The impact of research has been growing ever more important not only in its own right, but as a factor that feeds into funding decisions at both institutional and individual levels. We are therefore pleased to present a Working Paper written by the Director of PASCAL and CR&DALL, Professor Mike Osborne, in which he assesses the cumulative impact of research that assesses the cumulative effect of research that has systematically measured, mapped and analysed learning provision at urban/regional level, contributing internationally to developing learning cities over decades.

The 17 SDGs adopted by the United Nations in 2015 constitute a significant step up in scale and ambition in that they apply to all nations, whether developed or developing. Actions to achieve the Goals are demanding and education is seen as central.

The development of a learning city requires city leaders to build a complex partnership with a potentially large number of stakeholders in city institutions, business and civic society. Of the wide variety of measurement tools available to cities to gain some understanding of their strategy needs and performance, the paper argues that a benchmarking approach, using a mixture of qualitative self-assessment supported by some qualitative data offers the most fruitful approach to assess the strengths and weaknesses of policy and practice, and offers a guide to prioritising actions.

Please find attached PASCAL Briefing Paper 15,  Building entrepreneurship in sustainable learning cities, written by PASCAL Board Member, Peter Kearns. We offer our thanks to Dr Yuan Dayong of Beijing Academy of Social Sciences for the translation into Mandarin and to Ms. Jihye Han, Doctoral Student at the Free University of Berlin for the translation into Korean, arranged by Professor Han Soonghee of Seoul National University.