UK: A brave new world for higher education

In a wide-ranging set of proposals for the future of higher education, the Labour government includes plans for strengthening Britain's place in the international student market by promoting a strong "UK HE" brand.

Although the main body of the document concentrates on domestic policy, it says the government will "empower universities to be world leaders in the growing market in transnational education based on e-learning" by supporting a new task force led by Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library.

Brindley will identify opportunities for investment and innovation between universities and the private sector. The report says that in a rapidly expanding global market, UK institutions have a unique opportunity to provide education in many different forms.

It says the country can build on established strengths in both accreditation and educational publishing. The potential to develop international education through partnerships with broadcasters and internet service providers is considerable.

The strategy includes a "consumer revolution" for students with courses labelled with key facts about drop-out rates, contact hours and employment prospects. Other main proposals are:

* Widening access using "contextual data" about students' backgrounds to give a better chance to candidates from poorer families.
* Creating pathways from apprenticeships to foundation degrees and building bridges between further and higher education.
* Establishing an inquiry by the Head of Office for Fair Access, Sir Martin Harris, to see how elite universities can improve social diversity.
* An increase in part-time work-based and home study.
* Closer links between business and universities, with firms to take part in designing and funding programmes, sponsoring students and work placements.
* More competition between universities for funding for high level skills courses.
* Universities setting out clearly what students can expect in terms of the nature and quality of courses offered.

Speaking in the House of Lords, Mandelson said the government wanted universities to make an even bigger contribution to Britain's economic recovery. So his department would give greater priority to science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM subjects).

"With employers and universities, we will identify where the supply of graduates is not meeting demand for key skills," he said, adding that the funding councils would be asked to give priority to the courses and subjects that matched the skills needed.

"In the decade ahead we will expect more from our universities than ever before. They will need to use their resources more effectively, reach out to a wider range of potential students and devise new sources of income, at the same time as they maintain teaching and research excellence."

The government expects more from the business sector as well. Companies need to be active partners, not passive customers, says the document: "The majority of businesses that invest in high-level skills do not make enough use of higher education. This should change."

The organisations representing higher education gave a guarded, sometimes defensive, welcome to the strategy. Dr Wendy Piatt, Director General of the Russell Group of research-led universities, pointed to the £45 million (US$74 million) spent by her members' income from student fees on outreach and bursaries for disadvantaged students.

"However academic achievement continues to be the key factor in determining whether a student will go on to university," Piatt said. "This is why our universities are working hard to help raise attainment and aspirations, with staff and students devoting an increasing amount of their time to working closely with local schools and colleges, arranging summer schools, and providing access courses."

GuildHE, representing smaller, specialist institutions, warned that the government's pledge to support diversity in higher education and widen access would seem worthless unless it extended funding for teaching and research beyond STEM subjects.

Professor Elaine Thomas, Vice-chancellor of the University for the Creative Arts and a member of the GuildHE executive, said: "We recognise that growth is going to be constrained for a while. But that must not be allowed to constrain the aspirations of prospective students who may not wish to study STEM subjects.

"The narrow emphasis on STEM flies in the face of all the evidence on the value of the creative industries and other specialised areas both to students and the British economy."

The university think-tank million+ welcomed the emphasis on employability, part-time and mature students. Professor Les Ebdon, its chair, said modern universities would also welcome the promise to fund excellent research wherever it was found because a simplistic policy of research concentration would stifle innovation and postgraduate opportunities.

diane.spencer@uw-news.com

Additional articles and commentaries

Even Lord Mandelson can't see into the future
Suggesting business leaders could direct the shape of degrees is foolhardy; they don't have the skills to design courses, and they cannot predict future skill requirements any better than anyone else, writes Roger Brown, professor of higher education policy and Co-director of the Centre for Research and Development in Higher Education at Liverpool Hope University, in The Guardian.
www.guardian.co.uk


Mandelson needs a liberal arts degree
Perhaps, in 1997, Peter Mandelson's proposals for reform of higher education would have seemed like radical, "hard choices". But today they look old-fashioned, like the unconscious reflexes of ideological dogma, writes Alan Finlayson in The Guardian.
www.guardian.co.uk


Labour's campus revolution
Plans for the biggest shake-up of universities for decades, including the first charter of rights for students, have been unveiled by the government, writes Richard Garner, education editor of The Independent. Many of the proposals in the blueprint for how higher education will look in 10 years' time will win cross-party support, ensuring they are seen through no matter who is running the country after the next general election.
www.independent.co.uk