BU Research Blog | HEIF | Bournemouth University

Category / HEIF

July 23, 2018

HE Policy update for the w/e 20th July 2018

Funding opportunities, HEIF, innovation, policy, Student Engagement jforster

Free speech still in the news

The Higher Education Policy Institute has published a report on free speech on campus – Cracking the code: A practical guide for university free speech policies. This is the last report to be written for HEPI by Dr Diana Beech before she goes to work for Sam Gyimah as policy adviser. [Those readers who met Diana when she attended our recent policy meeting or read my blog about the event will know that this is a good thing – Diana is well informed and positive about the sector and open minded rather than partisan –we’re looking forward to seeing her impact.]

HEPI say about the report:

The report finds some worrying loopholes in existing codes of practice, including:

overlooking new types of meetings afforded by social media and digital technologies;
failing to publish updated policies following internal reviews;
neglecting to provide codes in a wide range of accessible formats such as braille or audio;
not hosting codes in the public domain; and
not linking to necessary supplementary materials such as room booking forms and risk assessment protocols.

This new guide is intended to assist university boards and committees when formulating or updating codes of practice on freedom of speech to ensure policies are as efficient and user-friendly as possible.

The foreword is written by Peter Tatchell, human rights campaigner, who says:

“Overall, I find most universities positive, conducive places for healthy debate. When you compare the lively conversations that take place on UK campuses to those that are openly or more subtly squeezed out, or plain banned, in other countries, our universities look like bastions of free speech. And yet … Not everything is perfect. A minority of students do seem remarkably intolerant and unwilling to hear others’ views. It’s not even a left / right split. Sometimes the fiercest disagreements come between people who all regard themselves as progressive. Challenging student meetings can get bogged down in red tape about the rules of debate and their interpretation. It is also sometimes contested who can speak, what they can say and the degree of dissent that is permitted.”
And “In my view, bad ideas are most soundly defeated by good ideas. Bigoted opinions should never be given a free pass. They should always be protested and countered. But the best way to do this is usually by subjecting them to open debate, to show why they are factually and morally wrong.”

The recommendations are lengthy, but then this is a complicated area:

“To optimise the format of codes of practice on freedom of speech, we recommend universities:
- include a cover page to the code detailing the document’s history, including key information on the date of its approval, the next date of review and contact information for the responsible officer;
- consider formulating the codes in other formats (such as braille or audio) to ensure the widest possible readership;
- enhance the usability of the codes by employing hyperlinks throughout all online versions of the policies, as well as writing out web addresses in full in an appendix to the code (or in footnotes or endnotes) to ensure this information is not lost when the codes are printed out;
- make use of additional appendices to the codes to host vital supplementary documentation including application forms and additional guidance, so that this information is all housed in one place;
- visualise application and assessment processes in the form of process flowcharts wherever possible, to allow event organisers to easily understand what is required of them and to ensure the policies are as simple as they can be during the design process;
- take care to define what the code covers both in terms of meeting size and meeting format; and
- outline the precise remits of the code if intended, for example, to be applicable to students’ unions, in other countries, in constituent parts of a university with otherwise autonomous governance structures (such as Oxbridge colleges) or in faith-based institutions, where contradictions may occur with religious doctrine (such as Canon Law in Catholic institutions).
To optimise the processes surrounding the codes of practice on freedom of speech, we recommend universities:
- regularly review and update their code, particularly in line with developments in relevant legislation;
- ensure the latest versions of the code are swiftly approved by relevant university boards and committees, and published accordingly on university websites;
- keep a visual record of where the code has been disseminated to allow university committees and boards to decide whether this is appropriate and sufficient at the next review meeting;
- avoid requesting information from speakers or event organisers that could be deemed unreasonable or offputting (such as routinely requesting copies of speeches before they are made);
- include in the code reasonable timescales for both the initial application to host an event or external speaker and the appeals process;
- offer in the code assistance to event organisers – such as PA systems or added security provisions – to give an event the best chance of going ahead before considering it for cancellation;
- consider including a disclaimer in the code to cover more lengthy and complex decision processes over appeals (although every effort should be made to stick to the original timescales outlined as above); and
- consider employing the expertise of an assessment panel, as opposed to just one accountable officer, to help in the case of deciding whether more complex or controversial events or speakers should go ahead.
In addition, higher education institutions – particularly in England – may consider producing additional governance documents, such as statements of commitment to the codes of practice. This will not only help institutions to become clear about what their codes of practice are for, and what purpose they serve, but also help them to prepare for life under the Office for Students and its new Regulatory Framework, which may well require providers of higher education to justify their policies and processes in more detail in the future.”

Sir Michael Barber was on the Today programme on Thursday – he refused to say that stopping organisers requesting speech in advance was going to be OfS policy (the OfS is not a bureaucratic organisation or a rule maker, but a regulator, he said – we aren’t sure about this distinction without a difference either) – but he did say it was a good idea.

Smita Jamdar of Shakespeare Martineau tweeted a response thread which is worth reading:

“So the JCHR may have said universities should not ask for details of what will be said, but as long as that guidance remains in that form I do not think it is fair to ask universities to carry the risk. Government needs to work out what it wants and make some policy changes.”

