Background

The University of British Columbia was established in 1908.  It has developed in its 100-year history into one of the leading universities in the world, consistently ranking within the top 40 worldwide.   It is first and foremost a community of scholars with a global orientation, and is continuously seeking to attract international scholars to undertake research at the university.  The University had total research funding of some $469m in 2007/8, and some 4000 on-going research projects at any one time.

The University is in the process of reviewing its strategic plan, and a revised plan is in advanced stages of preparation.   Whilst the orientation described above will remain, the new strategy is likely to include a number of prominent commitments to regional and national engagement.   

There is already significant engagement in a number of areas, particularly relating to cultural engagement, social inclusion particularly with respect to first nation people, continuing education and knowledge transfer and innovation in business.    Each of these areas is discussed below, using material drawn from interviews with the Directors of relevant Departments within UBC, published reports and from the university website.

Location

The main campus of UBC is situated on extensive endowed lands on the south-western boundary of the City of Vancouver.   It has two other campuses: one at Robson Square in the centre of downtown Vancouver which is the base for the Continuing Studies Department and also has facilities which are used by other faculties such as Law, and the Okanagan campus at Kelowna, a southern interior city, which offers a range of teaching and region-related research facilities.   The focus of this report is on engagement activities through the campuses in Vancouver.

The main Vancouver campus has over  xxx  undergraduate and xxx postgraduate students and some xxx faculty staff.   As well as extensive teaching and research facilities it is also the location for several significant cultural facilities such as the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, the Museum of Anthropology, the Belkin Art Gallery and the Botanical Gardens.

Organisational arrangements

The University has an Office for Community Relations, which works directly to the President’s Office, and is therefore outside the Deaneries, and is sustained within the University.   It is this Office, which drives much of the community relations’ work of the University, particularly in relation to cultural engagement.    The Director of community relations is also Director of the Chan Centre for Performing Arts.

The Director of Community Relations has an academic background, but has had extensive experience in running science centres, and clearly has a strong commitment to both increasing awareness in civic society about knowledge creation in the University, and increasing participation in cultural activities both on and off-campus.   Frequent use is made of the media, through, for example, partnership with the main national newspaper in Canada, and through partnering with other outside organisations and cultural groups.

There is also a University Industry Liaison Office (UILO), which is focussed on the interface between research and industry, both in promoting industry-sponsored research and in developing UBC as a major source of innovation.   It generates and manages research funds, invention disclosures, spin-off companies and licensing revenues.  The UILO reports to the President’s Office through the UBC Vice-President, Research.

The Continuing Studies Department is a free-standing, self-sustaining organisation.  The Executive Director has a seat on Senate, and works to a Committee of Deans.  It has a turnover of some $20m per annum, mostly income from fees, but also from grants from provincial sources and donations from sponsors, and with some support from the University.    It has important responsibilities in relation to aboriginal (First nation) peoples, for alumni relations and for external relations.   It has within it a Division of Applied Technology, which is a very nimble group undertaking applied research, and is developing a Centre for Sustainability, of which more below.  The Department is entrepreneurial in its approach to developing its range of provision and seeking of funding opportunities.

In addition to these formal organisational groups within the University, there are a huge range of ad-hoc relationships between individual faculty and community and business groups.

Cultural Engagement

The University sought opportunities to promote awareness of its activities.  One means was through events to celebrate research such as annual (?) Celebrate Research Weeks focussed on public lectures by researchers at UBC, and a Celebrate Research Gala, which provided awards for significant developments through research at UBC.    These were widely publicised through state and national media.

The Chan Centre for Performing Arts had been developed into a major cultural venue for the City of Vancouver through the attraction of prominent musicians and other artists from around the world.   Performances were sustained through sponsorship and partnerships with local businesses and organisations.   This same process had also allowed the centre itself to develop as a major teaching centre, attracting international students in the performing arts.

The University also supports and promotes the Museum of Anthropology, which is a major resource nationally and for the local community, and has an active programme of visits from schools and community groups.

The University was also promoting a cultural festival to support the Winter Olympics in 2010.  The festival will consist of a series of public lectures on major social issues affecting Canada and the world, again promoted through a partnership with the leading Canadian national newspaper.  

Social Inclusion

The Continuing Studies Department provides an enormous range of courses  (some 1200 annually), which range from 1 hour free’ noon workshops’, through day courses on popular and/or topical themes, week long ‘summer institute’ courses, non-credit (sometimes at evening and weekends) courses and UBC certificate courses. Courses can be face-to-face, entirely on-line or blended learning.    Courses range widely in subject matter across Arts and Humanities, Languages, Inter-cultural studies, health, multi-media, IT and business.    Courses may be for career and personal exploration, academic development, or professional development.

Several elements of this overall course provision can be highlighted with respect to social inclusion and community engagement.

One of the core values of the Department is to put aboriginal issues at the centre of its provision.   Whilst it has taken time to work up such provision, certificate courses in Intercultural studies and in Aboriginal health and Community Administration are now prominent, and are one important means by which UBC intends to meet its strategic objective in relation to First Nation peoples.   

Again, British Columbia is very ethnically diverse, and continues to attract immigrants whose language skills in English are not strong and may be insufficient for careers in business or admission to undergraduate education.   The continuing studies department offers a wide range of English courses designed for speakers of English as a second language.   Related to this is an extensive programme of provision at the Continuing Studies Writing Centre ranging from courses for personal and creative writing through to writing for business?

Continuous Professional Development Courses were for the most part provided by the main faculty departments rather than the Continuing Studies Department, although Department worked closely with Faculties in their provision.

The Continuing Studies Department engaged with the private sector on a sector by sector basis to identify training needs.  It worked through partnerships within each sector.  It had, for example, well established programmes in hospitality and wine sectors.   It recognised that work-based training was not one of its strengths.

The Continuing Studies Department did not involve itself greatly in Government-sponsored training programmes as experience had shown that continuity of funding was problematic.    It did though try to support major events within the city.  It had, for example, seconded a senior member of staff to the Vancouver Olympics Organising Committee (VANOC) as director of education programmes.  

Economic development

There are a variety of ways in which UBC engages with economic development issues.   

Whilst the Director of the ULIO made it clear that UBC had a global orientation, it nevertheless had some research centres which directly related to prominent regional industrial sectors.  For example the Wine Research Centre was working on issues of micro-climates for wine growing and factors associated with the longevity of wine in close association with the emerging wine industry in the Okanagan valley region.  Again, the wood research centre was directly relevant to the timber industry in the province. However, it was pointed out that the centres had been created because of the interests of the researchers concerned, who had found a suitable place for the pursuit of their research, rather than as a response to an identified need of the relevant industries.

There were examples too where the University was directly supplying specialist materials to local industry which it would be inefficient for the industries to obtain elsewhere for example, hydrogen gas.

More fundamentally, the university was a major source of knowledge transfer and innovation, particularly in the fields of the bio-sciences and in the emerging field of visual analytics.

• Transfer of ideas and IP

• Transfer of people

• Entrepreneurship

• Social Enterprises

The Director was developing systematic ideas and frameworks for the support of economic development, in discussion with others in similar roles in other universities in other parts of the world.