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College ConnectionCollege of Medical and Dental Sciences Newsletter

Spring Term 2014 Issue

College’s BUAFTA Nominees Celebrate

www.birmingham.ac.uk/mds

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College Connection newsletter

Edited by Angie Gibson, Internal Communications Manager, Communications and Marketing Team, College of MDS.

We are always looking for stories, articles and items from College staff for College Connection. If you would like to make a submission, please email MDS-Information@adf.bham.ac.uk.All submissions may be subject to editing.

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None of these developments would be possible without the tremendous dedication and commitment of our staff, and the College’s achievements pay tribute to everyone’s hard work and continued efforts.

Professor Eric JenkinsonPro-Vice-Chancellor and Head of College

Welcome to the Spring Term issue of College Connection.

There have been lots of very positive developments across the College to report on over the last few months. We warmly congratulate our Professional Services staff who were shortlisted in the BUAFTAs.

In research terms, we have made around 240 applications for funding, worth around £80M, so far this academic year. This has already brought in around £30M of new academic awards, in the face of a shrinking funding landscape. I’m sure you will welcome me in congratulating all of our successful applicants and wishing the best of luck to those still waiting for decisions. The College’s submission for the REF was made in November, and Dr Kate Bishop talks a little more about the REF process in this newsletter.

On the education front, there have been a number of positive and innovative changes over the past year to ensure our students receive a first class learning experience. This high standard has only been achieved through the dedication of our staff and the continuous development of our resources, learning methods, facilities and career opportunities.

As a major international institution for research and education in medical and dental sciences we aspire to lead the way through our learning practices to ensure our students develop the skills they will require to compete in the modern workforce.

We also warmly welcome Professor Fiona Irvine who took her post as Professor of Nursing and Head of the Department of Nursing on 1 March.

Applications to study on our post-graduate courses are also up as well as seeing a significant rise in international numbers. Being awarded the Times University of the Year 2013 will no doubt have had some impact upon this.

The success of the College’s Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) has been clear, with over 12,000 people enrolling on to our first courses – Dental Photography and Good Brain, Bad Brain. There are further opportunities to enrol onto these programmes, so please do consider signing up and experiencing a MOOC for yourself.

Head of College’s introduction

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Professor Karim Raza (School of Immunity and Infection) was invited to talk at the Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) Summit at the House of Lords in December 2013.

The aim of the Summit was to highlight the need for, and to get political will behind, strategies to raise awareness about RA, a chronic autoimmune disease which affects nearly 700,000 people across the UK,

Most of us have been lucky enough to benefit from a University education with the privilege of being taught and inspired by world leading teachers and researchers. Higher education increases the opportunity to pursue a range of intellectually stimulating and challenging professions and careers.

I cannot remember taking the decision to apply to study at University. Both of my parents went to University and, until the age of 12, I was under the impression that it was what everyone did. I was fortunate to have the support of my parents, my school (a comprehensive in a good area) and my sixth form college when deciding what I wanted to study, where I could study it and in preparing my UCAS application. However, for many students this is simply not the case and has resulted in their under-representation at University, in professions such as Medicine and Dentistry and in scientific careers.

The College of Medical and Dental Sciences has a long tradition of supporting widening participation of under-represented groups in our degree programmes, particularly with the University’s flagship Access to Birmingham (A2B) scheme. However, in 2011-12 we missed our targets for participation of state school and college students by 10%, of socio-economic classification classes 4-7 by 5% and of low participation neighbourhoods by 5%. In addition, we do not compare favourably with other Colleges in the University.

With the introduction of £9000 per annum fees, the University has signed an agreement with the Office of Fair Access which requires

us to increase our outreach activities to ensure that students from under-represented groups are encouraged to apply to University. Over the last two years, the College has been working to increase the activities offered to students from these groups to introduce them to University. This has included raising their aspirations of studying Medicine, Dentistry, Medical Sciences, Nursing and Pharmacy, and supporting them in applying for these programmes.

Our widening participation activities provide staff and current undergraduate and postgraduate students with an excellent opportunity to get involved with these potential students. The objective is to share their experiences of higher education in order to raise aspirations and support the students in applying to University. Currently, a small but very dedicated number of staff and students deliver these activities and

we would like to open up the opportunity to all members of staff and students to take part. The commitment need not be large. For example, if you can spare as little as one hour a year to get involved in one of our activities this will substantially increase our ability to support these students, widening participation and giving them the opportunities we had.