Student Loans, RPI & HE Funding

The cost of student loans and how it is presented in public accounting is an issue that has been bubbling for a while. Both the Commons Economic Affairs Committee and the Treasury Committee reviewed the treatment of student loans in the public accounts during 2018. The timing is fascinating in the context of the Government’s current review of post-18 education – often described as the fees and funding review, but as we know, it is not only this. We wrote about this in our policy update on 6th July. Andrew McGettigan, who spoke at the recent Wonkhe conference eon this, has now published a blog on Wonkhe setting out his argument in full – this is well worth reading.

The debate has now moved on as this week two bodies proposed alternative methods of accounting for student loans, one from the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) and the other from the Office for National Statistics.

The Times explain the financial trickery:

Currently student loans are treated as a normal loan for the purpose of the public finances, which means that the cash transfer does not show up as borrowing but as an asset. Interest payments owed, but not necessarily paid, by former students show up as receipts and reduce the deficit. The effect is to improve the deficit in the early years as interest is capitalised. When students fail to meet repayments and loans are written off 30 years later, the loss is incurred as spending.

It is only at the point of writing off the loans that they count as expenditure and negatively affect public spending statistics. If the government sells off the loans before the write-off is due, that moment of reckoning will never arrive and the government will never, so far as the public accounts are concerned, have had to demonstrate direct public expenditure on student finance. Its benefit is that it provides sustainable funding for HE. Arguably therefore, HE does not have to fight with other departments to secure an adequate share of public funds.

OBR’s chairman Robert Chote speaks of the system saying it:

“flatters the impact of student loans on the public finances and creates a perverse incentive to sell them, even at a loss…. Capturing the impact of student loans in measures of the public sector deficit and debt is not straightforward, because the full impact of any particular cohort of loans takes more than three decades to fully work through…”

The OBR estimates that the government’s plan to sell £12bn worth of older student loans by 2020-21 “will deprive it of £23bn of future repayments”.

This article on Research Professional provides more detail on alternatives to the current treatment. It goes on to note that the HE Review has been instructed to make recommendations that do not worsen the spending deficit. Research Professional explain that:

“changing the way student loan repayments are presented in the public finances would automatically add to the deficit and would not only hamper Augar’s review but also make it next to impossible for chancellor Philip Hammond to meet his own spending targets. This is before you factor in the money—as yet unaccounted for—promised to the NHS and all the other demands that will be made by Brexit.
A degree of collusion is evident between the two reports, with the OBR’s working paper citing the one from the ONS. In short, both put up a range of different accounting models and invite us to pick one, with a strong steer that we should go for a hybrid model that would classify the estimated part of the loan that will be repaid as a loan, and the estimated part that will not be repaid as a grant or direct upfront expenditure.
The effect of each of the accounting models is significant, with the hybrid model immediately adding 0.7 per cent to the public spending deficit. All the models considered present the public finances in a less favourable light than the existing system, with a commercial model of revenue and expenditure for loan repayment, as you might find in the banking industry, adding 1.1 per cent to the deficit by the mid-2040s.”

This presents a challenge for the HE Review as it is expected to work within public spending constraints. Research Professional note that any short-term change would almost certainly mean higher education having a negative impact on the public accounts. This could put universities in line for budget cuts.

Retail Price Index

The use of the Retail Price Index (RPI) to calculate the interest owed on students loans is another challenge. RPI has been denounced as an inappropriate statistic that inflates the amount students are required to pay back. The Economic Affairs Committee has investigated the use of RPI and considered its possible reform. The Committee session spanned several topics, including a focus on its use within HE. John Pullinger (Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority) said he did not wish to unilaterally change the RPI as it would result in some parties getting windfall gains and others losses. However, he felt the reform of RPI would definitely happen at some point in the next ten years. He stressed the need for the change to be ‘choreographed‘ with changes by the Treasury and the Bank of England (BoE). It was put to him that it was the role of the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to come forward with an alternative proposal (to move away from RPI) for the chancellor for due consideration.

On the use of RPI within student loan accounting Lord Burns highlighted that ONS felt the economic nature of student loans closely matched the definition of a loan in national accounts. Whereas consideration could be given to the proportion of loans not expected to be repaid. John responded within the historical context noting that when student loans first came about they were considered by the national accounts team to be loans, which was how they had appeared in the national accounts since. He said the response to the committee on this issue during the loans enquiry could have been more ‘nuanced’, but this is essentially what happened.

John Pullinger went on to note if student loans will be sold, maybe they should not have been considered as loans at all. Since April the ONS had been considering how they should be treated, which had resulted in five new options. (Watch the Committee session for more detail on this.) He went on to state the ONS had now ‘opened the box’ and was looking at the issue carefully, he mentioned a decision would be made by December.

He was also asked to comment on the suspicions that the reforms to student finances had constituted a ‘fiscal illusion‘ (see the two reports out this week mentioned above) to reduce the deficit. He confirmed he was observing recent developments with regard to this point.

