Last week we published an initial analysis of all the evidence that we have compiled to date about good practice in research commercialisation, and invited university experts to provide us with additional views, weblinks and papers as responses to a survey. More...

The Sunday Times did not publish the data on which the article is based, but from the few statistics they do quote, it would appear that they have not focused on admissions to universities. Instead, they have counted all students attending university including those in their second and subsequent years of study. Furthermore, they have not distinguished between full-time and part-time, young and old, those aiming for a degree, and those who are studying on short courses. More...

Almost 140 universities, colleges, local councils and NHS bodies have started work as part of the new Local Growth Academy – a unique programme designed to build stronger collaboration at the local level. More...

Poor contracting is a waste of time and resources for universities and their research partners, and hence something that ARMA is already engaged in improving, for example in issuing revised templates for research agreements. We asked university experts whether there are opportunities to do more, particularly where closer working between universities, their partners and national funders or policy-makers could help. More...

We trained a group of students to explore attitudes towards higher education opportunities. This was the first step in exploring whether, by training young people who live in educationally disadvantaged communities to be researchers, we can unlock fresh understanding and solutions for the future. More...

Round 6 of the UK Research Partnership Investment Fund will make £220 million available to universities across the UK for the development of leading-edge research facilities that support collaboration and excellent research. Interested universities need to submit an initial notification by 10 November 2017. More...

The Research Excellence Framework (REF) is the system for assessing the quality of research in UK higher education institutions and is undertaken by the four UK higher education funding bodies. It was first conducted in 2014, replacing the Research Assessment Exercise. The results of the REF drive the allocation of public funding for research. Following consultation earlier in the year, the funding bodies have now set out their initial decisions on many aspects of the next REF assessment, REF2021, in ‘Initial decisions on the Research Excellence Framework 2021’ (REF 2017/01). More...

The Government has committed to fund an extra 1,500 medical places by 2020. Today’s announcement confirms that following HEFCE’s successful allocation of 500 student places to existing medical education providers for 2018-19, the remaining 1,000 places are to be allocated through a competitive process jointly led by HEFCE and Health Education England (HEE), which we expect to launch in the Autumn. More...

HEFCE has published the results of the 2017 National Student Survey. Over 300,000 final-year students took part in the survey, around 68 per cent of those eligible. Of these, 84 per cent were satisfied with the overall quality of their courses. More...

Higher education (HE) providers in England are making good progress in fulfilling their statutory duty under the Government’s Prevent policy to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism.
A new report by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) shows that providers are assessing risks and implementing a range of measures to support Prevent. More...