The Reinvention Centre for Undergraduate Research, a collaborative project based in the Sociology Department at Warwick and the School of the Built Environment at Oxford Brookes, was part of a national HEFCE initiative to create Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETLs). The purpose of CETLs was to promote excellence across all subjects and aspects of teaching and learning in Higher Education. Funding 74 CETLs to the amount of £315 million over five years from 2005-06 to 2009-10, the CETLs represented HEFCE's largest ever single funding initiative in teaching and learning.

The main aim of the Reinvention Centre was to integrate research-based learning into the undergraduate curriculum. The purpose was not simply to teach undergraduates research skills but to enable undergraduates to become involved in research and integrated into the research cultures of their departments.

The Centre was awarded £500,000 recurrent over 5 years and £800,000 capital funding. The recurrent funding covered staff and running costs, including lectureships, funded fellowships (students and academics/support staff) and administrative posts at Warwick and Brookes. The capital money enabled the refurbishment of a student learning and study area at Brookes influenced by Warwick’s Learning Grid.

In August 2010, at the end of the HEFCE funding period, the Warwick half of the Centre merged with The CAPITAL Centre to form IATL (the Institute for Advanced Teaching and Learning). The Brookes half was absorbed into the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development.

Centre poster

Two-year evaluation report (July 2007)

Final evaluation report (April 2010)