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Priority one: Excellence

We will support our research community by defining research excellence, providing clear assessment frameworks in line with our commitments to responsible research assessment, identifying and supporting our research strengths and ensuring development is available at all career stages.

At our University, we put people at the heart of our research – not only in conducting research that changes lives but in how we support our research community.

Over the past 12 months, we have embedded a definition of research excellence throughout our organisation. Our definition values the traditional measures of excellence such as the quality of the outputs and outcomes of research – as well as placing explicit value on how we undertake research, the rigour and integrity underpinning our research, and the generosity of leadership and collegiality that creates a supportive and collaborative environment in which to work.

We feel strongly that the culture of the organisation makes an extremely significant contribution to the outputs we are able to deliver. We are prioritising research culture initiatives, and this year have taken this to the next level with the development of a University community action plan focussed on enabling professional fulfilment; rigorous, open and responsible research; and collaboration, creativity and innovation.

A good example of our focus on research culture is our research into building an anti-ableist research environment – with thanks to a Wellcome Trust Institutional Funding for Research Culture Award.

As part of our ambitions for research excellence, we have also undertaken a review of our research entities. Our purpose was to identify and celebrate ambitious, productive cross-faculty and faculty-based research centres, and translational research and innovation centres. Along with external investments in our research, our research entities are making a crucial contribution to challenges facing society both nationally and internationally, and we are here to support them.

Our shared ambition and collaborative work environment enables us to conduct research that changes lives.

Our grant income is growing, with our average grant size increasing; and we are encouraging our research community to focus on producing a smaller number of very high quality outputs and impact beyond academic research.

For example, this year we designed a breakthrough technological aid for dementia patients to combat malnutrition. With funding from the Alzheimer’s Society we’re working to make The Tasty Spoon™ accessible and affordable to people living with dementia – that’s around 50 million people worldwide.

We don’t work in isolation. Our partners and funders help us to make an impact in communities across the world. With government funding we are working to define responsible use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in education, policing and the creative industries. With Yorkshire Cancer Research we’ve begun seven world-leading cancer research studies to help more people survive the disease.

This year, landmark funding secured our world-leading MND research for the next decade through the expansion of our 91̽»¨ Institute for Translational Neuroscience (SITraN). More recently, with partners and funders, we announced a new £38 million centre to develop planet-friendly alternatives to animal proteins with the aim of securing a continuous supply of safe, tasty, affordable, and healthy proteins that also support Net Zero goals and futureproof the UK’s food and animal feed security. We will work with over 120 partners around the world, including companies such as Quorn and organisations such as the Food Standards Agency and the Good Food Institute.

Learn more about how we’re addressing a wide range of global challenges by exploring our world-leading research centres and facilities.

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Priority two: Postgraduate research students 

Our research excellence, innovative training, and commitment to researcher development and wellbeing makes us the institution of choice for postgraduate research students (PGRs).

Our holistic approach to research excellence and research culture extends to our commitment to postgraduate students. We’re continuously working to better understand their unique experiences of our research culture and to create a better future together.

Last year, we sought the opinions of PGRs at all stages of their research in our PGR Voice survey, designed in collaboration with the University of Manchester. Overall, our results are positive, particularly for academic supervision, which is critical to PGR success.

We also identified a number of areas for improvement, including improved support for PGR students with disabilities, a renewed focus on training and development, and new mechanisms for community building such as a mentoring programme to enable connections and support between students at different stages of their studies. We have also established a PGR Wellbeing Strategy Group and will be implementing its initial recommendations in the coming academic year.

In line with our commitment to increasing opportunities in doctoral research for minority students currently under-represented in our PGR population, we advertised fully-funded University of 91̽»¨ Research Scholarships for UK Nationals, who identify as Black or Black British, Asian or Asian British or who are of multiple ethnic backgrounds. We have recruited students to these scholarships in the Faculties of Arts and Humanities, Engineering, Health, and Science.

With a view to supporting our supervisors to navigate diversity and to enable them to support racial equity, we have launched bespoke learning and development sessions with the appointment of a new racial equity trainer.

Read more about our Research pillar and explore related case studies