Our Blog
How do we save ‘Widening Participation’?
We don't talk about widening participation quite as much as we used to. Back at the time of the Dearing Review and New Labour's commitment to a 50% target and the economic and social benefits of mass higher education, we took it for granted. But not anymore. Access to...
Making the case for higher education: not too many graduates – just too few graduate jobs
For those who believe too many people go to university these days, the latest ONS report on graduate employment seems to provide good ammunition. But a closer look suggests they'd be firing blanks. According to the ONS study, in the last twenty years graduates have...
New strategy for new times
In case it passed you by we’ve just had “living wage week”. Almost every cause gets a day or a week dedicated to it nowadays, and Nov 4th–8th 2013 was the moment we were supposed to turn our attention to the living wage. It’s a serious issue, of course. Low pay is a...
You are small, but could you be massive?
“When the best brands start giving their courses away for free, we have to take note. We must ask, are we prepared to be on the wrong side of history? We disrupt ourselves now or let someone else do it,” – that was the message from Open University Vice Chancellor,...
Getting warmer? Participation, regional variation and policy-making
So now we know, courtesy of HEFCE, that higher education participation has continued to grow right up to the eve of the tuition fee reforms. Cue a plethora of responses welcoming this as progress and arguing (rightly, in my opinion) that this expansion – and the...
Getting warmer? Participation, regional variation and policy-making
So now we know, courtesy of HEFCE, that higher education participation has continued to grow right up to the eve of the tuition fee reforms. Cue a plethora of responses welcoming this as progress and arguing (rightly, in my opinion) that this expansion – and the...
Witty’s arrows of outrageous fortune
By opting for a 'sector not postcode' approach, Andrew Witty suggests a different path for universities to boost economic growth than his predecessors. Read Andy Westwood's blog on The Guardian Higher Education Network -...
There’s ageism in our reaction to tuition fees
The fall in university undergraduate applications in England continued this autumn, according to the Independent Commission on Fees. In its latest analysis it highlights a drop amongst full-time applicants of 14 per cent – that's 18,000 fewer students in England...
Economic vs social conservatism?
On the face of it, the Conservatives should be looking forward to discussing higher education at their party conference in Manchester. As we will no doubt hear, the numbers of full time students starting this year look to have bounced back to somewhere close to 2010...
(It’s) Hard Labour?
Labour’s 2015 position on higher education policy – of all the three main political parties – is still probably the hardest to predict. But this is not necessarily because of the affordability of a £6k or even a £5k fee (the IPPR costed it at nearly £2billion up front...