If you would like to get involved in any of the current outreach activities or you have ideas for new ones, we would love to hear from you. Please e-mail me (Clare Ray; c.j.ray@bham.ac.uk) for further information. Opportunities are also advertised in the MDS messenger, so please look out for notices if you would like to get involved.

Dr Clare Ray, College of Medical and Dental Sciences Lead for Outreach and Widening Participation

Widening Participation in Higher Education

Raising Awareness of Rheumatoid Arthritis at the House of Lords

amongst the public – in order to reduce delays in help seeking when individuals develop new onset disease.

Professor Raza has published extensively in the field of help seeking behaviour in patients with RA and also on the importance of early treatment and is leading an NIHR funded study looking at reasons for delay in help seeking.

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Professor Ian Chapple to take up the Presidency of The British Society of Periodontology

The British Society of Periodontology (BSP) is a ‘learned society’ established in 1949 to Promote, for the benefit of the public, the art and science of dentistry and in particular the art and science of periodontology, and in furtherance thereof to advance all aspects of periodontology and to promote improvements in the teaching of the same. As a registered charitable Trust, it is regulated by its original Trust deed dated 19 July 1949, and today has almost 1000 professional members.

The BSP was founded on an ethos of scientific enquiry and rigour within the biological sciences and the translation of resulting discoveries into the medical and surgical management of diseases and conditions of the tissues that surround the teeth. Indeed chronic periodontitis is the most common chronic inflammatory disease of humans and is independently associated with several other chronic non-communicable diseases of ageing.

Having returned to the BSP Council following a 7-year absence working as Treasurer of the European Federation of Periodontology, several exciting challenges faced me. Firstly the need to modernise this great society: knowledge in Dentistry doubles every 5-years and the BSP needed to develop new ways to communicate with the public, patients and practitioners using modern media; it needed to stimulate young

graduates to become active members; and to develop a strategic plan that included the establishment of a national independent patient-run charity ‘Periodontal Health UK’; it needed to develop key strategic partnerships and raise the funding necessary to deliver and sustain its core functions of education, research, public engagement, and developing/influencing national healthcare policy, in order to deliver a new vision of ‘Periodontal Health for a Better Life’.

This exciting journey begins in Birmingham’s Town Hall from 21 to 23 September 2014 with an international congress that addresses periodontal medicine and surgery under the overarching theme of ‘a collaboration between the arts and science’. Internationally acclaimed speakers including a medical advisor to the Clinton government will provide seminal lectures and the University of Birmingham will entertain around 500 delegates in the stunning Bramall Theatre and the Great Hall.

Professor Iain Chapple from the School of Dentistry talks about becoming the President of the British Society of Periodontology for 2014-15.

Refurbishment Work Planned for the Arthur Thomson Hall Refurbishment work on the Arthur Thomson Hall (ATH) is planned to take place during the summer.

The 14 week programme of work, planned by Learning Spaces, is due to commence after the main exam season ends and will include upgrading the ventilation to the lecture theatre, redecoration and reconsideration of the raked seating area.

The plans are currently being discussed within the College and there are opportunities for staff and students to input into some elements of the refurbishment.

During the period when the lecture theatre is unavailable, the College Timetabling Team will attempt to re-home as many bookings as possible, and are already looking at options around centrally bookable space for the re-sit period.

A Day in the Life of a BMedSc Student Ever wondered what a typical day in the life of a BMedSc student is like? Now you can find out thanks to a video that’s now available on the University’s YouTube channel.

It’s one of the latest suite of ‘A Day in the Life’ videos written and produced by students offering a unique insight in to student life from a very personal perspective, yet one which is reflective of the general student body. It’s hoped that these, like the earlier A Day in the Life films, will prove popular amongst potential applicants to the University.

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Thank you to everyone who took part in the third University Staff Survey, and particular thanks go to our local Staff Survey Champions who promoted the survey to their colleagues and contributed to its success. Our College completion rate was 55%, which was on a par with the University’s overall completion rate, but slightly down on our response rate in the 2011 exercise.

The College’s results are now available on the College intranet and the University’s highlights are also available here.

The College Quality Office has undertaken an initial analysis of the results, which has helped identify some key themes

and areas for celebration within the College and at a more local level. The College Staff Survey Planning Group has been established to agree and have oversight of the College’s action planning in response to the issues raised in the survey, and ensure the development and delivery of local action plans.

The College’s top level action plan was submitted to UEB on 7 March and work is now being carried out to develop the School, Hub and subunit level action plans. There will be a number of opportunities for all staff to get involved with the action planning process, and all staff are encouraged to give their feedback and input. All planning activity

is due to be completed and actions being implemented by 31 May.