HE Funding

The House of Commons library regularly produces succinct briefing papers on topics to inform MPs. They have just released one on HE funding (England) which sits alongside more specific papers on student loan statistics, HE finance and the value of student maintenance support (all papers can be accessed here). The HE Funding paper itself covers all the main points in a simple way to draw together the myriad of HE funding changes in the last 6 years. Despite the Brexit furore Parliament is actually winding down towards recess. (Recess being the time when MPs return to catch up on their constituency work and take some time off.) With the release of the HE Funding briefing paper as summer reading just before recess one wonders what is in store for HE when Parliament reconvenes in September.

Cost Effective Universities – Student Spending

New analysis from Which? University reveals how choosing where to study can have huge consequences on the cost of living for students – with a potential disparity of £15,000 over the term of a typical degree between the cheapest and most expensive UK regions. Using data on student expenditure and the average cost of rent, Which? University ranked 12 regions across the UK to reveal the most expensive and cheapest areas for students to live.

Unsurprisingly London was the most expensive region (£14,200 average student living cost per year). Second were the South East and the East of England (both £11,000 per year). Northern Ireland was the cheapest (£8,800), followed by Wales (£9,500). The South West region is mid-table for cost. The student budget calculator on the Which? website shows BU coming in very reasonably at £10,824 per annum (Arts University Bournemouth comes in at £12,120 per year).

The rest of the analysis highlights familiar student finance themes:

31% per cent of students said that money worries have negatively impacted their mental health/stress
20% use their overdrafts to manage the cost of living at university, (10% rely on credit cards)
46% rely on their parents to bankroll their living costs (remember there is an expectation that parents contribute anyway for students from certain household income bands)
40% of students found the cost of university was higher than expected
13% of students considered not continuing their studies due to financial difficulties

Which? use the analysis to advertise their student budget calculator tool which calculates average monthly expenditure, including a breakdown of rent, utilities and transport costs per university selected. It also factors in regional variables to improve accuracy in its predictions. With Clearing fast approaching Which? are keen to ensure students who are forced to change their HE plans have access to fast information on their potential new institutions.

There is an interesting section showing student spending habits.

Category	Percentage of students that spent on the category
Water & Energy	99%
Food Shopping	98%
Mobile & Internet	93%
Interest & Hobbies	92%
Coffee & Tea	91%
Transport	88%
Other Expenses	88%
Going Out	83%
Take Away & Snacks	83%
Personal Care	82%
Clothing	66%
Alcohol & Cigarettes	57%
Bank Charges & Fees	54%
Holidays & Flights	42%

Research Commercialisation

There was a dialogue in the House of Commons on the commercialisation of university research during oral questions this week.

Chris Green (Bolton West, Conservative) quizzed Sam Gyimah on what steps he is taking to support the commercialisation of universities’ research. Sam responded:

“we want the UK to be the place where innovators, researchers and entrepreneurs turn ideas into reality. Our universities have a strong part to play within this, alongside business. That is why we are funding, through United Kingdom Research and Innovation, support for research collaborations between universities and business. We also have the industrial strategy challenge fund, as well as higher education innovation funding and our Connecting Capability funding. All of those will help universities work together with business “

Chris Green took the opportunity to highlight the research partnership between the University of Tokyo and Imperial College London as an excellent example of how the UK can benefit from sharing innovation and technology. He asked Sam:

“what more will my hon. Friend do to ensure that we continue to strengthen academic networks and communities post Brexit? Sam responded:

our research and innovation collaboration is important in what we do with the EU, but also globally in what we do around the world. That is why UKRI has established a new £110 million fund to explore and develop international partnerships with leading science and innovation regions. We will also bring forward an international science strategy in the autumn.”

Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield, Labour/Co-op) asked Sam if he would look at universities in the United States, such as Cornell University, which have different ways of paying and incentivising research on those campuses? Gyimah responded:

“the reason behind UK Research and Innovation, which brings together all the research agencies in the UK, is that, for the first time, we have a strategic brain to direct UK research so that we can allow innovation and ingenuity to flourish in our universities. That is the best way to create returns that benefit the economy but also the best minds in our country.”

Research Funding and Talent

Q – Adam Afriyie (Conservative): How much funding his Department has provided to the UK science base in the last 12 months.

A – Sam Gyimah:

The principal research funding route is through UK Research and Innovation, which in 2018 alone accounts for over £6 billion of investment in research and innovation. I am proud that the Conservative Government have overseen the largest increase in scientific research and development funding that we have ever seen in the UK. We are investing an additional £7 billion in R&D by 2022, as a first step in delivering our ambition of increasing the UK’s R&D spend to 2.4% of GDP.

Q – Adam Afriyie As a former shadow Science Minister, I am very conscious of the increases in funding, particularly in cash terms, but I am also acutely conscious that it is not just cash but the availability of talent that matters when it comes to science, innovation and the industrial base. Given the recent concerns around Brexit and everything else, will the Minister reassure me that the availability of highly talented scientists will still be a priority for this Government?

A – Sam Gyimah:

The increase in funding is actually in real terms, but my hon. Friend is absolutely right: to succeed here, we have to be open to ideas and open to talent. He will have seen the recent relaxation in the tier 5 visa restrictions for scientists. We are also investing £900 million in UKRI’s flagship future leadership fellowships and a further £350 million for the national academies to expand their prestigious fellowships. When it comes to science, innovation and research, we are open for business.

