The State of the Relationship report reveals resilience in the higher education sector in the face of impending change
The last year has been anything but steady. From the machinations in Westminster and uncertainty over Brexit, to a Post-18 Review which gave with one hand while threatening to strike with the other. So it is heartening to see resilience and strength in universities’ collaborations with industry. More...
Five reasons for universities to develop their partnerships with industry
A lot is (rightly) expected of universities. Most commentators agree that the UK’s universities punch above their weight in terms of rankings, reputation and return on investment. More...
Forget the 2.4% target for research and development spending
When higher education policy conversations turn to research, they tend to dwell upon the UK Government’s commitment to increase the share of GDP spent on research and development (R&D) by public and private sources to 2.4% by 2027. More...
Five Challenges to Address During University Strategy Development
In a previous article on the HEPI blog we reported one of the results from our University Strategy 2020 research report: 63% of UK universities are due to renew their strategy over next year or the year after. This was based on an analysis of a sample of 52 university strategies. We have since extended this analysis to 155 UK Universities and found that 60% of the entire sector will have a new strategy by 2021. More...
Why Augar’s confusion provides a clear sense of where the TEF should go in the future
When considered in the light of these challenges, it becomes clear that the Augar review does not take a consistent position on the TEF. There are two aspects to this. First, the review explicitly welcomes the TEF and, in its definition of low value degree courses in terms of those that offer low graduate premiums, its underlying logic is clearly aligned to the TEF’s focus on employment outcomes. More...
Is students’ well-being what really matters?
Universities are investing more resources in their students’ well-being. This is right. It is important for student success and is something about which parents worry about a great deal. But when assessing universities – and even ranking them, is it really – that is fundamentally – what matters. More...
How Informed Choices can help support access to competitive universities
Recently, the Russell Group launched a new interactive website to host our Informed Choices guide explaining how subject choice at school is important for progression to university. The new website provides personalised information for users, enabling them to see which subjects provide the best preparation for the degrees they are interested in and to test various combinations of A-levels, to see which degrees these open up. More...
The future for Augar is political
On the day the Augar report appeared, I said on the radio that it felt like Christmas Day. To a higher education policy wonk, over 200 pages of tightly-argued and long-awaited text on how to reform higher education is a rare but exciting gift. More...
The Augar report and the not-so-missing middle
MillionPlus has been at the forefront of organisations calling for the Level 4 and 5 education space in England to be revived as an outcome of the Augar process and it is pleasing to see this agenda picked up in the report. More...