Dave Harte is a Senior Lecturer in Media and Communications and award leader for the MA in Social Media at Birmingham City University. For many years he has worked closely with Birmingham’s vibrant digital media sector acting as a link between the public sector and the business community. In the mid-2000s he worked closely with the regional development agency for the West Midlands on their business clusters strategy, subsequently managing a major business support project on their behalf.

Dave has worked with Birmingham City Council as Economic Development Manager for Digital Birmingham where he championed the use of social media and digital tools to the city leaders and the business community.

He is currently co-investigator on the AHRC and EPSRC funded project ‘Media, Community and the Creative Citizen‘ where he leads a research strand investigating the scale and value of Hyperlocal news websites. His work on this has been published by Ofcom to support their understanding of this emerging sector.

Dave blogs at daveharte.com and runs his own hyperlocal news website for Bournville.

Professional Secondments: 
Economic Development Manager – Digital Birmingham (2008-09)
Project Manager – Digital Central (2006-08)
Cluster Innovation Manager – Advantage West Midlands (2003-05)
Subject Co-ordinator – Art, Design, Media, Subject Centre (2003-05)

2011 – with Jackson, J (2011), ‘Media Employability 2.0’ in Media Education Research Journal 2:2, pp:42-56
2009 – ‘Issues in developing an Audio-Visual Cluster in the West Midlands’ Harte, D. In Vol 2 Issue 1, Creative Industries Journal, Intellect.
2005 – ‘Assessing the Engagability of Online Courses: The case of Professional Studies Curriculum’ Knight, J. Pandir, M and Harte D. In: Proceedings of IADIS Virtual Multi Conference on Computer Science and Information Systems

Knowledge Transfer Publications:
2010 – The West Midlands’ Digital Media sector – A Cluster Approach, Advantage West Midlands
2008 – Evaluation of Animation Forum West Midlands, Screen Media Lab, Birmingham City University
2008 – Looking Forward, Skillset/Screen West Midlands
2007 – Digital Central Live Music Venue Survey, Digital Central, Advantage West Midlands
2007 – Box (Editor). Digital Central, Advantage West Midlands
2005 – Film Partnership Project Report, Hi8us, Inclusion Through Media

Contributions to regional strategies:
2005 Screen Image Sound Cluster Strategy, Advantage West Midlands
2008 Screen Image Sound Cluster Strategy, Advantage West Midlands

2008 – ‘Issues in developing an Audio-Visual Cluster in the West Midlands’, Regional Studies Association.
2008 – ‘Higher Education and the Creative Economy – a cluster-based approach’, Creative Ambition conference.
2007 – ‘Delivering Clustering in the Screen, Image, Sound Sector’, Creativity and Creative Sectors, Clusters and Networks Seminar Series, University of Birmingham
2007 – ‘Intermediaries for regional partnerships’, Research Exchange Network Conference, Nottingham University
2005 – ‘West Midlands Cluster Development: Identifying investment models for the creative industries’ Creative Clusters conference
2005 – ‘The role of Higher Education in developing a Media Cluster in the West Midlands’ MeCCSA,