(Episode 173) Beyond Town and Gown: The Civic Exchange at University of Leeds

In this episode, we’re joined by Professor Catherine Noakes to explore the Civic Exchange — an initiative at the University of Leeds that's rethinking how universities and communities work together.

We cover:

🔸 What the Civic Exchange is (and isn't) — it's not about doing new things, but about connecting what's already happening across research, education, and engagement

🔸 Moving from "doing things for communities" to co-creating with them — and why that shift matters

🔸 The persistence of "town and gown" and what it takes to break it down

🔸 What Cath's career — from engineering to the SAGE Committee during the pandemic — taught her about working in partnership, understanding different motivations, and not assuming you have all the answers

🔸 The assumptions we make across disciplines about impact — and how arts, humanities, and sciences have more in common than we think

🔸 What a civic university of the future might look like, and why devolution could be both a carrot and a stick

A few favourite moments from the conversation:

"If you get it right, what you get out the end is so much richer and so much more powerful and impactful." — Cath Noakes

"We do need experts, but many of the people we work with are also experts in a different way." — Cath Noakes

Big thanks to Cath for a genuinely thoughtful conversation. If you're working in or around universities, community partnerships, or research culture, I think you'll find this one interesting.