Transcript for the University of Leeds Strategy 2020–2030: Overview video embedded in the Our strategies and values page.
[Music playing]
[Various shots of the University of Leeds campus are shown including the Parkinson Building, the Bragg Building, a lecture theatre and students sitting around a table]
[Professor Simone Buitendijk, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Leeds, appears on the screen standing outside the Great Hall]
Professor Buitendijk: Our new strategy is called "Universal Values, Global Change."
It's a 10-year strategy focusing on three major themes: culture, community, and impact.
With culture, we mean a culture of working together, of collaboration, really thinking about what the world needs and how we can contribute.
[Music playing]
[Various shots of students walking in Leeds and around campus are shown along with aerial views of towns and cities around the world]
With community, we mean our internal community, but we also are focused on the local community and the global community, ultimately.
And then we're thinking about impact.
We're thinking about our local impact, but also nationally and even internationally, because research-intensive universities can play an enormously important role.
[Music playing]
[Professor Simone Buitendijk appears on the screen]
So, we're going to be implementing a very, very ambitious strategy around our student education.
We'll be moving into modes of active learning.
What this means is that we'll see a lot more interaction between students who will bring their different ways of thinking, their different cultural backgrounds into these group sessions.
So there's much more of a sense of togetherness.
[Various shots of students walking on campus and working at computers and in labs are shown]
It's going to create a completely new way of learning, which resembles the real workplace much more.
[Professor Simone Buitendijk appears on the screen, followed by various shots of students learning using digital technology]
Another reason why we're going to be trailblazing is that, from the get go, we're going to blend our thinking about how we can do this active learning with new digital technologies because the digital technologies will give us a great opportunity to be in the forefront of evidence-based active learning methodology.
[Shots of smoke coming from chimneys and people walking in villages around the world are shown]
We want to contribute to solving the big problems.
We can't do that without cutting-edge, interdisciplinary, stellar research.
And we need to think about creating a truly collaborative research culture, working together with other universities, but also with policymakers, with NGOs, with governments.
[Professor Simone Buitendijk appears on the screen, followed by various shots of cities around the world, people doing research and children in villages]
And if we bring all those perspectives together, it will have an incredible opportunity to make real change. And that's absolutely something that we'll be measuring.
When universities think about the societal impacts of their research, I think they can start locally, with the students, with the research, with the implementation of the research results in the local area.
But they can immediately make the jump to thinking about doing that globally.
And we need to be very aware of that and also make sure that we measure it, we think strategically about it, and we use our energies well.
[Professor Simone Buitendijk appears on the screen]
The future for the University of Leeds looks very bright.
In 5, 10 years, we'll be known for our caring and empathic, outward-looking, modern, human-focused community.
[Music playing]
[A screen appears that reads ‘Universal Values, Global Change, 2020-2030’]