Professor Petra Wend: Universities need freedom to make next big discovery

FOLLOWING the spending review announcement, the future and shape of Scotland’s universities and colleges are in the spotlight again. The emphasis on economic development, employability, regionality, widening access, efficiencies in the learner journey and further concentration of research funding are some of the headlines. Is it timely to consider the role of universities in this context?

Whilst the financial investment in the university sector has quite rightly been positively received by Universities Scotland and the universities it represents, there are also some signals which point less desirably towards changing the purposes of universities, or at least of some of them.

On the one hand we hear about knowledge exchange, skills development and the closer alignment of these to the needs of industry, while on the other we hear about further concentration of research funding in centres of excellence. Equally, there are strong signals about the differences between regional and national or international universities and a perceived duplication of provision in “regional” universities. We need to proceed with care: while it is absolutely right for the Scottish Government to seek the best value from its investment in universities, we need to ensure that we build on the diverse ways in which every university contributes to Scotland’s success.

It is only natural that a more utilitarian view emerges when money is tight and that there can be a jump to conclusions about what functions of a university are best for society and a country’s economic recovery. Universities are major providers of higher-level skills. In particular, it is tempting to view skills development and knowledge exchange as more imperative to economic growth than the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake. However, if we look at high-impact inventions and discoveries coming out of universities, many of them were not necessarily planned nor the result of government and stakeholder directives.

Numerous examples could be given to support this proposition. For example, the discovery of genetic fingerprinting more than a quarter of a century ago was unplanned, but it was the result of the University of Leicester having attracted an excellent researcher, Professor Alec Jeffreys from the University of Amsterdam, to advance research in genetics in 1977. Seven years later, he and his team stumbled across the uniqueness of DNA fingerprinting.

This groundbreaking discovery has shaped forensic sciences across the world and was the result of the University of Leicester having had the foresight to invest in excellent genetics academics without any hint of funders, public or private, seeking an instrumental outcome. Indeed, it could be argued that this major discovery was due to the lack of intervention or steer from external stakeholders and that directed research can be a poor predictor for discoveries.

In a recent article in this newspaper, Andrew Cubie suggested that over the next decade “the most creative, exciting and embracing innovations in learning will take place outside the education system”. From a historical perspective, this argument cannot be straightforwardly dismissed.

Going back in time, the mid 17th century showed a decline of universities in Europe as student enrolments dropped in many countries. In Italy, alternative places for learning and research were founded, which were academies and informal circles of literati and scientists. Most notably perhaps, in the late Renaissance, in Rome, the Accademia dei Lincei, of which Galileo was a member, tried to form a network of academies across Europe, but Galileo’s imprisonment disrupted this plan.

Elsewhere, the idea of forming academies to further the sciences fell on more fertile ground. In 1662, in England, the Royal Society was formed “for the glory of God and the benefit of mankind”. Meanwhile, in France, the Academie des Sciences was founded in 1666 in Paris. These institutions would very much guide science in the 18th century.

Intellectual thinking during this period did not only take place in academies and universities. In the 18th century, London had 2,000 coffee houses, nicknamed “penny universities”. Everybody entering had to pay a penny but then had access to as much coffee as desired. They were egalitarian meeting places, locations to think and philosophise.

Yet such alternative sources of intellectual debate and discovery are in short supply today. It is therefore surely problematic to draw a distinction between universities that engage in research and those that engage in education and “training”. For, leaving aside the obvious need for research and scholarship to inform teaching, where other than in universities can we be sure that research is undertaken that yields much needed economic and social benefits and supports the pursuit of human knowledge where beneficial outcomes are uncertain?

Research should therefore be encouraged, supported and funded wherever it is found. To do otherwise will damage social and economic progress, as well as social justice. The research on educational attainment of children from deprived backgrounds at the Institute of Education in London and that at Queen Margaret University in public health and development both demonstrate this all too clearly.

Of course universities have a key role to play in economic development. Indeed, they already play such a role.

As major employers and recruiters of students who support the local economy whilst at university, universities contribute billions of pounds every year to Scotland’s economy. Universities also transfer more than £300 million per annum of costed expertise to business as we engage in a more targeted way via our subject disciplines, our knowledge exchange and our research. Indeed, universities are at the core of Scotland’s success in areas including renewable energy, life sciences and creative industries, as well as being at the heart of Scotland’s successful cities.

To focus on skills development required for economic growth cannot, however, be at the expense of investment in building intellectual communities to nurture the unfolding and sharing of knowledge that could potentially revolutionise the health, wealth and wellbeing of future generations.Universities can, and should, therefore have multiple functions, providing research, education, public engagement, economic development and social mobility. The balance between these functions may vary between institutions as part of their differing missions. However, a university that is forced to fulfil only one role at the expense of the other arguably ceases being a university and an institution capable of contributing fully to the economic and social welfare of society.

While universities continuously need to examine and analyse how much they can afford to engage in any one function, contrary to some current thinking we should avoid their further stratification. We have the chance in Scotland to build on shared values about the importance of students learning in a research-active environment which is constantly at the edge of new discovery. We have consistently chosen not to go down the English route of thinking that some students only deserve to learn at “teaching-only” universities, remote from the fountainhead of discovery.

As consultation on the future of Scotland’s universities goes forward, the question needs to be asked: will further categorisation of universities and subsequent directed funding force some functions currently held in universities outside the state university sector. Will there be a resurgence of academies or research institutes, or will private universities fulfil this or other niches?

The market, including the recent fees-setting exercise for students from the rest of the UK, will certainly influence further developments in this respect and time will tell. However, it is the current potent mix of universities’ multifaceted functions and the way these are inseparable from each other that make them leaders for a better society.

I hope, and expect, that the outcome of consultation on the Scottish Government’s proposals for reform of post-16 education will be an affirmation of the diverse contribution which every university makes to building the sort of nation we all want to live in.

• Professor Petra Wend PhD FRSA is principal and vice-chancellor of Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh. Prof Wend will present a lecture looking at the role of universities on 24 October at 6pm at the Royal College of Physicians, 9 Queen Street, Edinburgh.