Uni sacks lecturer for failing to earn enough grant money

A Veterinary Sciences lecturer has been sacked after 15 years of service for failing to secure enough grant money.

Dr Alison Hayman’s primary job as a lecturer in veterinary sciences was to teach students attending the university.

But over the past five years she said she found herself under increasing pressure to win grants for her research projects.

Now, in an extremely rare case, she has lost her job at Bristol University for failing to secure enough money.

The married mother-of-two claims the dismissal is extremely unfair as decisions over her funding applications were out of her control.

She also said her sacking will raise questions about the futures of 387 other academics at the university who have also failed to land enough funding.

Dr Hayman said she felt her proud record of working at some of the world’s leading educational establishments had now been tarnished.

In the past she has worked at Cambridge University, Zurich and St George’s Medical School in London.

Dr. Hayman was the sole breadwinner in her household and said the sacking had also devastated her family.

She said: “I have sons aged 10 and 12 and it’s had a terrible effect on us all. The pressure and stress has been horrendous, and it’s had a knock-on on my children.

“I moved 200 miles from Cambridge for this job and this has just smashed my career to pieces. I’ve now got the label of ‘dismissed’ over my head.”

Since starting at the university as a lecturer and researcher in 2000, Dr Hayman has made bids for grants amounts ranging from £5,000 to £500,000.

She needed the money to aid her biology research looking at enzymes which are found in increasing quantities in diseases, including cancer.

The funding typically pays the wages of research assistants and technicians brought in to help with the projects.

A system change was introduced at the university in 2007 which meant all lecturers working at Dr Hayman’s level must work towards a promotion, and were bracketed as failing if they were not pulling in enough research funding.

The University and College Union (UCU) is campaigning for Dr Hayman to be reinstated, with a petition attracting more than 300 signatures.

A spokesperson for the university told the Tab efforts had been made to assist Dr Hayman in reaching her goals. They said: “If staff remain unable to meet the relevant criteria, a capability process comes into play whereby the university will work with the staff member to help them meet their objectives.”

However, Dr Hayman has described this process as “demoralising and paralysing”.