In my February newsletter: Enhancing the student experience, reflecting on LGBT+ History Month, the impact of artificial snow at the Winter Olympics, and the LeicestershireLive Innovation Awards.

Enhancing the student experience

The start of Semester 2 this month signalled another step forward for the vast majority of our staff and students. Throughout the pandemic, we have been sector leading in the amount of in person activity on campus, and now students have returned to full capacity in person classes. Staff and students have told me how pleased they are to see full classrooms again, and to be able to have those casual conversations which are so important to feeling part of a community. It is wonderful to see the campuses buzzing with energy. 

The Loughborough Student Experience is renowned within the sector and is the envy of many other institutions. In my few months here, I am constantly asked what makes the Loughborough experience so special. I suspect everybody you ask would give a different answer. But for me, it’s a combination of factors: the academic experience we provide, including the range of educational opportunities that are part of our degree programmes; the academic, careers, entrepreneurial and wellbeing support for students; and most importantly the fact that all staff across our campuses care about our students, are supporting them to succeed and providing them with experiences that set them up for their futures. 

Of course, there are also the extra-curricular opportunities: raising more than £1m a year for Rag and spending more than 20,000 hours volunteering through Action; participating in sport in our fantastic facilities; and being part of more than 100 active student societies. All these enable our students to develop skills and qualities that will be invaluable in their future lives and careers.

Education and the student experience are central pillars of our new University strategy. They have been the bedrock of our success for many years – a key component in our ability to recruit the very best students to Loughborough. I want to ensure we build on those foundations and continue to innovate and enhance the offering still further. We cannot be complacent; we need to stay ahead.

Initiatives such as the National Student Survey (NSS) are key to this. Through the survey we gather invaluable feedback from our final-year undergraduates, which enables us to enhance the student experience for current students and helps future students make the right choices about where and what to study. If you have not already done so, please encourage eligible students to fill it in – they will be helping to shape the University’s future development.

The impact of climate change on the Winter Olympics

I’m sure many of you will have caught at least some of the coverage of this year’s Winter Olympics, which were held in Beijing. Perhaps fewer of us, however, appreciated that the snow covering the city’s Olympic venues was artificial, with more than 400 snow generators used to cover the slopes in advance of the Games. Unsurprisingly, this has caused much controversy, as the process to create artificial snow is energy- and water-intensive, with chemicals used to slow the melt. 

However, Beijing is not unique in facing issues with a lack of snow; climate change is threatening mountain areas around the world, making conditions much more dangerous for snow sport participants, as sport ecologist Dr Maddy Orr, from Loughborough University London’s Institute of Sport Business, explained in the run up to the Games.

Dr Orr was a lead author of a report – Slippery Slopes: How Climate Change is threatening the 2022 Winter Olympics – produced by the Sport Ecology Groupat Loughborough University and the climate action charity, Protect Our Winters. The report includes contributions from leading skiers, snowboarders and bobsledders on their fears for the future of their sports as our climate changes.

The study gained attention worldwide, with coverage in all the UK’s major media outlets, Europe, North America, Asia and Oceania, and generated huge engagement on social media. Professor Orr was also on The Conversation podcast. The study, and Professor Orr’s promotion of it, has helped to kickstart discussions about the impact of climate change on snow sports, underlined Professor Orr as a leader in her field and helped to raise our global research profile.

LGBT+ History Month

Throughout February we have been celebrating LGBT+ History Month, which provides an opportunity for us to reflect on the progress we are making to improve the experience of LGBT+ people on our campuses and to consider the steps we can all take to make Loughborough a more welcoming, inclusive community.

As well as the many events and activities hosted during the month, I am sure many of you will have seen the rainbow flags that have been put up on campus to celebrate the diversity of the LGBT+ community – banners featuring some of our students have been added to our lampposts, an installation has been painted near the Students’ Union, and on 21st February Hazlerigg Building was lit up in rainbow colours as part of an event hosted by the LGBT+ Staff Network. 

Events such as LGBT+ History Month encourage inclusivity and understanding in the workplace, and they make us think about how we can be better allies. Members of the University’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Sub-Committee have made a video exploring the role of an ally. If you’ve not yet had a look, I’d recommend you do.

LeicestershireLive Innovation Awards

The University’s research and innovation activities enjoyed outstanding success last week at the LeicestershireLive Innovation Awards, receiving nine awards in total: seven of the ten categories, the overall Innovator of the Year and a Special Recognition Award.

The awards recognised impactful research, academic spinouts, graduate start-ups and technology businesses launched on campus, all delivering innovative new technologies and solutions to major challenges. 

The winners, all based at LUSEP, were: 

• spinouts Zayndu, founded by Dr Felipe Iza (Mechanical, Electrical and Manufacturing Engineering), and Figura Analytics, founded by Dr Mark Platt(Chemistry) 
• wearable sports tech start-up INCUS, founded by Product Design Engineering alumnus Chris Ruddock
• new graduate start-ups ACT Medical, founded by Product Design and Technology alumnus Joseph Bentley, and Tanzii TV , founded by Sociology alumni Ottavio and Dario Tanzillo – which are supported by LUinc, the University’s incubator
• global fuel cell leader Intelligent Energy, whose origins trace from Loughborough’s Automotive Engineering and Chemistry research
• Foster+Freeman RECOVER, a novel fingerprint development system, underpinned by Chemistry research impact; and 
• Nemaura Medical, the NASDAQ-listed pioneering digital healthcare company, launched on campus in 2017, which won two awards including the overall Innovator of the Year honour. 

It is excellent to see that so many of the awards recognised achievements from across the University’s extensive innovation and research portfolio. Full details about all the winners are available in the press release.