Universities, research institutes, societies and funding bodies are invited to become signatories of the Technician Commitment, where they pledge action against the key challenges affecting their technical staff (or technical staff they support). This helps safeguard valuable and vital technical skills in the UK that support research and teaching.
Since its launch in 2017, the initiative has grown to a global community of over 150 signatory and supporter organisations championing technicians and their contributions to higher education and research, and now includes international signatories as well as UK institutions.
Northumbria University signed as a proud signatory to the commitment in November 2021 and co-created an institutional action plan with its technical staff, addressing the four main pillars of the technician commitment (visibility, recognition, career development and sustainability). That first plan ran from 2022–2026 and delivered lasting change: embedding technical staff in institutional governance, securing recognition of technicians as research contributors, and building a funded development infrastructure that didn't exist before 2022.
Building on that foundation, Northumbria's 2026–2029 renewal action plan has now been through faculty, institutional and University Executive governance and signed off at Vice-Chancellor level, with a continued focus on career frameworks, fair attribution, succession planning and equity in senior technical roles.
Our plan is brough to life through our Technician Commitment Working Group and progress against the plan is monitored by our Research Culture Committee.
Technical Staff at Northumbria University:
Our technical staff enable our research, teaching and knowledge exchange activities at the institution through their roles working in our specialist technical spaces and facilities. Working across our Faculties, technical staff have a variety of roles enabling activities in areas such as laboratories, core facilities, workshops, design studios, making spaces, specialist research and teaching IT support, field work activities, clinical skills facilities, sports exercise facilities and fashion and fine art studios plus many more.
If you would like to find out more, please contact our Institutional Lead Professor Louise Bracken, Pro-Vice Chancellor Research and Knowledge Exchange(louise.bracken@northumbria.ac.uk) or our Technician Lead for this work Demelza Menendez (demelza.menendez@northumbria.ac.uk).
Page last updated 15/07/26
