeholder events and host our own. We will apply for relevant awards and build a strong reputation. We will partner with Schools to develop appropriate communication channels and methods, maintaining a collaborative approach to information sharing. We will ensure the website is updated and create case studies from each of our suitable engagements.
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