Our Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research) Professor Christine Raines tells us more about the University’s new collaboration with the Cabinet Office Open Innovation Team.
The University of Essex is engaging in an exciting and innovative Government initiative. We’re on a journey of discovery, not just to enter the world of No. 10, but also a completely new venture for the University.
University of Essex and partners at Number 10 Downing Street
Today marks the start of a three-year relationship between the Open Innovation Team in the Cabinet Office and the University of Essex, alongside Brunel, Lancaster and York Universities. On Tuesday 18 June, Vanessa Cuthill (Director, Research and Enterprise Office) and I attended a short signing ceremony at No. 10 Downing Street to formalise the relationship. Oliver Dowden, Minister for Implementation, presided over the ceremony. Read what he had to say here.
The Open Innovation Team is relatively new in Government and aims to ‘bring academics closer to the policy-making agenda’. They have already ran a successful pilot phase and we are proud to be part of the new phase 2019-2021.
As a leading dual-intensive university with a strong link between transformative education and research we have a valuable role to play in the formulation and implementation of policy. We can be a ‘go-to’ source of rigorous and evidenced-based knowledge. We are in the top 20 UK universities for research excellence and home to world-leading social science. Our Institute for Social and Economic Research holds a Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education, the highest form of national recognition for the work of a UK university.
Our strategy 2019-25 highlights the value we place on research – ‘we will define the next generation of research challenges, set agendas for addressing enduring and emerging challenges, lead the advancement of knowledge and develop innovative applications of knowledge and ideas for the benefit of people and communities’. The new knowledge created by our world leading research is making a difference to people’s lives at the local, national and international levels. But we don’t do this in isolation. We work with a wide variety of partners: businesses, academics, charities and local government. But in order to maximise the impact of our research we need to be able to reach key individuals in government departments.
Through our engagement with the Open Innovation Team we are already building relations with a number of government departments. Highlights include: Professor Pete Fussey’s research, which is informing work by the Home Office on future technology in UK policing; Professor Lorna McGregor recently presented her research to the newly-created Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation and is now cited a recent Parliamentary paper.
Our relationship with the Open Innovation Team brings a number of other exciting opportunities including workshops about the policy making process, internships for early career researchers and PhD placement opportunities.