University of the Highlands and Islands in Perthshire
by Sheena Howden
Graduation day
The green light for the University of the Highlands and Islands is getting
closer and now is a good time to consider what the establishment of a university
campus at Perth College mean for Perthshire?
Let’s talk about the prestige, new found status, academic excellence, the
ability to design and award degrees that reflect local aspirations, all of which
is great and very desirable, but let us also think about what the University of
the Highlands and Islands in Perth really means for Perth and Perthshire.
Looking at it from a business perspective first, for every £1 spent by a
student attending university level courses, a further £3 is spent in the
immediate local economy. For every single international student on a university
course, the average spend/benefit to the economy is a staggering £10 000 per
year of study. But that is just one- way economic traffic. Under the Fresh
Talent (Scottish Executive) initiative, international students graduating with
at least an HNC can remain to work in Scotland for a further 2 years deploying
skills and talent to benefit your business.
All recent Future Skills Scotland reports indicate that many graduates from
Perth tend to migrate to the bigger cities to find their employment and careers.
What if local employers were able to grow their businesses by recruiting
high-level talent from the immediate area? What if, and this is a much bigger
question, national businesses chose to open in the area specifically because
there was a high density of high calibre, well qualified and well motivated new
graduates? Never happen?
Looking to Dundee then, what do you remember Dundee representing 15 years
ago? A run down city struggling to develop from a great trading past based on
jute, jam and journalism? What do you see now?
Dundee now has two universities which have a worldwide reputation for
excellence in biotech technologies and software engineering. International
businesses locate there purely to tap into the new talent that is leaving the
universities and this is now a self-sustaining situation. The businesses go
where the talent is and wider talent (ie relocating employees) then goes to
where the business is. But what if you are not in biotech or software
engineering – “all too technical for me” you might say. Look at the wider
picture of what has happened in Dundee. New shops, re-vitalised city centre,
beautiful riverside esplanade, new contemporary arts centre, new housing and new
jobs – all based around the need to support the new economies and new locators
to the area.
This is the potential that Perth has with the College and UHI gaining
university title next year. Often people speak about the marker in the sand
scenario – what marker will Perth College UHI and Perthshire want to put down?
Perthshire and Perth have heritage (natural and historical), thriving tourism,
hospitality, arts (especially music), leisure and recreational and also
logistics (possibly the most understated feature of Perthshire is the ease of
communication to and from the major cities. What marker could a Perth-based
university campus place to reflect the aspirations and talents that it already
has. This is a major challenge facing both the business communities and UHI
because one decision feeds the other’s activity.
UHI and Perth College are international experts in tourism study (Perth leads
on Masters level in Tourism Interpretation) and we also host the Centre for
Mountain Studies, which has international significance (Professor Price advises
on the Cairngorm National Park and the European Mountain Forum). We have led on
the development of new courses in new formats to attract wider international
recognition and students from overseas (for instance our 40 international
students studying for their Masters qualification over the internet with us).
Perthshire has attracted major international coverage with the recent G8 and
golfing championships and almost everyone worldwide now knows of Gleneagles! It
could easily be argued that internationally, Scotland and Perthshire are known
for heritage, countryside and stunning locations to visit; especially through
Hollywood films (Highlander, Braveheart, Rob Roy, Trainspotting, Harry Potter,
DaVinci Code, the Wicker Man etc). This international reputation as a place to
visit could also indicate that it a great place to do business from, either as a
first tier supplier or supporting operations.
www.perth.uhi.ac.uk
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