By Grant Smith, education reporter

DUNDEE UNIVERSITY is looking for a new leader after the sudden announcement yesterday that Sir Alan Langlands is to quit after eight years as principal and vice-chancellor.

During his time at the helm the institution has won accolades for the quality of its research and teaching—including its recent shortlisting in a UK university of the year contest—and he has overseen investment totalling £200 million in expanding and improving the campus.

However, he has also found himself at loggerheads with unions and employees as budgetary problems led to course changes and a voluntary severance scheme that has seen more than 100 academic and support staff leave.

Sir Alan is to become chief executive of the Higher Education Funding Council, which is responsible for allocating £7.5 billion to universities and colleges in England. He takes up his new post in April.

It is understood the announcement of his departure was brought forward because a government minister decided to speak about it publicly last night.

Chairman of the university court John Milligan said, “The university will move quickly to appoint a new principal and interim arrangements will be announced early in the new year.”

He paid tribute to Sir Alan, saying he had made an “outstanding contribution” since his appointment in 2000, adding, “The university has made enormous progress under his leadership and he leaves an important legacy—a strong pipeline of funded research, new programmes of undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, a strong professoriate, a well- motivated community of students and some excellent new facilities and research platforms.”

Sir Alan came to Dundee University having held several posts in the NHS, including managing teaching hospitals in Edinburgh and London and running a regional health authority.

Latterly he was chief executive of the NHS in England for six years and he was knighted in 1998.

He was only the fifth principal since the university achieved independence from St Andrews University in the 1960s.

By co-incidence, St Andrews will also soon be seeing a change at the top when its principal, Brian Lang, steps down at the end of the year.

Commenting on his departure, Sir Alan said, “I am enthusiastic about my new post but I will miss Dundee.

“It is a great privilege to be the principal and vice chancellor and I know that the university will move from strength to strength under new leadership.”

The university is renowned for academic quality in subjects including science, medicine, art and law and has been ranked in the world’s top 250 universities for the last two years.

However, Sir Alan will be leaving his successor an unfinished task.

The university’s finances have been under pressure and management came up with a plan last year to move from a seven-figure deficit to a 3% budget surplus by 2010-11.

This involved changes to language, town planning and community education courses, cutbacks in spending on the botanic garden and substantial job losses—although compulsory redundancies have not been necessary.

Although the initial reaction from employees and students was negative, with protest rallies being staged, both university management and the trade unions representing staff have since been working together to try to resolve any disputes as amicably as possible.