Q – Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge, Labour): I am sure that the Minister saw the recent report from the Office for Life Sciences, which showed that R&D investment in the pharmaceutical sector fell from £4.9 billion per annum in 2011 to £4.1 billion in 2016—a decline of £800 million per annum. To what does he attribute that, and given that life sciences are so important, what does he plan to do about it?

A – Sam Gyimah:

I am aware that everyone in the life sciences sector has welcomed the life sciences sector deal. As part of our work to reach 2.4% of our GDP being invested in scientific research by 2027, we will be working with the pharmaceutical industry along with other industries to increase their research investment in the UK.

Another question clarified that an announcement on the national quantum technologies programme would follow shortly.

LEO

Robert Halfon (Conservative) questioned Sam Gyimah on LEO

Q – Robert Halfon: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what use officials in his Department are making of the Longitudinal Education Outcomes (LEO) database.

AND

Q – Robert Halfon: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when he plans to make data from the Longitudinal Education Outcomes database available to education researchers outside his Department.

A – Sam Gyimah:

The department has published seven statistical first releases and one ad hoc release for graduate employment outcomes using Longitudinal Education Outcomes (LEO) data. These cover the employment outcomes for undergraduates and postgraduates one, three, five and 10 years after graduating. Figures are published at institution and subject level as well as national level.
Students’ ability to make informed choices is at the heart of the higher education (HE) reform agenda. We are keen that these releases are easily accessible by HE students. We have therefore launched a Higher Education Open Data Competition, which is part of the work we are doing to improve the way we provide information to students. The competition aims to give students full access to valuable data on graduate outcomes – including aggregated, publically available LEO data – on an accessible and innovative digital platform. By supporting the development of new tools, the competition will help all applicants, regardless of their background, make decisions that are right for them and get value for money.
We plan to make appropriate extracts of the data available in the ONS Secure Research Service, in late 2018. In addition to this, we currently make data available, under contract, to the following research groups: Centre for Vocational Education Research, Institute for Fiscal Studies, University of Westminster.

Mental Health

A Guardian article this week considered mental health within the university context and noted the rise in wellbeing services. While traditional counselling still has its place within universities it noted some had vastly reduced the availability of counselling. In response The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy publicly voiced their concern at the reduction in traditional counselling sessions.

Meanwhile HEPI published a new guest blog: Could data and analytics help to promote student wellbeing and mental health? by Professor Martin Hall. It considers how learning analytics is already used to improve academic attainment through analysing the students’ digital footprint and engagement with the university. It is used to identify students at risk and triggers supportive interventions where the student may be under engaging to underperforming. The blog describes how this could be extended to identify patterns that may indicate student mental health concerns. Allowing support to be offered before the student reaches crisis point. s

Technical Education

Q – Adam Afriyie: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department has taken to put technical courses on parity with academic courses.

A – Anne Milton:

The government is transforming technical education to create a high quality system that meets the skills needs of businesses and is held in the same high esteem as our academic option. 15 prestigious technical routes will set a clear path to skilled employment through reformed apprenticeships and the new flagship T Level programmes. T Levels are a central part of the greatest shake-up of technical education for 70 years and builds on the recommendations made by the Independent Panel on Technical Education, chaired by Lord Sainsbury. They will provide a distinctive and rigorous technical alternative to A levels.
They are, however, just one strand of our ambitious new technical education offer. We also intend to undertake a review of qualifications at Level 3 and below so that those we fund serve a genuine and useful purpose, are of high quality and enable students to progress to meaningful outcomes.

Despite Anne’s response to the Parliamentary Question she caused a scandal this week by seemingly confirming T levels wouldn’t be fit for purpose at their point of launch. At the Commons Education Committee she was questioned on the timing of the roll-out of the T levels and responded “I’m a parent of four children. If somebody said to me ‘Your children can do this new qualification’, I would say ‘Leave it a year.’” The Times covered the story: Anne Milton has advised teenagers who are considering taking up T-Levels to “leave it a year”.

Gordon Marsden, Labour’s Shadow Minister for HE stated:

“It’s astounding that the Minister doesn’t have confidence in her own Government’s flagship education policy. It is not acceptable for there to be one rule for the Government, and another for everyone else. The Department for Education’s Permanent Secretary has already said that T-Levels cannot feasibly be implemented on time without a serious risk to taxpayers’ money.”

Consultations

Click here to view the updated consultation tracker. Email us on policy@bournemouth.ac.uk if you’d like to contribute to any of the current consultations.

Other news

STEM: Jenson Button is leading the way for women in STEM in his calls for the motor industry to get more women involved in engineering. He said:

“female engineers are already making a big difference in motorsport, but that we need a far higher percentage in order to address imbalances. It is vital to push for more women working in mechanical engineering. Many Le Mans championships have been won by female engineers so there is obviously no reason why more females can’t get involved, including the driving. I’ve worked with very competitive women at the highest levels of engineering, but we need many more to enter the field.”

