2. Agenda
10:25 A view of the last twelve months Professor Paul Boyle, vice chancellor of
Swansea University and Jisc chair
10:35 A look ahead Heidi Fraser-Krauss, chief executive officer,
Jisc
10:55 Finance update Nicola Arnold, chief financial officer, Jisc
11:05 Question and answer session
11:25 Breakout rooms:
Further education and skills Robin Ghurbhurun, managing director,
further education and skills
HE/Research update Liam Earney, managing director HE and
research, and executive director of digital
resources
12:30 Close
2
3. A view of the last twelve
months
Paul Boyle, chair, Jisc
7. Satisfy members and funders
Maintained our core grant funding with funder relationships going from
strength to strength as we increased interactions around their digital and
data agendas, including:
acting as strategic partner in the
Welsh Government’s post-16
Covid-19 resilience plan
Producing a blended learning study with
the Higher Education Funding Council
for Wales (HEFCW) and Universities Wales
helping to inform the
Scottish Funding Council’s
(SFC) digital vision for
the FE and HE sector
Working with the Department for Education (DfE) in
England to promote our offer to FE; and with the
Office for Students (OfS) in the production of Gravity
Assist a report on the shift toward digital teaching and
learning in English FE since the start of the pandemic.
7 A view of the last twelve months
9. Satisfy members and funders
Net Promoter
Score (NPS) at
41+
for FE
Net Promoter
Score (NPS) at
25+
for HE
customer
satisfaction scores
91%
customer
satisfaction scores
86%
9 A view of the last twelve months
11. Cyber security
“Ransomware attack: how one college
pulled together to rebuild and recover”
“It helped that we had asked the Jisc
cyber security team to provide data
analysis of the attack and their
recommendations backed up what we
were saying. Their support throughout
was outstanding ”
Simon Hewitt, principal, Dundee & Angus
College
11 A view of the last twelve months
12. Top 5 themes
1. Cyber security
“Making sure our data is as
secure as it can be”
2. Technology enhanced learning
“Exciting use of digital learning that is engaging,
eg gamification”
3. Digital strategy “Ensuring staff are confident to deliver digitally”
4. Staff and student capability “How we support the workforce of the future in terms of their
skills”
5. Learning spaces/campus
“Looking into implementing virtual learning”
12 Further education and skills
13. Cyber security
56%
increase in security
incidents raised
100%
resolved within SLA
commitments
16 questions
We created a checklist of what
you need to ask to assess your
cyber security posture
800
Foundation DDOS attacks
against our members mitigated
13 A view of the last twelve months
14. Open Access
£8m
from transitional
agreements
50
open access
agreements
Covering
60%
UK research output
20%
increase in active API
users on Sherpa
compared to only
20%
globally
Rising to
80%
with Elsevier
14 A view of the last twelve months
15. Student services
2.3m
Visitors to prospects
website every month
Hedd closed down
85
UK websites selling
fake degrees
15,000
Visitors to the Luminate website every month
15 A view of the last twelve months
16. Data and analytics
Over
24,000
uses of the Heidi plus
service
88%
Of UK HEIs are using
online surveys
27,000
learners took part in Digital experience insights survey
16 A view of the last twelve months
17. Member engagement
Delivered
169
virtual events for nearly
14,000
delegates.
