By Alex Lucas, Research Manager at ukactive and Victoria Goodyear, Associate Professor in Pedagogy in Sport, Physical Activity and Health, University of Birmingham
When it comes to facing some of today’s challenges across health, the value of partnerships continues to grow. There is greater recognition that we each hold a part of the solution, and the answer cannot be found as effectively without collective input. Partnerships become even more powerful with the merging of industry organisations and academic institutions, and we are seeing this more and more in political calls, research funding and thought leadership.
The ukactive Research Institute and the University of Birmingham have had an established relationship for several years, working together on a number of National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) funded projects. However, today, we are embarking on a new partnership, that is a little different.
The University of Birmingham and ukactive have established a partnership focusing on connecting the needs of the physical activity sector with the expertise from academia. This has been created to help progress some key joint areas of challenge in relation to the equity in physical and mental wellbeing.
This partnership comes as the Economic and Social Research Council awarded the University of Birmingham £7.1m for a centre dedicated to doctoral training (Centre for Doctoral Training Plus – CDT+). This is a National Training and Research Excellence centre for Understanding Behaviour – known as CENTRE-UB – and this is part of the wider investment to radically expand UK behavioural research capacity.
As part of this partnership, ukactive and the University of Birmingham will focus on:
- Upskilling the workforce: How can the fitness and leisure sector workforce be supported, upskilled and upscaled to support individuals with certain long-term health conditions to engage in physical activity?
- Leisure facilities: What interventions are or aren’t effective that use fitness and leisure facilities to improve certain health conditions (eg musculoskeletal, mental health), and what are the economic benefits for the health system (NHS)?
- Inequalities: How can we address inequalities in the fitness and leisure sector, through using customer data, and by exploring areas focused on harder to reach and underrepresented groups (eg disabilities, women and girls, ethnically diverse groups, areas of deprivation)?
For the ukactive Research Institute, the translation of academic evidence into practice that supports, protects and informs its members is an essential function of the institute. Partnership working is a key part of this ensuring high quality and rigorous research can be both conducted and communicated in a way that achieves academic, sector and policy impact. It also establishes new opportunities for ukactive members and the wider sector who are interested in learning from academia and collaborating on academic research.
The University of Birmingham and its CENTRE-UB focuses on the development of research and training in partnership between the university and its students, and non-academic partners in industry. This involves funding a series of doctoral and post-doctoral level partnerships, working with a wide range of partner organisations from across the public, private or third sector on a range of interdisciplinary projects.
This partnership offers industry partners and ukactive members with access to a range of events, webinars, and application opportunities. Together, the ukactive Research Institute and CENTRE-UB are hoping to forge new connections between ukactive members and other relevant industry partners to progress research that can have meaningful impact in an industry setting.
Some upcoming areas we are working on as part of the partnership include:
- Establishing knowledge sharing between academia and industry partners through knowledge exchange events hosted by CENTRE-UB.
- Facilitating and promoting opportunities for academic and industry partners to network and work together on specific research topics, through providing access to studentship and fellowship opportunities.
- Working collectively on developing events, like roadshows, webinars and training, which upskill industry partners in areas of interest and need.
Sign up to the CENTRE-UB to keep up to date on upcoming webinars and application deadlines.
To get in touch with the ukactive Research Institute email research@ukactive.org.uk and you can meet the team at Active Uprising 2025.
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