The UK currently has the lowest percentage of female engineering professionals in Europe (11%)

Simpler R&D tax credits: The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) has called on the Government to introduce a new tax credit to tackle the innovation productivity fap within small business in the UK. On Tuesday the FSB published a report revealing that 24% of small firms have not made any significant changes to products or ways of working in the last three years – with many held back by pressures on time and finances. The report noted that as well as improving support for the creation of ‘new to market’ innovations, the complexity of the R&D tax credit and Patent Box Tax relief systems must be simplified.

Research Costs: Research Professional consider the Transparent Approach to Costing report, published by the Office for Students, which says that UK universities received funding that covered less than 75 per cent of the full economic cost of research last year.

Subscribe!

To subscribe to the weekly policy update simply email policy@bournemouth.ac.uk

JANE FORSTER | SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor Policy & Public Affairs Officer

66724 65070

Follow: @PolicyBU on Twitter | policy@bournemouth.ac.uk

April 16, 2018

HE Policy Update for the w/e 13th April 2018

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, HEIF, Impact, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer, policy, Public engagement, Research news, Student Engagement jforster

Knowledge Exchange Framework

After the initial announcement and consultation, things had gone a bit quiet. Louis Coiffat from Wonkhe chaired a conference on it before Easter and wrote about it here. BU’s concern has been that there is likely to be an over-focus on commercialisation and technology transfer so that the result of the KEF is to recognise and distribute investment funds to those institutions already receiving income from commercialisation – rather than to invest in those participating in a broader range of knowledge exchange activities and with potential to develop important – but possibly less financially significant – technology transfer arrangements, e.g. in healthcare or other less remunerative areas (see John Vinney’s blog for Wonkhe from February).

And see the section below on research news – HEIF funding, which is likely to be influenced by the KEF – is increasing.

So the feedback from the conference is interesting:

“It’s looking like KEF will involve a leadership statement (or concordat) – for institutions to self-evaluate, define, and communicate their own KE strategy. And, of course, some metrics. The latter will probably see institutions clustered and benchmarked. Speakers had good intentions about “proportionate” reporting burdens.
A one-size-fits-all approach clearly won’t work, as another speaker said, this “isn’t a simple league table with one institution best at knowledge exchange”. Also, real life is messy, how can everything universities do be measured? In reality, much KE activity is already happening, it’s just not being captured, synthesised or described. But, nobody wants every academic completing a timesheet.”

And:

“There’s also the question about how KEF relates to REF impact case studies. The consensus seems to be that KEF is about an institutions’ overall capabilities, not a peer-reviewed example of a single research impact in time.
One promise of KEF is that it should support better self-evaluation so that providers can work on their weaknesses honestly without finger-pointing, and crow about their strengths. It should provide institutions with valuable new information they can then tailor to different audiences. However, it should also be formative, open, and flexible – rather than box-ticking. Universities will always need to answer questions about how their impact compares (with other institutions and internationally), and how they can improve. KEF could help with that.”

We look forward to the response to the recent consultation to see where all this ends up.

Student Loan Repayment threshold

The changes to the student loan repayment threshold announced by Theresa May last year have come into effect.

Graduates earning over the new £25,000 threshold are set to benefit too, with lower payments compared to before, for example:

£25,000 per year repays £0 per month instead of £30
£27,000 per year repays £15 per month instead of £45
£30,000 per year repays £37 per month instead of £67
£33,000 per year repays £60 per month instead of £90
£35,000 per year repays £75 per month instead of £105
£40,000 per year repays £112 per month instead of £142The increase in the student repayment threshold marks a key milestone and is another example of the steps the Government is taking to support those in higher education.The increased repayment threshold applies to any student who has taken out a post-2012 undergraduate student loan or Advanced Learner Loan.

Martin Lewis has written about the change in threshold on Money Saving Expert.com. It is also important to note that this change also affects interest dates.

We are seeing more 18-year-olds than ever before attend university, including the highest ever number from disadvantaged backgrounds and we want to give these students a fair deal both during their studies and afterwards too. Not only will it benefit hundreds of thousands of graduates in the next financial year alone, but millions in the years to come.

Research news

Research England announced a pilot to explore a longitudinal, real-time evaluation approach for the REF 2021. The pilot will be led by research teams at Cardiff University and the University of Sheffield, and will test the feasibility of evaluating the perceptions, experiences and understanding of the REF among academics across career stages, and in a range of departments and universities.

The pilot will launch in the spring with the results available by early 2019.

Executive Chair of Research England, David Sweeney, welcoming the pilot, said:

“UK universities deliver world-leading research and are recognised globally for the quality of their outputs and diverse impact. National research assessment has been part of our high-performing system for over 30 years and has developed over that period through consultation with the community. This work presents an opportunity to test evaluating REF 2021 in a new way, informing the collection of evaluative data for shaping exercises post 2021.”

Research England has agreed budgets for the academic year 2018-19 and capital budgets for the financial year 2018-19. Allocations for individual institutions will be announced in early May 2018. The letter to all institutions is here.

There is an overall increase of £70m available in 2018-19, enabling higher education institutions (HEIs) in England to deliver on the government’s industrial strategy and tackle global, national and local challenges.