Regular updates will appear in MDS Messenger and through local communication channels. Look out for this logo – this will highlight all the activity the College takes in response to the issues you raised in the survey.

Have Your Say Staff Survey 2013

Cutting Edge Technology in Anatomy Teaching

The College has recently invested in an anatomage table, a computerised virtual dissection table which allows students to perform dissection without the need for scalpels, medical instruments or any of the worries of getting it wrong. The University is only one of a small handful of institutions in the whole of the UK to be using this cutting edge technology.

Dr Carmel Toms, Anatomy Demonstrator, explains how this investment has complemented our prosectorium delivery of anatomy teaching: ‘An anatomage table

is an interactive computerised teaching tool, where CT scans of human beings have been reconstructed so students can look through them in a digital way, giving them a good overview of human anatomy. Students get the opportunity to essentially perform electronic dissection.

‘It’s also more real to their clinical experience, very similar to how CT scan will be presented in a hospital, so it starts to build those foundations of how students can recognise radiological images which are going to form the rest of their professional careers.’

Meet the Business Engagement TeamA newly formed Business Engagement team, within Development, Alumni, and Business Engagement (DABE), is tasked with enabling interaction between the University and industry, promoting knowledge exchange and developing mutually beneficial relationships. They will support, simplify, connect, facilitate working with businesses effectively.

Business Engagement Partners (BEPs) are attached to the Colleges and are on hand to support their academic colleagues to work with business in a streamlined and co-ordinated way. They can signpost to business opportunities, provide support and advice at meetings and assist in proposal preparation and project management.

Find out more about Business Engagement who we are and what we do.

YOU SAID, WE DID

Research Awareness Days for collaborative University/QEHB work

Patients and the general public were given the opportunity to learn about research being undertaken by the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham and the University in the first of a series of regular awareness days.

The first of these events was held on 15 January

in the main entrance of the QEH, and involved researchers, liver PhD students, nurses and support staff discussing their involvement in research projects and how patients and their relatives could get involved. Visitors to the stand were also able to take part in hands-on games and interactive displays.

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The Research Excellence Framework (REF) is the new system for assessing the quality of research in UK higher education institutions (HEIs) and replaces the Research Assessment Exercise, which was last conducted in 2008. The REF is being undertaken by the four UK higher education funding bodies and is managed by the REF team based at HEFCE. The whole process is overseen by the REF Steering Group, consisting of representatives of the four funding bodies.

The primary purpose of the REF is to undertake an assessment of UK HEI research which will provide: o A mechanism for the funding bodies to

allocate their research funding to HEIs, with effect from 2015-16

o Accountability for public investment in research and produces evidence of the benefits of this investment

o Benchmarking information

The REF is a process of expert review, undertaken by sub-panels for each of the 36 units of assessment, which work under the leadership and guidance of four main panels. In October 2012 all UK HEIs were invited to make submissions to the 36 units of assessment, with submissions being required by 29 November 2013.

Each submission consisted of the following:o Information on eligible staff in post on the

census date, 31 October 2013, selected for inclusion within the submission

Dr Kate Bishop provides an overview of the Research Excellence Framework

Details of publications or other outputs that selected staff have produced during the publication period (1 January 2008 to 31 December 2013)o A completed impact template, detailing

the submitted unit’s approach to enabling impact during the assessment period (1 January 2008 to 31 July 2013) and case studies describing specific examples of impacts achieved during the assessment period

o Data about research doctoral degrees awarded and research income relating to the period 1 August 2008 to 31 July 2013

o A completed template describing the research environment, related to the assessment period

Submissions will be assessed by the expert sub-panels throughout 2014. The outcome from the assessment will be an overall quality profile for each submission.

The College led the preparation of three submissions to the following units of assessment: 1 Clinical Medicine, 2 Public Health, Health Sciences and Primary Care and 3 Allied Health Professions, Dentistry, Nursing and Pharmacy.

For summary submission data please see the table below:

3 Minute Thesis VideosTwo students from MDS – Rajeev Desai (School of Cancer Sciences) and Karin Diaconu (School of HaPS) were amongst the finalists in the University’s Three Minute Thesis (3MT®) competition.

3MT® is a research communication competition developed by the University of Queensland in 2008, in which doctoral researchers have just three minutes to deliver an engaging presentation on their thesis topic, its originality and its significance.

Research students were battling it out for a £1,000 travel bursary prize but the event was also a great opportunity for anyone interested in postgraduate research degrees to discover more about the exciting doctoral research being carried out across the University. Films of all of our Three Minute Thesis finalists are now available on the University’s Youtube channel.

