Introducing the Lancaster Postgraduate Statistics Centre — a Centre of Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL)

Abstract

In the spring of 2005, the University of Lancaster was successful in winning a £4.85 million bid to fund a Centre of Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL). In common with other CETLs, the Lancaster CETL has the core aim of achieving excellence in teaching, however our specific focus on the development of postgraduate statistics taught both within the discipline of statistics and more broadly in other disciplines is more unique. The award is partially funding a £3.3 million building, the Postgraduate Statistics Centre (PSC), to expand the postgraduate activities of the department and will provide state of the art new teaching spaces for teaching statistics courses. In addition to this, funding has provided the department with several new members of staff and will allow a range of new resources to be developed within the centre. This article will give a general overview of the PSC and will discuss the main aims and objectives of the project followed by a brief summary of our achievements to date.