Enablers
Strengthen and diversify our revenues
The pandemic has brought into sharp focus the reason why revenue diversification is such an important part of our strategy to achieve financial sustainability. Fees from international students support our research base to a significant extent at present. We need to ensure we are not too exposed to any one particular geographic area and that we identify new sources of unfettered long-term income.
- Philanthropic support for the College’s academic mission has been growing in recent years. It was heartening to see the swift response to appeals for funds to support our COVID-related research. While significant leadership gifts did not materialise and the overall level of support was lower than the previous year, the College saw a sizable increase in the base of donors making gifts of less than £10 million.
- We continue to build businesses that take advantage of our expertise, brand and London location. ScaleSpace, the joint venture between Imperial and Blenheim Chalcot based at our campus in White City, welcomed its first tenants in July 2020. ScaleSpace provides dedicated support to technology companies that are moving from startup to scale up.
Provide professional support, consistent processes and appropriate technology for all of our staff and students
- The investments we have been making in refreshing the way we deliver our core curricula put us in a great place to move quickly to support a multi-mode approach to teaching and learning in response to the restrictions required related to the pandemic. This effort has been supported by the ICT department, which is operating with a product-based approach following the recent restructure. As the department is set up to support improved engagement with customers and enable greater end to end accountability, they have been well equipped to assist the majority of our support staff in their move to remote working. Additionally, the Digital Learning Hub and Faculty based educational teams continue to grow and support academics and departments with learning design, media production, learning analytics and innovation in teaching and learning advice.
Act courageously and innovatively when pursuing new opportunities
We continue to invest our own funds into new and exciting ideas.
- In July 2020, we announced the launch of the Imperial College London Mathematics School, a specialist school, run in partnership with Woodhouse College, for sixth form students doing maths and further maths, alongside a range of other subjects. The school will focus on attracting more underrepresented students.
- The President’s Excellence Fund for Frontier Research supports ground-breaking science that has the potential to make significant global impact. In March 2020, the College awarded funding to three projects, one of which explores ways to grow plants without soil to support more sustainable farming.