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We all enjoy good news stories, and last week you covered two stories with clear similarities; both concerned university announcements of particularly large new multidisciplinary research institutes.

One was a ?20 million initiative creating 100 jobs. This received 414cm2 of coverage on the back page. The other was a ?50 million initiative creating 250 jobs. This received 36cm2 of coverage on page nine.

There is no prize for guessing which research institute is in Wales.

Swansea University's ?50 million Institute of Life Science, in collaboration with IBM, must be one of the largest single research investments in a UK higher education institution in recent years. And yet it received only passing reference in The Times Higher . Could we please have a more even-handed coverage of future initiatives?

Richard B. Davies
Vice-chancellor
Swansea University