Manchester 2035
Introduction
Imagine it's 2035 and our University has changed the world for the better. How did we do it? What role did you play?
Manchester 2035 is our bold new strategy – and you can help shape it.
Help us identify and accelerate our strategic ambitions for the next decade.
What does a truly great university look like in the 21st century?
Manchester 2035 is about all of us – students, staff, alumni and partners – coming together to shape our strategy and take on the challenges of the future.
Through collaboration, we'll consider who we want to be and how we get there, creating a joint plan that reflects our aspirations and benefits the communities we serve.
Your voice is crucial in reimagining what's possible.
Where are we up to?
Phase one: Listening and discussing
October 2024–January 2025
You shared your ideas online and in-person, and we discussed them at staff, student and community and civic workshops.
Phase two: Testing proposals
February–May 2025
We'll create bold proposals based on your ideas and test these with our community.
Phase three: Approval and publish
June–October 2025
With your input, we'll shape and develop the final strategy, outlining the actions you can take to help us achieve it.
Phase one engagement
During phase one we asked you to imagine a future where our University is more impactful, more engaged, more innovative and more committed than ever before – and you answered the call in an incredible way:
Colleagues, students, alumni and local community members involved
Workshops held, in-person and online
Workshop bookings
Online ideas and comments submitted
Foundations and leaps
Our wide-ranging conversations in phase one ran across five key themes:
- Reimagining student experiences
- Becoming one university
- Accelerating research impact
- Advancing our social responsibility
- Funding a world-class university of the future
These discussions confirmed our foundations and pointed to bold, cross-cutting ambitions for 2035.
Sprint groups formed of our University Executive, leadership groups and Students' Union Executive have now turned your ideas into our 'foundations' and 'leaps’.
Foundations
Foundations are central to our identity and underpin the university we need to be in the future:
Social responsibility is embedded across everything we do, shaping our curriculum and inspiring students to become graduates who drive positive change for society and the environment.
At home in Manchester, but global in everything we do, we connect students to skills, our community to ideas, and our research to solutions that drive local growth and global change.
With a unified vision and well-designed, integrated systems, we empower our people to do their best work and deliver meaningful impact as one University.
Driven by a commitment to discovery and truth-seeking, our teaching and research inspire innovation and create knowledge and graduates who shape the future.
Equity, diversity, and inclusion are at the heart of our community. We nurture and respect individual differences, while coming together as one University to ensure every voice is valued and every individual feels connected, seen, and heard.
Leaps
Leaps are the bold, future-focused ideas that will set our university apart by 2035. Building on our foundations, they push boundaries, foster innovation and ensure we thrive in a rapidly changing world.
Learn more about each leap in our Manchester 2035 podcast. We explored the big ideas for each in our Ideas Lab.
Flexible, personalised, and digitally enabled learning
We empower students with a tailored learning experience, combining flexibility and cutting-edge digital tools to meet their goals and aspirations.
Inside the sprints – learn more about how your feedback has shaped the leaps and the big ideas emerging:
We explored the big ideas for this leap in our Ideas Lab and you shared your thoughts to help refine our strategy together.
Accelerating the path from research excellence to impact
Our research pushes boundaries, redefines knowledge, and accelerates the journey from discovery to real-world impact, tackling the world’s most urgent and complex challenges.
Inside the sprints – learn more about how your feedback has shaped the leaps and the big ideas emerging:
We explored the big ideas for this leap in our Ideas Lab and you shared your thoughts to help refine our strategy together.
A powerhouse of innovation
We will become Europe’s leading innovation university – recognised globally for driving inclusive economic growth and new ways of working – together and with others.
Inside the sprints – learn more about how your feedback has shaped the leaps and the big ideas emerging:
We explored the big ideas for this leap in our Ideas Lab and you shared your thoughts to help refine our strategy together.
The university to partner with
We look outward in everything we do – an open and connected university, trusted for our innovation capacity and stand-out collaborations. Easy to engage with and unified in our approach, we create seamless, high-value partnerships that deliver impact across boundaries.
Inside the sprints – learn more about how your feedback has shaped the leaps and the big ideas emerging:
We explored the big ideas for this leap in our Ideas Lab and you shared your thoughts to help refine our strategy together.
Digital inside and out
We aim to double our investment in digital transformation to seamlessly blend our physical and virtual estate – creating the ultimate personalised experience and equipping our university to thrive in a rapidly changing world.
Inside the sprints – learn more about how your feedback has shaped the leaps and the big ideas emerging:
We explored the big ideas for this leap in our Ideas Lab and you shared your thoughts to help refine our strategy together.
Ideas Lab
What kind of University do we want, and need, to be over the next decade?
Our Manchester 2035 Ideas Lab – both a pop-up exhibition and digital Ideas Lab – invites you to explore this question and share your ideas.
Pop-up exhibition
The physical exhibition took place in Nancy Rothwell Building from 1–11 April 2025.
Thank you to all who took part and provided invaluable feedback on the leaps and big ideas within them.
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Digital Ideas Lab
Our Digital Ideas Lab on IdeaScale was open from 1–18 April 2025.
Thank you for taking part and providing insights that will help to shape our strategy.
You can continue to view and interact with the Digital Ideas Lab, but we cannot guarantee that any comments made post-18 April will be taken forward.
Project timeline
The Manchester 2035 consultation process was formally launched by President and Vice-Chancellor, Professor Duncan Ivison, at the University’s Foundation Day on Wednesday, 2 October 2024.
From October through to December, online and in-person consultation workshops took place with staff and students. An online feedback tool was also made available to capture staff, student, alumni and partner views.
Consultation feedback was collected and analysed, and is being drafted into proposals of what could be included in the new strategic plan.
In February our University Executive, in collaboration with leadership teams and the Students’ Union, formed sprint groups to transform your insights into bold, cross-cutting proposals – our leaps.
In April we launched our Manchester 2035 Ideas Lab – physical and online spaces to invite further feedback and engage our whole University community to refine and prioritise these ideas.
We’ll gain formal approval of our strategic plan through University committees and publish the final version in autumn 2025.
Through further collaboration, we’ll work with colleagues to integrate our strategic priorities into their activities.
Feedback
Email feedback
If you have any questions or feedback about the strategy process, please email us at [email protected].