John Goddard, emeritus Professor of Regional Development Studies at Newcastle University UK

He was previously Deputy Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for the University’s links with the city and region, in particular the development of Newcastle as one of the UK’s six Science Cities. As DVC he also led the implementation of a major restructuring of the University and the installation of an institution wide management information system (SAP R3).

John’s academic background is in economic geography.   He founded and led the University’s Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies (CURDS) from 1977 to 1998 and directed numerous academic  and policy research projects on the role of innovation in territorial development.

Within the UK John contributed to the Dearing Review of Higher Education through a Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals report on Universities and Communities and in subsequent work for the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and Universities UK (UUK) on the Regional Mission of Higher Education.

Internationally John has been academic leader of an OECD programme now published as Higher Education and Regions:  Globally Competitive, Regionally Engaged (2007). He has also led several reviews of regional engagement by Finnish Universities sponsored by the Finnish Higher Education Evaluation Council.

John currently hold a Leverhulme Emeritus Fellowship to enable him to prepare a book on The University and the City. He is also a Visiting Fellow at the National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts (NESTA) working on the concept of the Civic University and a member of the Lead Expert Group on a national Foresight programme on the Future of Land Use. He continues to work with OECD on a future round of evaluations of links between universities and regions and has established a new relationship with the Brussels based  European Centre for University Management(ESMU) benchmarking university- business links.

John was a lecturer at LSE from 1968 to 1975 prior to moving to Newcastle. He was awarded an OBE in 1986 and the Victoria Medal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1992 and elected a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in 2004.