We all enjoy good news stories, and last week you covered two stories with clear similarities; both concerned university announcements of particularly large new multidisciplinary research institutes.
One was a £20 million initiative creating 100 jobs. This received 414cm2 of coverage on the back page. The other was a £50 million initiative creating 250 jobs. This received 36cm2 of coverage on page nine.
There is no prize for guessing which research institute is in Wales.
Swansea University's £50 million Institute of Life Science, in collaboration with IBM, must be one of the largest single research investments in a UK higher education institution in recent years. And yet it received only passing reference in The Times Higher . Could we please have a more even-handed coverage of future initiatives?
Richard B. Davies
Vice-chancellor
Swansea University