New Postgraduate Programmes Launched in the College of Medical and Dental Sciences The College is continuing to expanding its portfolio of postgraduate programmes, developing a number of new courses for launch in 2014:o MSc Diabetes and Obesityo MSc Musculoskeletal Ageing

and Healtho MSc Trauma Scienceo MSc Health Economics

and Econometrics

All of the College’s PG programmes offer the opportunity to be taught by world-leading experts and to access a comprehensive support system to support students in their studies.

Full details of these programmes, and the full range of the College’s PG programmes, are available here.

Summary submission data

Unit of Assessment 1 2 3

Number of staff submitted

181 (of which 13 NHS employees)

49 19

Number of early career researchers

21 10 1

Number of impact case studies

16 5 3

Research Excellence Framework (REF)

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Universally known as MOOCs (Massive Online Open Courses), the University’s first MOOC in Dental Photography began in December 2013, with over 2000 people enrolling on the course. The course will be running for a second time in June 2014. Additionally, a three-part MOOC, Good Brain, Bad Brain began in January 2014, with parts two and three focusing on Parkinson’s Disease and Drug Origins commencing in February and April 2014 respectively.

The courses have been developed by senior academic staff and the College’s Educational Technology Team, and the content is quality-assured in line with the University’s other programmes. There are no entry

Have you embraced social media to enhance your career? Know your LinkedIn from your Twitter?

Over 12,000 people enrolled on the first free, open, online courses offering a taste of higher education launched by the College of Medical and Dental Sciences.

requirements for students enrolling on the MOOCs, though no credits are available.

The University has already successfully run a MOOC on Shakespeare’s Hamlet and is currently developing a MOOC on the First World War Wings of Modernity, in conjunction with the BBC.

Delivered by world-class academics from the University of Birmingham, in partnership with FutureLearn, the courses enable learners to sample high-quality academic content via an interactive web-based platform.

You can sign up with FutureLearn to receive information about course registration.

Careers Network

Over the last two years, the College careers team at Careers Network have worked with students to ensure that they are aware of their digital footprint and how to use social media to either find about opportunities or keep updated with developments. @mdscareers is the MDS careers team twitter account, and with over 400 followers, we can re-tweet the latest news from the BMA, NMC, NHS Careers, UKFPO etc . We have a dedicated student helper to ensure that tweets are regular and relevant and use it as a means to reach a wider audience. Along with Facebook pages for BMedSc and Biomaterials, plus Canvas announcements, we aim to keep students informed without filling their inboxes. This year, we created an online careers fair using Canvas and over 1,000 students enrolled, with 700-800 hits being recorded daily, as students downloaded

careers information, podcasts, videos and accessed web chats. With 100s of work experience and job opportunities on the careers database, students can access these opportunities, set up email alerts, sign up for careers events and book careers appointments online. By using their student log in, all students can access Careers Connect.

But support isn’t all “virtual”; each week many face-to-face careers appointments take place. All students and graduates (up to a year after graduation) can access support; whether it’s a CV check or advice about next steps. Academic colleagues can make referrals to the careers team or contact us about supporting your programme.

Jenny Mullins-White, Careers Consultant

College launches MOOCs

Centre for Human Virology Launch Event –“Working together to conquer virus disease”

To celebrate the launch of the new Birmingham Centre for Human Virology, everyone was invited to attend a discussion forum for identifying trends and developments in human virology.

The event took place over two days on Monday 7 and Tuesday 8 April 2014 in the Elgar Lecture Theatre, Bramall Music Building.

Professor Jane McKeating, one of the event organisers, said “For the past half century virus research at the University of Birmingham has focused on the improvement of human health. We study virus associated cancers; immune responses and vaccines for chronic viral disease. The CHV provides a platform to promote a greater understanding of viral associated disease, treatment and prevention by fostering collaborations between basic scientists and clinicians. Working together we will conquer viral disease.”

For further information please visit the Centre for Human Virology website.

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What is a Birmingham Professional?

All staff that are not academic staff members are defined as being members of professional services and therefore ‘Birmingham Professionals’. This includes support staff, academic-related staff, technical staff, administrative staff, catering staff, estates and ground staff, nursery staff and security officers at ALL levels of the University.

There are around 3000 staff working in Professional Services in a huge variety of specialist, generalist, managerial, technical, manual and administrative roles.

All Birmingham Professional events and activities are open to all members of non-academic staff but some may be more suitable for different types and levels of staff.

