A planned £3m incubation centre to help develop business ideas has seen Norwich University of the Arts (NUA) win a national award for innovation in the arts.

NUA received the prize at the Times Higher Education Awards on Thursday, which shone a spotlight on the outstanding achievements of institutions, teams and individuals in the UK higher education sector.

Shearer West, of the University of Oxford, and one of the award's judges, said: 'NUA has developed an innovative and professional programme for engaging with the business community, with positive outcomes for all those involved.'

The award recognised NUA's employability strategy, which is closely tailored to the sorts of creative careers that its students want, specifically through its ideasfactory@NUA commercial department, which provides students with opportunities to work on professional briefs.

The success of ideasfactory@NUA helped to attract a £1.5m grant from the Higher Education Funding Council for England, and £200,000 from the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership, towards a £3m project to construct an incubation centre and hub that will further the agency's work, stimulate the regional economy and contribute an estimated 200 high-value jobs by 2020.

Sarah Steed, business director at NUA, said: 'The award recognised that the experience students receive at NUA prepares them to not only produce outstanding creative work, but also to become fully prepared to operate in professional industries.'

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