110
training workshops
delivered for
1250
participants
1519
engagements with
members by account
managers
17 Jisc briefing for Research England
19. Looking ahead
• Cyber security
• Future of Janet/Supporting 5G
• Managed services
• Importance of data
• Supporting academic integrity
• AI
• Carbon footprint and sustainability
19 A view of the last twelve months
23. Finance
Unrestricted funds
2021
£’000
Restricted funds
2021
£’000
Total funds
2021
£’000
Total funds
2020
£’000
Donations and grants 48,090 22,938 71,028 67,782
Value of HECSU assets on merger - - - 7,288
Income from charitable activities 105,681 229 105,910 91,936
Income from other activities 18,666 145 18,811 17,342
Income 172,437 23,312 195,749 184,348
Charitable activities 174,054 17,455 191,509 177,448
Non-charitable activities 5,909 2 5,911 4,882
Expenditure 199,963 17,457 197,420 182,330
Net (expenditure)/income excl pensions (7,526) 5,855 (1,671) 2,018
Unrealised gains/(losses) 12,386 - 12,386 (1,988)
Exceptional item 20,929 - 20,929 -
Movement in pensions provision 21 - 21 7,785
Net income/(expenditure) 25,810 5,855 31,665 7,815
23
24. Finance
24
36%
38%
20%
7% Grants from UK funding
bodies
Digital resources licensing
income
Other income
HE and FE subscription
income
42%
38%
5%
8%
4%
3% e-infrastructure
Digital resources
licensing
Digital resources other
Data & technology
Marketing and comms
Other expenditure
Professor David Maguire
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Professor David Maguire, who preceded me as Chair, and Dr Paul Feldman who served as Jisc’ CEO for 6 years. David led the board through a significant period of evolution and change for Jisc and our members. In addition to overseeing successful mergers in recent years with Eduserv, HECSU and HESA Enterprise, David led the ground-breaking work on Learning and Teaching Reimagined that Jisc delivered with Universities UK, Advance HE and Emerge Education. I, along with my fellow members of the board, would like to thank David for his unwavering commitment to ensuring the success of Jisc throughout his tenure.
Dr Paul Feldman
Paul has recently retired from the CEO role, and the board has been extremely impressed by the transformation of Jisc during his tenure. Paul delivered a number of successful mergers, guided the organisation through the pandemic, and drove a range of developments over recent years to secure Jisc’s current standing as a strong member-led sector organisation. We extend our sincere thanks to Paul for all that he accomplished during this time.
Heidi Fraser-Krauss
The board would like to welcome Heidi Fraser-Krauss who joined as the new CEO in September 2021. Heidi brings considerable experience of Jisc, and digital systems and we look forward to supporting her plans, confident that she will take Jisc into its next phase building on the strong foundations laid by Paul.
I would like to start with the sincere thanks of the board to every member of Jisc staff, who have worked tirelessly over the past year to support the organisation and its members.
It’s a critical time for Jisc and the wider higher, further, research and skills sectors.
The past year has once again highlighted the adaptability of the organisation and if there is a positive that comes from the past few months, it is that there is a renewed understanding of the possibilities for digital in the education and research system.
We have maintained our core grant funding, and have continued to strengthen relationships with our funders increasing interactions around their digital and data agendas, including:
· acting as strategic partner in the Welsh Government’s post-16 Covid-19 resilience plan
· producing a blended learning study with the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales (HEFCW) and Universities Wales
· helping to inform the Scottish Funding Council’s (SFC) digital vision for the FE and HE sector
· working with the Department for Education (DfE) in England to promote our offer to FE; and with the Office for Students (OfS) in the production of ‘Gravity Assist’ - a report on the shift toward digital teaching and learning in English FE since the start of the pandemic.
- And we have, of course, continued to work closely with our funders in NI
I would like to start with the sincere thanks of the board to every member of Jisc staff, who have worked tirelessly over the past year to support the organisation and its members.
It’s a critical time for Jisc and the wider higher, further, research and skills sectors.
The past year has once again highlighted the adaptability of the organisation and if there is a positive that comes from the past 18 months, it is that there is a renewed understanding of the possibilities for digital in the education and research system.
The pandemic has continued to impact the way that our members deliver learning, teaching and research. We have provided significant support to our members since the start of the pandemic to help our them adapt to the ongoing changes to the delivery of learning and teaching to students.
Just over a year ago, we completed the learning and teaching reimagined initiative, a sector wide exercise exploring both the short and longer term implications of the pandemic. Since the release of the report, we have continued this work to address the acceleration of the digital agenda. Launching our FE and skills strategy in Autumn 2020, our research and innovation sector strategy in January and our HE strategy in March.
