Arts universities win £1.4m for knowledge-sharing projects

Helping students to develop the entrepreneurial skills they need to build more sustainable careers after graduation is the focus of a £900k grant awarded to the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM), Royal Central School of Speech and Drama (Central) and University of the Arts London (UAL). The StART Entrepreneurship Scheme will enable the three institutions to run student workshops, offer professional placements giving real-world experience, and provide mentorships and networking opportunities with partner organisations across the creative sector.

A second project has been awarded £560k for Central to scale up its work with NHS staff at the Imperial College Hospital NHS Trust. The project, through which students will be involved in improving patient experience of NHS care, will be led by Central with support from Imperial College and the My Dementia Improvement Network. It will extend activities already underway to address social isolation, improve patient wellbeing and boost staff morale. Students working with patients will use applied theatre techniques alongside storytelling and social interaction, empathy training, bespoke films and Virtual Reality 360 technologies.

Both of the awards have been made as part of the £10m Knowledge Exchange funding being distributed amongst 20 UK Universities by the Office for Students and Research England. The overarching purpose of the funding is to explore the impact of student engagement in knowledge exchange. These projects were selected on the basis of their potential impact on students and external partners and their potential to show examples of good practice which can be shared across the higher education sector.