Using CPD to tackle the UK's grand challenges

21 February 2025

The university is committed to fostering lifelong learning opportunities for all, championing the 'upskill, reskill, new skills' agenda to ensure future generations are equipped with the expertise and practical knowledge to address the nation’s most pressing challenges.

Read our Review of the Year, which highlights the work we are doing to develop CPD opportunities, and support the university's strategic mission.

Many of our CPD programmes serve as stepping stones into broader university study, acting as gateways to full-time degree programmes. In 2024, we partnered with the Net Zero Innovation Institute to develop existing MSc modules as non-credit bearing CPD courses. These modules allow delegates to learn alongside full-time students, gaining specialised expertise and valuable insights, while upskilling in areas such as energy systems, low carbon built environment and sustainable planning and policy. It is hoped that access to high-quality CPD opportunities like this will begin to address the skills gap and to prepare key sectors for the transition to net zero.

Our intellectual curiosity and research intensity will create a depth of understanding from which we will innovate; sustaining and securing the future, enriching lives, supporting social integrity, pioneering public values, embedding one-health, enabling physical and mental well-being, driving decarbonisation and developing new transformational technologies.

Cardiff University strategy: Our future, together. Our path to 2035.

Professional development can play a pivotal role in shaping strategy—whether by applying academic research to plan for unprecedented large-scale events like the Covid pandemic or tackling critical front-line challenges such as reducing NHS waiting lists and enhancing fire service management capabilities. Skills developed via CPD training not only address immediate needs but also drive service improvement in the long term. CPD short courses can be a solution to an immediate learning need. Courses can be developed and updated quickly to ensure they respond to specific skill requirements.

Through our collaboration with Cardiff Business School, we deliver cutting-edge programmes in leadership, management, and lean working practices, empowering tomorrow’s leaders to take on complex challenges. From one-day courses in Service Design to international programmes that support SMEs, aspiring CEOs, and emerging leaders, our offerings are tailored to nurture talent and build essential skills.

Watch Service Design marketing video

We also partnered with Cardiff Business School to win a 3-year Foundation Improvement Skills course for uniformed and support workers at Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SRFS). Now in its second year, this programme supports SFRS’s modernisation and innovation efforts, equipping staff with essential system and improvement tools to lead meaningful change.

We enrol candidates on this CPD course in groups from our department - a mixture of nurses and doctors from several disciplines. We have seen dramatic improvements in patient care in the resus room after they attend the course. In particular, we have seen significant improvements in team dynamics and non-technical skills. It is a very useful course for all and, importantly, it is improving trauma care.

Dr Huw Lloyd Williams, Consultant – Emergency Medicine, Emergency Department, Prince Charles Hospital

Our work with the School of Medicine continues at pace; we launched two new CPD courses aimed at upskilling emergency clinicians – Point of Care Ultrasound - Ultrasound Guided Regional Anaesthesia and Emergency Airway Management at the Front Door.

Another key milestone this year was the expansion of the Major Trauma Life Support (MTLS) short course — a blended learning programme developed in partnership with the South Wales Major Trauma Network. Designed to address the critical need for enhanced trauma education in acute care, this hands-on training exemplifies how practical learning can directly improve patient outcomes. As medical professionals on the front line battle pressures and cuts, effective and speedy decision-making can save lives, particularly in an emergency setting.

We play a vital role in developing CPD activities that upskill existing employees, reskill professionals from related sectors and equip individuals with new expertise in key research and technology areas.

This is an essential part of the CSconnected UKRI Strength in Places Fund (SIPF) project, in which we lead the CPD work package. There is a shortage of workers with appropriate skills to support the growth of the compound semiconductor sector in South Wales. The SIPF project aims to increase skills capability, and support plans for accelerated organic growth and inward investment.

In response to this need, we have dedicated much of 2024 to delivering a mix of face-to-face, online and blended learning CPD courses and preparing for the launch of the second phase of short courses.

Watch the promotional video for Introduction to compound semiconductor electronics

In our interactive review of the year, we have categorised our main areas of work into the following categories: working with global organisations, using CPD to tackle the UK's grand challenges, and transforming local communities. Our review is packed with links to videos, courses, partner and stakeholder websites, and articles and reports we think you may find interesting.