The following budgets are being increased:

An additional £25m for knowledge exchange through Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF), enabling universities to increase their contributions to deliver commercialisation and working with business to meet Industrial Strategy priorities;
An additional £20m for the postgraduate research degree supervision element of quality-related research (QR) funding, supporting universities to develop the next generation of researchers and protecting the health of the talent pipeline through postgraduate study and into research and the wider economy;
An additional £10m for the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) element of QR, supporting investment in cutting-edge research that addresses the challenges of economic development and wellbeing faced by developing countries;
An additional £6m to contribute to the charity research element of QR, providing additional support for research that universities carry out on behalf of charities.

David Sweeney, Executive Chair of Research England, said:

“We are delighted to announce funding levels for the coming year. The increased public investment in universities reflects their central role in delivering economic growth and creating social prosperity for the country.
We see universities as key partners in tackling global challenges, and the increased investment into GCRF reflects that. Our investment into the postgraduate pipeline will enable our higher education sector to continue to grow and attract top talent.
Achieving the government’s target of 2.4% of GDP investment in R&D by 2027 depends on universities deepening their partnerships with business, charities and other organisations. Through HEIF, and working with the Office for Students, we are committed to investing in the knowledge exchange activities that underpin R&D partnerships.”

And a new funding scheme to build research excellence has been announced- the deadline is noon on 17^th July 2018.

“We are delighted to announce the launch of the Expanding Excellence in England (E3) fund, a first new initiative for Research England. This competitive fund will allocate up to £75m over three years to help grow small but excellent research units and departments in English universities. Bids will be assessed by an expert panel chaired by Professor Sir Ian Diamond, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Aberdeen.”

“Aims of the Fund

Strengthen the contribution of English HEIs to our society, pushing the frontiers of human knowledge, delivering economic impact and creating social impact by supporting our society and others to become enriched, healthier, more resilient and sustainable;
Build the capacity and quality of research in departments and units within English universities where excellence exists but at a small scale with potential for growth;
Contribute towards the delivery of government strategy, including the Industrial Strategy, the GCRF strategy and local priorities by supporting sustained improvements in research capacity across England while maintaining the principle of funding excellence wherever it is found;
Enhance the skills base and build talent in areas of research excellence where there is untapped potential;
Stimulate strategic partnerships between HEIs and other organisations outside of Higher Education.”

As part of the Connecting Capability Fund Research England has invested £67 million in 14 collaborative projects between universities and with other partners to drive forward world-class university commercialisation across the country, including a project to build a creative technology network through a project led by the University of the West of England

HE Review

Reminder: to inform our BU response to the HE Review all staff and students are invited to consider the issues in this (anonymous) short survey. Please take a look at the survey questions as we’d like to hear from as many staff and students as possible. You don’t have to answer all the questions. The major review of HE will shape the HE system, including how universities are funded for years to come. The survey will be available to staff and students until Friday 20^th April.

Prevent

The Secretary of State wrote to the Office for Students about its monitoring duty in relation to Prevent:

As monitoring authority, the OfS’s function will be to collect information from RHEBs to enable it to monitor those bodies’ performance in discharging the ‘Prevent duty’ imposed on them by section 26(1) of the Act.
I am now looking to the OfS to build on this experience when undertaking their function as the new monitoring authority; and in particular I would like them to build on the valuable work HEFCE has undertaken in sharing good practice and driving continuous improvement, which I know the HE sector values. Their work should include ensuring RHEB’s continue to effectively balance their Prevent and free speech responsibilities .
I would also like the OfS to take the opportunity to review the existing monitoring framework and consider how it might evolve to align with the values and approach of the Office for Students. In particular, I would like the Office for Students to consider how it might take a more risk-based approach.

Transforming the service economy

The Government Office for Science issued a report on Growth Opportunities for the UK Service Economy.

