Building and developing regional relationships and collaborations (EE)

The EE Hub has been encouraging the development of working relationships between regional HEI contacts. There are many examples of collaborations and relationships that have been developed as a direct result of engaging with the East of England Hub.  The following examples demonstrate how the Hub has been actively promoting collaboration in the region in order to work towards embedding sustainable support for researcher development.

Examples of collaborative activity as a result of engagement with the Vitae EE Hub are:

• University of East Anglia (UEA) has an ongoing link with the Essex GRADschool and has provided a tutor in exchange for two student places. Dr Sue Jickells (UEA) was also seconded to the event as a co-tutor; this exchange did not involve financial remuneration in the form of student places, since Sue did not operate as a ‘full' tutor, but did provideboth Sue with excellent experience to back up her GRADschool tutor training from Vitae and the GRADschool with the expertise Sue brought to the groups she worked with. This illustrates good collaboration between institutions and is an outcome of the relationship with the Vitae EE Hub
• The British Antartic Survey (BAS), a small research institute in the East of England, has experiences and requirements that can differ enormously from large universities. For example, their students are able to grow their public engagement skills by assisting the BAS Press, PR & Education department through giving talks at schools, etc. EE Hub meetings have enabled representatives at BAS to gain some insight into what works and what doesn't when trying to get students interested in training. As a result of the Hub meetings, Paul Rodhouse and Alison Teague from BAS met Jessica Morrod, Head of Graduate Development at Cambridge University, to discuss the possibility of BAS students having access to courses at Cambridge University. The details for this are now being finalised and BAS students should be able to take advantage of this opportunity any day now. This will enable BAS students to benefit from a much broader and more frequent range of courses than has been offered in the past. Jessica Morrod is also due to give a skills development talk at BAS in 2011 and presentations given by the Vitae EE Hub Manager, Joanne Warner, such as at the BAS Student Network Day in October, build on the awareness of the EE Hub and Vitae as a whole.

Other Hub collaborative activities

Vitae East of England Hub