Search these pages to explore a selection of our directory of activities. You can use the keyword search and filter buttons to discover how we are addressing each of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals and the five priorities in our Social Responsibility and Civic Engagement Plan. You can also filter activities by location and function.
searching subjects: Prosperous communities
Our Whitworth Art Gallery partners with the Afrocats to hold a series of creative events and workshops to drive social change. Afrocats is a female-led charity that works closely with communities to address and dismantle inequality by identifying and breaking down barriers. Their vision is to create a robust and more inclusive social environment for vulnerable asylum-seekers and refugees.
Dr. Sherilyn MacGregor, Reader in Environmental Politics at our University, is the lead author of a major report ‘Caring in a Changing Climate‘ commissioned by Oxfam America that investigates the impacts of climate breakdown, climate mitigation and adaptations on care work. The report calls for greater actions to limit greenhouse gas emissions and a more significant focus on the nexus of climate and care work within policy and research. It points to the need for climate initiatives to pursue gender-transformative approaches via the adoption of care sensitive interventions.
The ESRC festival of Social Science is an annual celebration of the research conducted in social sciences and its profound impact on society. It offers a fascinating insight into some of the country’s leading research and how it influences our social, economic, and political lives – both now and in the future. The festival is open to everyone and is a unique opportunity to engage directly with researchers about the projects they work on.
At the University of Manchester we are proud to be part of the City of Manchester team who worked together to achieve the Living Wage City Status. The University is a pioneer and advocate for the Real Living Wage in the City and has been a Real Wage employer since 2019.
Manchester Day of Action (MDoA) is our annual flagship volunteer programme where alumni from across the world are invited to choose a local project that needs volunteer assistance. Each project relates to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and a team of alumni work together to support the project during the ‘Day of Action,’ which takes place during the summer.
Examples of our civic partnerships include: We also prioritise global partnerships to advance our work towards the SDGs. These include:
Policy@Manchester is our University’s sector-leading policy engagement institute. It connects researchers with policymakers and influencers, nurturing long-term policy engagement partnerships and impact.
We partner with small local charities in Manchester right through to major government departments through our Q-Step programme. This places students on internships in organisations that require data skills and analysis and we’ve collaborated on projects with the Office for National Statistics on global, national and regional datasets used to measure progress on SDGs.
We’re committed to empowering students with the knowledge, skills and opportunities to address all of the SDGs through partnerships with public, private and civil society organisations. Our University Living Lab platform connects student projects with external organisations to address the SDGs. Our Volunteer Hub acts to advance partnerships between hundreds of charities and our student volunteers. And many academic programmes offer service-learning partnerships, where external organisations benefit from practical student interventions in areas such as dentistry, optometry, pharmacy, business and legal advice.
We’ve become the first higher education institution in the UK to adopt the Social Value Portal, the leading online tool that helps organisations prioritise and measure their social value when they procure, or pay for, major services.
Our African Cities Research Consortium (ACRC), funded by the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) as part of UK Aid, tackles complex problems in some of Africa’s fastest growing urban areas. Aimed at reducing urban poverty and inequality, our research will generate new evidence to catalyse integrated, sustainable, inclusive approaches to urban development in partnership with frontline humanitarian responders, effective policy influencers, local government networks and deeply rooted civil society groups.
As an accredited Living Wage Employer, our 10,000+ staff are paid at least the voluntary living wage level in the UK set by the Living Wage Foundation.
Our Alliance Manchester Business School has partnered with regional organisations and authorities to create the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter, which aims to advance decent work and employment standards across our city region. We have also joined campaigns with Citizens UK to highlight our role as a living wage organisation.
Our Work and Equalities Institute is providing the evidence base to inform global employment debates and policies. Research in three key areas is undertaken: minimum wage and collective bargaining; the gender pay gap; and precarious work. This work is shaping guidance produced by international policy bodies and national policies of multiple countries, and is also providing evidence for European trade unions in their interactions with EU and national policymakers.
Our Alliance Manchester Business School hosts The Productivity Institute – a new UK-wide £32 million research organisation exploring what productivity means for business, for workers and for communities, how it is measured and how it contributes to increased living standards and wellbeing. It will help pinpoint the causes of stagnation in UK productivity and lay foundations for sustained and inclusive productivity growth by directly informing government policies and business strategies to improve productivity.
We work in collaboration with Association des Guides du Rwanda (AGR) to provide volunteer opportunities for students to help girls and young women in Rwanda acquire skills for their development and become agents of positive change.
Our research into agriculture and apparel sectors in Africa, Asia and Latin America, and collaboration with three large UK retailers, has led to more than 390,000 workers in value chains in low- and middle-income countries directly benefiting from the implementation of gender-equitable strategies. More than a million workers have been indirectly advantaged through opportunities for women to advance to leadership positions and new strategies from companies that have the potential to reach 33 million workers in 180 countries.
#BeeWell is an initiative established in Greater Manchester in 2019 by our University, Anna Freud, The Gregson Family Foundation, and Greater Manchester Combined Authority. The programme aims to explore young people’s opinions on wellbeing and the ways in which it can be improved. The findings inform activity across Greater Manchester, with schools, voluntary sector organisations and children’s services working closely with young people to interpret and act on the results.
Our student-run, campus zero waste shop, Want Not Waste, holds a community fridge. This contains food from unsold meals offered by local business and surplus raw ingredients provided by our catering outlets. Stocking these items combats local food waste while helping to tackle food insecurity within our own university community.
Since its inception in 2013, the UK’s first student-led and campus-based foodbank, Manchester Central Foodbank, has helped thousands of local citizens with food insecurity. This included developing an online store and delivery system for vulnerable and isolated people, and providing 70,000 meals during the pandemic in 2020.
Our Global Development Institute has examined whether cultivating in groups – by voluntarily pooling land, labour, funds and skills and sharing costs and benefits – enables small farmers to create larger, more profitable enterprises in South Asia and beyond. The research in Kerala, south India showed that carefully structured group farming created sustainable, food-secure livelihoods for vast numbers of poor women farmers.
Our academics are exploring the impact of austerity on reproduction. The project uses a range of creative activities and interviews with women from areas in the north-east, where there are significant socio-economic barriers. This project is providing new insights into contemporary austerity and how this may affect childbearing.
Our student community work on a range of projects to tackle extreme poverty and inequality. Love for the Streets was established by two Manchester students to use youth events, content and social media marketing to tackle homelessness in partnership with local charities. Once a Month fights period poverty through public campaigns and providing sanitary products to vulnerable women across Manchester.
The Homeless Healthcare Society helps improve the healthcare of Manchester’s homeless population by raising awareness of the medical inequalities and stigmas faced by homeless patients when accessing healthcare. The aim is to ultimately improve the care provided by tomorrow’s healthcare professionals.
Our Global Development Institute is the UK’s largest university-based postgraduate centre specialising in international development. More than 5,000 students have completed master’s programmes in international development since 2012.
Afrocats takeover at The Whitworth
Caring in a Changing Climate
ESRC Festival of Social Science
Living Wage City
Manchester Day of Action
Social responsibility partnerships
Policy@Manchester
Q-Step data partnerships
Student learning partnerships
Social Value Portal
African Cities Research Consortium
Living wage
Good employment
Influencing international and national employment policies to promote inclusive labour markets
The Productivity Institute
Girl Guides Rwanda remote volunteering
Gender equality in global value chains
#BeeWell
Community Fridge
Manchester Central Foodbank
Creating sustainable livelihoods through group farming
Reproduction and austerity
Student action
Homeless Healthcare Society
International development study programmes