Recommendation 1: The Office for National Statistics should work with academia to develop new methods for mapping value chains as well as measuring research and development in the service sector. Opportunities to pilot and test new methods include the SERVCOM survey of service sector outputs and revisions to the Standard Industrial Classification.
Recommendation 2: Industry and sector councils should raise the level of horizon-scanning to anticipate and monitor emerging opportunities and challenges to their services. In addition, government should undertake detailed studies to better understand how the potential to trade services at a distance is developing, and how this tradability will affect individual services.
Recommendation 3: BEIS should build on the Bazalgette review of creative industries, the Maier review of industrial digitalisation, the Bell review of the life sciences sector and the Hall and Pesenti review of artificial intelligence to strengthen the service sector through the Industrial Strategy. Government and business should work together on the collected recommendations from these reviews. To support the service economy, this process can exploit sector deals, place-based policy making and support development of education, skills and lifelong learning, and the work of UK Research and Innovation and the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund
Recommendation 4: (1) Government needs to close the skills gap in STEM subjects such as data science, and ensure that our education system cultivates creative, social and critical thinking skills. (2) Industry needs to make a commitment to lifelong learning in the workplace by providing courses that train and reskill existing employees, rather than relying on new employees to fill skills gaps.
Recommendation 5: Government and industry should jointly conduct a public debate on the impact and regulation of digital disruption, especially with regard to ensuring the protection of casual employees. There should be similar analysis and debate of the market and regulatory status of incumbent businesses and potential disruptors to help produce a level playing field. This could be facilitated through the work of the Alan Turing Institute and the Open Data Institute.
Recommendation 6: Government, industry and academia should work together to raise productivity, encouraging the adoption and diffusion of innovation across the service sector. Government procurement could be used to incentivise support for SMEs as a key part of the supply chain to government, as is done in the USA. Schemes for place-based support from BEIS, Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) and other departments should consider how to incentivise diffusion of best practice, which needs to be in management and leadership as much as in technology.
Recommendation 7: The Departments for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) and BEIS should continue developing a coordinated approach that takes into account business broadband concerns and ensures businesses can benefit equally from digital technology initiatives to help drive productivity and economic growth.
Recommendation 8: Analysts and policy makers and those who deliver public services should work across government to understand how the government policy levers identified in the Technology and Innovation Futures report 2017 can be applied to greatest effect in the service sector.
Recommendation 9: Government should consider using outcome-based contracts and avoiding over-prescriptive specifications. This approach to procurement will allow providers of assets to servitise and innovate their business models using digital technologies. It will be important to carefully examine and test outcome-based contracts and regulatory approaches to avoid unintended consequences and to achieve the full set of desired outcomes.
Recommendation 10: The development of outcome-based contracts offers great opportunities to the UK. Industry, academia and leadership councils should together explore the possibilities for provision of outcome-based contractual services. Horizon-scanning will be essential to anticipate, monitor and assist in the identification of emerging opportunities in this area. Innovators should be encouraged to look across sectors and think more broadly about potential opportunities for servitisation and where the UK could create new comparative advantage.
Recommendation 11: Government should use sector and city deals to develop and build on existing financial ecosystems across the UK with the aim of reducing regional disparities. This will require mass data collection to measure and evaluate the planning and implementation of these deals.

Subscribe!

To subscribe to the weekly policy update simply email policy@bournemouth.ac.uk

JANE FORSTER | SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor Policy & Public Affairs Officer

Follow: @PolicyBU on Twitter | policy@bournemouth.ac.uk

December 4, 2017

HE policy update for the w/e 1st December 2017

BU research, Business Engagement, EU, Funding opportunities, Fusion, Fusion themes, HEIF, Impact, innovation, international, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer, Knowledge Transfer Partnership, PG research, policy, Public engagement, Research assessment, Research news, Uncategorized jforster

The KEF is coming

On 1^st December, HEFCE launched a consultation on the new Knowledge Exchange Framework – the KEF – which was announced earlier in the Autumn by the Jo Johnson – as the “third leg” of the HE stool*. Putting aside the rather unflattering stool analogy, we prefer to think of this as the third side of the Fusion triangle. (For those of you who have not yet looked at the staff consultation on the BU2025 strategy, spoiler alert – the proposed new Fusion device is more of a vaguely triangular swirl. Much more inclusive and dynamic. And better colours than the red and yellow of the previous one.) But anyway, knowledge exchange is an important part of what we do at BU and this is important.

The consultation, which closes at the end of January, will give us a chance to contribute to the design of this framework. The HEFCE press release says “The KEF metrics system will provide more information for the public and businesses on the performance of universities in knowledge exchange – how they share knowledge, expertise and other assets for the benefit of the economy and society. The aim is to provide regularly updated data that enables fair comparison between institutions’ performance in knowledge exchange. This will help to support further improvements in universities and promote accountability, responsiveness to economic and societal needs and effective use of public funds.”

So much like the TEF this is being pitched as being about value for money and choice (for those interested in funding research or choosing where to work). And, like the REF (indirectly), and as with the TEF (at least as originally planned – more on this later), there are cash incentives for universities to do well in this new framework via HEIF funding.

“The KEF metrics will help support the Industrial Strategy, which includes the commitment announced on 27 November to increase Higher Education Innovation Funding to £250 million by 2020-21. This increase will allow Universities to work with businesses of all sizes to support the delivery of the Industrial Strategy in diverse ways.”

And of course, like the TEF, the key to all of it is the metrics. A metrics working group has been established – details of the people are below.

There are only 5 questions, as follows.

What approaches and data need to be used to ensure a fair and meaningful comparison between different universities, taking into account factors that might impact individual institution’s knowledge exchange performance (such as research income, size or local economic conditions), whilst allowing identification of relative performance? How should benchmarking be used?
Other than HE-BCI survey data, what other existing sources of data could be used to inform a framework, and how should it be used?
What new (or not currently collected) data might be useful to such a framework?
How should KEF metrics be visualised to ensure they are simple, transparent and useful to a non-specialist audience?
Any other comments?

This is a bit of a concern. If it measures research income, there is a great risk of it being circular – and therefore not inclusive across the sector. This would conflict with the principles behind the Industrial Strategy – which are about focussing on areas of strength – wherever they are. We would prefer it not to be entirely metrics based (as we said for the TEF – where the written submission became a key part of the process and had a significant impact on the outcome in some cases).