The target audience and learning outcomes are defined for each event or activity so you can see if the activity will be relevant to you in your current role or in any plans for future development.

If you are not a member of academic staff then the Birmingham Professional includes YOU.

BUAFTAs 2014Professor Eric Jenkinson and Dr Emma Robinson held a celebration in January for all of the College’s BUAFTA nominees – with 160 nominees in attendance!

Nominees enjoyed coffee and cake at the annual informal reception, to celebrate their nominations.

The College had the most nominations of all Colleges (186!) and this reflects the dedication and enthusiasm of our Professional Services staff, and the readiness of their colleagues to recognise their achievements.

Full details of all nominees can be found on the intranet.

Congratulations to all of our nominees and those colleagues who were shortlisted.

Forthcoming Birmingham Professional Events

Action-centred learning workshops

Tuesday 22 April 2014 (10.00am–12.00pm)

Tuesday 3 June 2014 (2.00pm–4.00pm)

Senior Manager workshop

Friday 27 June 2014

For more details, visit the Birmingham Professional intranet site

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This recognises that the University’s global aspirations are not matched by the diversity of its current workforce in terms of the ethnic profile of its staff or the representation of women at senior levels. The year of ‘Advancing Equality in Employment’ is to signal a step change in the University’s approach to equality and diversity, acknowledging that there is a longer term programme required to achieve a more balanced workforce. The objectives for the project are: o To signal that Birmingham is serious

about employment equality o To boost the degree to which

equality is consistently embedded in management practice

The full programme of BPINS sessions is now available on the College intranet.

This is an excellent opportunity to meet College colleagues and promises to be an interesting and enjoyable session. We hope to see you at a seminar soon!

o To review and refresh the policy framework where appropriate, and address any outdated areas of discretion in terms of good practice

o To maximise talent in the University

The programme of activities is designed to draw together, to complement and to enhance existing activities that are happening all over the University.

If you have any comments, ideas, questions or opinions that you would like to share then please contact equality@contacts.bham.ac.uk.

More information is available on the intranet.

2013-14 has been designated as a year of advancing equality and diversity in employment by UEB.

Birmingham Professional Information and Networking SeminarsBirmingham Professional Information and Network Seminars (BPINS) have been organised to bring together MDS colleagues to learn about the work of colleagues across the College and University.

College life

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Thanks to everyone who donated items to be included in the Christmas parcels for UK soldiers. Sue Silk (College Hub) worked with a group of servicemen from the Medical Corps to collect donations of items for service men and women who would otherwise not receive a parcel at Christmas.

A total of 65 parcels for serving soldiers and two parcels for service dogs were made up.

The soldiers said this was a fantastic effort and said that the parcels boost morale and were welcomed by service personnel who would otherwise not receive a gift at Christmas.

Donated items that could not be included in the parcels (eg chocolate and aerosols) were donated to the Servicing Officers wards at UHB. Sue is pictured at the far left of the photo.

Sparkhill Foodbank/Women’s Aid Tin CollectionThank you to everyone who has donated items of food in the Collection Box in the IBR Common Room for Sparkhill Foodbank/Women’s Aid Collection. These groups urgently need donations of tinned food, UHT milk and fruit juice. Sparkhill Foodbank alone provides up to 90 food parcels a week, a 200% increase this time last year.

If you would like to donate an item, please drop it in the collection box in the IBR Common Room.

During November, the Education Technology Team led an environmental campaign across the College to raise awareness of energy saving solutions within the workplace. Teams were invited to identify one new energy-saving task to commit to for the whole month. This ‘Green Pledge’ scheme attracted lots of creative ideas from staff, as teams or individuals, focusing around reducing heating, lighting

or waste and improving recycling and sustainable travel arrangements. Throughout the month, the Team led a series of virtual meetings with Pledgers to highlight good practice ideas and share experiences. Following the overwhelming success of this scheme, the Team plan to run a similar event in November. More details can be found here.

Christmas Parcels for UK Soldiers

Thank you to everyone who attended and took part in the events at the College Festive Social on 4 December. The main event was the Great MDS Bake Off, in which a host of very talented colleagues created a range of cakes and bakes on a Festive, Christmas or winter theme. The winner was Sarah Blair-Reid, with a ginger cake with lime frosting. All of the cakes were sold and a total of £330 was raised for Dr Jo Morris’s breast cancer research.

Thanks to very generous donations to the Giving Tree, we managed to fill the back of Sparkhill Food bank’s van with toy and tin donations to be distributed to families in the Birmingham area.

College Festival Social

The Green Pledge: Successes and Lessons Learnt