Universities should consider sharing services and facilities with neighbouring institutions as they look to cut costs in the face of funding challenges, sector leaders told Times Higher Education’s Campus Live event.
With declining enrolments, frozen fees and inflation biting, local collaboration might be needed to replace competition between universities in close geographical proximity, according to Niamh Lamond, registrar and chief operating officer at Swansea University.
She said she was “surprised” at the lack of facility sharing in the sector currently, beyond “low-lying fruit” such as shared bus services.
Ms Lamond previously set up a joint campus between Falmouth University and the University of Exeter, which she said saved each institution around 40 per cent of the costs they might have incurred if they had done it alone.
