Tom Crick

Tom Crick MBE FLSW FAcSS (born January 1981) is a British interdisciplinary computer scientist. He is Chief Scientific Adviser at the UK Government's Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and Professor of Digital Policy at Swansea University. Alongside his academic work, Crick has led major reforms to the science and technology curriculum in Wales, with related contributions to digital/technology policy in the UK.

Professor Tom Crick MBE CEng FBCS FIET FLSW FAcSS
Crick in May 2023
Born	January 1981 (age 44) Oxford, UK
Education	Wheatley Park School
Alma mater	University of Bath (BSc, PhD)
Known for	Computer science education, Artificial intelligence, Data science, Technology policy
Awards	IET Achievement Medal (2022) BCS Lovelace Medal (2023) Hugh Owen Medal (2023) BSA Honorary Fellow (2024)
Scientific career
Institutions	University of Bath Cardiff Metropolitan University Swansea University
Thesis	Superoptimisation: Provably Optimal Code Generation using Answer Set Programming (2009)
Website	www.swansea.ac.uk/staff/thomas.crick/

Early life and education

Crick was raised and educated in Wheatley, Oxfordshire.^[1] He completed his undergraduate and postgraduate studies in computer science at the University of Bath, having been sponsored through his undergraduate degree by ARM.^[1] His doctoral research, funded by the EPSRC, considered superoptimisation by developing practical strategies to generate provably optimal code using answer set programming.^[2]

Career

After a period as a postdoctoral researcher on ALIVE,^[3] a European Commission FP7-funded project at the University of Bath, Crick was appointed lecturer in computer science at Cardiff Metropolitan University in 2009, before being promoted to full professor in 2016. He was recognised as a UK National Teaching Fellow in 2014.^[4] He moved to a research chair at Swansea University in 2018, becoming Deputy Pro-vice-chancellor for Civic Mission in 2021. Crick joined the UK Government's Department for Culture, Media and Sport as Chief Scientific Adviser in 2023, and is the youngest UK government CSA to date.^[5]

In 2017, Crick was elected Vice-President of BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT^[6] for a three-year term. He has also served in a number of senior elected positions in the Association for Computing Machinery, including Vice-Chair of ACM Europe Council and a Member-at-Large of ACM Council.^[7]

Crick is editor-in-chief (2021–present) of The Computer Journal,^[8] published by Oxford University Press, and an editor (2020–present) of the Wales Journal of Education,^[9] published by University of Wales Press.

Computer science education and digital skills

Crick has been involved with the reform of the school-level science and technology curriculum in Wales since 2010.^{[10][11][12][13]} In 2013, he was appointed by the Welsh Government to chair an independent review of the ICT curriculum in Wales.^[14] Crick argued that Welsh learners were not being given the necessary skills or agency to thrive in our digital world.^[15][16]

From 2015–2016, Crick chaired the development of the bilingual Digital Competence Framework^[17] in Wales, which elevated digital competence (the skills, knowledge and attitudes required to be confident in the use of technologies^[18]) to the same statutory position as literacy and numeracy in the new Curriculum for Wales. It outlined how schools could incorporate student-centred digital competency into their local curriculum.^[17]

He then led the development of the Science & Technology strand of the new Curriculum for Wales in 2017.^[19] His efforts united the traditional sciences (physics, chemistry and biology) with computer science and design & technology.^[20] The new curriculum was published in January 2020 and started phasing in for all schools in Wales from September 2022 onwards.^[21] Crick was also appointed Chair of the National Network of Excellence in Science & Technology,^[22] a £4m Welsh Government strategic investment which focused on supporting STEM teachers in partnership with higher education institutions.^[23]

Crick also chaired Qualification Wales’ 2018 review of ICT sector qualifications, which reported that they were outdated and needed considerable reform,^[24] resulting in new GCSE and A-Level qualifications in Digital Technology from 2021 onwards.^[25]

Non-executive and board-level roles

Crick was a non-executive director of Swansea Bay University Health Board from 2017 to 2024,^[26] an inaugural Commissioner of the National Infrastructure Commission for Wales from 2018 to 2022.^[27], and a non-executive director of Industry Wales from 2021 to 2024.^[28] Alongside being a Vice-President of BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, he was a trustee from 2013 to 2020.^[29] He has previously been a trustee of the British Science Association and the Campaign for Science and Engineering (both 2011–2017).^[30] He was appointed a trustee of Cumberland Lodge in 2024.^[31]

Awards and honours

• 2011: British Science Association Media Fellow with BBC Wales^[32]
• 2013: Worshipful Livery company of Wales Gold Award^[33]
• 2014: HEA National Teaching Fellow^[4]
• 2017: Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE)^[34]
• 2020: British Educational Research Association Public Engagement and Impact Award^[35]
• 2020: Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales^[36]
• 2022: IET Achievement Medal^[37]
• 2022: Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences^[38]
• 2023: BCS Lovelace Medal^[6]
• 2023: Learned Society of Wales Hugh Owen Medal^[39]
• 2024: British Science Association Honorary Fellow^[40]