This support has landed well with our members across the sectors, Net Promoter Score (NPS) at 41+ for FE and 25+ for HE, and customer satisfaction scores of 91% and 86% respectively. We continue to look to improve these scores ensuring that we listen to colleagues in different roles throughout our member organisations and consider how we prioritise our resources
Janet network
The Janet network is a crucial part of Jisc’s responsibilities, and it continues to provide a secure, high-capacity, and collaborative infrastructure for our members. Our work to upgrade and rearchitect Janet remains ongoing to safeguard its future resilience and integrity. Jisc is aware that the long-term strategy for such support is a priority and is a key ongoing focus for us.
Cyber security
Another challenge that I'm pleased to note is high on your priority list is cyber security. We recently released the results of the 2021 cyber security posture survey which shows the vast majority of members now consider this to be a strategic priority of senior leaders - 86% of respondents in HE organisations 92% of respondents in FE providers.
Results from Jisc survey at Novembers AOC conference. Attended by senior FE leaders – asked what their top priorities were
Cyber security
With more research, teaching and learning activity taking place online than ever before, cyber security remains a priority issue for many colleges and universities. The increased sophistication and frequency of cyber-attacks has been challenging given the ever-greater demand for Jisc’s services .
In response to requests from members across the board, we have created a checklist of 16 questions you need to ask to assess your cyber security posture, which was published last week during the annual security conference
Open Access
Together with the sector, we have successfully negotiated more than 30 open access agreements with publishers which mean researchers can publish open access at no cost to them and at a sustainable cost to their institution. Over 50% of all UK research output is covered by a Jisc-negotiated transitional agreement as we continue to negotiate agreements that support the transition to open access.
Liam will provide an update on the state of the negotiations with Elsevier in his section.
Awarded additional funding by Research England to support development of a new publishing platform for the scientific community to provide a new ‘primary research research record’ for recording and appraising research ‘as it happens’, transforming research communication and culture.
Student services
The merger that we completed with HECSU in 2020 has enabled Jisc to expand its offer to include student-facing services. Our student services directorate has continued to deliver three market-leading platforms –
Prospects - provides information and advice to students seeking to choose a course and career
Hedd - verifies degree credentials, protecting our members’ integrity and reputation
and
Luminate delivers labour market analysis and intelligence to our members and stakeholders.
The value of each of these services is evident, demonstrating the benefits that were envisaged are already being delivered.
Data and analytics
We have continued to develop our data and analytics capability, supporting our members and customers moves towards more sophisticated data driven decision making
This work includes the successes of the HESA enterprise services like the Heidi plus, along with the vital Digital experience survey reports, which give a key insight into the recent experiences of both learners and staff.
A full merger with HESA will consolidate these benefits
As well as these strategic stakeholder updates, and despite the barriers thrown up by the pandemic, we have continued to engage with our members across a range of different events, training, and meetings.
We had record attendances for a number of events, due in part to the increased accessibility of virtual events, along with great delegate satisfaction scores. That feedback from members is guiding us as we begin to return to some physical events alongside continued online engagements.
Tackling digital poverty
Of course, a critical part of continuing to provide online education is ensuring that students have access to the devices, connectivity and learning spaces that they need. We are continuing our work to find practical solutions to address some of these issues and are pleased to be a member of an All-Party Parliamentary Group looking to address digital inclusion issues at a national level. One practical step we have taken has been the extension of eduroam into many more public spaces and we will be exploring how this might be extended further.
The pandemic has provided an opportunity to bring about collaborations between Jisc, local government, and national government. A lack of access to quality, inexpensive connectivity affected many learners during lockdown - and this issue isn't going away. It's crucial we come together to address this.
We’re publishing the annual review on 17 November which will be shared with all stakeholder strategic update event delegates in their joining instructions. If you think it’s appropriate, it’s always good to signpost and remind members to read, watch and listen to the stories featured.
With the immediate challenges of the pandemic behind us, this year’s annual review celebrates how you’ve been reimagining learning, teaching and research.