Univrsities and the Built Estate

Yesterday the University Business team went to the Universities and the Built Estate conference to meet the great and good from the sector. The event was attended by some of the most prominent figures in Higher Education; Charles Clarke gave a Keynote address on the importance of estates and Baronness Morgan, the Minster for Students, addressed the crowd, rather openly, about her new appointment and how she is willing to take advice from the sector on key issues.
The themes running through most presentations, in one form or another, were sustainability and studentification. These are more than just buzz words for the sector now. Sustainability is key to attracting new students and creating estates for the future, while the tricky issue of studentification is threatening the relationships between universities and their communities. The solutions for sustainability were outlined clearly enough – conscientious refurbishment and eco-friendly new builds – but the solutions to studentification were less stable. It seems that we still can't agree whether blocks of student accommodation in city centres are helping to maintain a natural balance in rented accommodation or wether they are student ghettos in the sky. If you have an opinion, post it on the forum.
The final address of the day came from Dr Avi Friedman, Professor of Architecture and Director of the Affordable Homes Programme at McGill University, Canada. He gave one of the most energetic and urgent presentations of the day about his eco-friendly, designer homes. The idea being to create homes with swithcable interiors, produced in sections. There are now thousands of such homes in Canada and they have been used at Lancaster university as part of their new accommodation. In his address, he talked about how universities must start inventing and must become agents of change – a fitting sentiment for a conference looking to the future of estates. If you have never encountered the charismatic Avi, do so here, and to find out more about the Affordable Homes Programme, clickhere.