Director of Manchester School of Theatre

About Manchester Met

With over 5,100 staff members across the university, and around 43,000 students – we are a big institution with even bigger ambitions. We are proud to be at the heart of one of Europe’s most diverse and vibrant cities, and with shared traditions of industry, innovation and inclusivity, our impact reaches around the globe.

We are committed to providing excellent education to transform our students’ lives, and to delivering high quality research with powerful real-world impacts and benefits, as evidenced by our highly successful REF outcome: 30% of our research, across more than 740 academics, has been rated as world leading. And 91% of our research impact is world leading or internationally excellent (REF 2021).

The opportunity

We are looking to appoint a Professor as Director of Manchester School of Theatre to lead our vibrant creative community that is one of the UK's leading centres for teaching and research in theatre and performance.

Manchester School of Theatre currently delivers: two undergraduate programmes, the conservatoire model BA (Hons) Acting and the hybrid model BA (Hons) Drama and Contemporary Performance; a taught postgraduate degree, MA/MFA Performance; and an active research group with multiple PhD students. Our work ranges from stage- and screen-focused actor training to scored and devised performance and practice as research. We are based in the Grosvenor East Building designed around our 180 seat Grosvenor East Theatre.

The primary responsibilities of the Director of Manchester School of Theatre are to: 

• Provide vision and operational leadership, developing new strategic directions for our creative offer that embed the University's Education and Research strategies.
• Foster a creative and stimulating environment, working with colleagues to develop programming, income generation and/or sponsorship to support curriculum development, research innovation and theatre operations.
• Build the School of Theatre's profile, brand development and reputation through advocacy and external engagement with arts and culture organisations, the creative sector, research and industry partners locally, nationally and globally.
• Establish and chair an advisory panel of theatre and performance industry experts to ensure strategic alignment of priorities and activities to current and future graduate outcomes and industry needs.  

About you

This is a senior strategic leadership role, and to be appointed at Professor level, we will need you to have a very strong track record, reputation and standing in theatre and performance education, industry practice and / or academic research.

You will also have extensive leadership and a deep understanding of, or personal involvement with, theatre, performance and the arts and culture sector, ideally with responsibility for leading a theatre, a theatre school, or other equivalent organisation.

We are committed to equality, diversity and inclusion and the Director will join our shared commitment to opening up theatre and performance education to a diverse range of students and staff from different cultural, ethnic and social backgrounds. 

Further information

Applications must be made via our recruitment system and should include a full CV and a letter of application setting out your interest in the role and details of how your knowledge, skills and experience match the essential criteria being sought.

Please refer to the full Director of Manchester School of Theatre Job Description and the appropriate Professor Job Description documents, for your information.

If you would like an informal discussion prior to application, please do get in touch via PAtoHeadofAandP@mmu.ac.uk.

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