Questions 2 and 3 are the opportunities to get into this debate – even through the questions are framed as questions about metrics. The letter from the Minister commissioning the work is a bit more helpful: “The design process should: …

Consider whether additional metrics can be devised and collected to provide a more comprehensive view of the effectiveness of universities’ external engagement, whilst having regard to the burden and cost of collection.
Take into account factors that might impact individual universities’ knowledge exchange performance, such as the university’s research income, size or local economic conditions, to ensure comparability between institutions …”

We will be working with RKEO to draft a BU response to this, so please contact policy@bournemouth.ac.uk if you would like to contribute to this process.

The key people involved: “The technical group, chaired by Professor Richard Jones FRS, University of Sheffield, will advise HEFCE and later RE on the design and delivery of the new KEF metrics system. The group’s members have been chosen to provide expertise in knowledge exchange metrics and external insights on performance. The members of the KEF metrics technical advisory group are:

Chair: Professor Richard Jones, FRS, Professor of Physics, University of Sheffield. EPSRC Council Member.
Tomas Coates Ulrichsen, Research Associate, Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation, University of Cambridge.
Alice Frost, Head of Knowledge Exchange policy, HEFCE / Research England.
Alice Hu Wagner, Managing Director for Strategy, Economics and Markets, British Business Bank.
Professor Graeme Reid, Professor of Science and Research Policy, University College London. Member of the Research England Council.
Mr Peter Saraga CBE, FREng, Senior Independent Member on the Research England Council. Former Managing Director of Philips Research Laboratories UK, Chair of HEFCE’s UKRPIF panel, and formerly President of the Institute of Physics and Vice-President of the Royal Academy of Engineering.
Stian Westlake, Policy Adviser to the Minister for State for Universities, Research and Innovation at Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS).
BEIS observer: Carolyn Reeve / Thomas Crawley.
HEFCE / Office for Students observers: Mario Ferelli, Richard Puttock
Higher Educations Statistics Agency (HESA) observer: Andy Youell, Director of Data Policy and Governance, HESA.
Head of secretariat: Hamish McAlpine, HEFCE / Research England

Professor Trevor McMillan, Vice-Chancellor of Keele University, has been leading work on the principles and good practices of university knowledge exchange since 2015. He will continue to do so, including providing advice to UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). For the KEF metrics system, Professor McMillan and his university expert group will advise on the value of the exercise for good practice development within universities”.

*(with REF and TEF – we’re in TLA chaos. Even though the TEF is now TESOF (SO = student outcomes) but we’re not allowed to call it that). Arguably as has been noted elsewhere, the KEF should be KEEF – Knowledge Exchange Excellence Framework). As we have also noted before, many voices have suggested that the OfS should be the OfSHE (Office for Students and Higher Education). But TLAs are the thing, it seems).

And…the major review of fees and funding….

We have discussed the options for fees and funding a lot recently, as the “national debate” that followed the election was continued over the summer and the debate shifted to whether there would be a review or not after the Conservative Party Conference in October. The Minister told Wonkfest in early November to watch for it in the budget, but no…. The BBC reported on 1^st December that it is actually happening – so please keep watching this space.

Future of skills and lifelong learning report

The Government Office for Science have issued the Future of Skills and Lifelong Learning report. In 112 pages it sets out a pathway to develop skills in the UK to support the Industrial Strategy, productivity and improve wages (and health and wellbeing along the way).

The focus on workplace learning, placements and work experience, and the role of extra-curricular activities are very interesting and consistent with the BU approach in many ways – so this is interesting for us. It also raises interesting questions about supply and demand and information flows.

To quote from the executive summary:

“Young adults in the UK have relatively poor literacy and numeracy and there are signs that we are falling further behind international competitors. …Seven OECD countries have numeracy scores equal to or higher than the UK for all age groups, and the number of countries increases considerably if the UK’s high-performing 60-65 age group is excluded. Literacy for UK 16-19 year-olds is ahead of only Chile and Turkey among a group of 24 (mostly OECD) countries. Literacy and numeracy performance varies between UK regions, with London and the South East achieving the highest scores …There is also evidence of intergenerational effects, with poor parental attainment reflected in the educational outcomes of the child. Breaking out of this cycle may require interventions that target both the parent and child, for example family learning programmes. Improvements to literacy and numeracy continue beyond school and higher education into the early years of work, suggesting that workplace environments play an important role in developing these skills.
Employers believe labour market entrants are not properly prepared for the workforce; again the UK compares poorly against other countries. Employers are looking not only for better literacy and numeracy, relevant qualifications and/or discipline-specific training but also for more positive attitudes towards work as well as ‘character’ attributes. Greater collaboration between employers and education providers may help to ensure that education-leavers are equipped with the skills that are in demand. Work placements and experience can help individuals gain the non-academic skills desired by employers. However, only around one-third of employers offer these opportunities and they are predominantly found in the South East of England. Informal learning also has a part to play, including participation in peer-to-peer learning or sports and other extra-curricular activities.
The UK has relatively large mismatches between the supply of and the demand for skills. Skills underutilisation is particularly high in the UK, while at the same time there are shortages of some particular high-level skills. Such mismatches imply that education providers are not offering, or students are not selecting, the courses that match with employers’ skills needs, and that future skill needs are not being fully anticipated. Improving the quality of and access to labour market information may be able to help address this.
Many places and sectors in the UK are in “low skills equilibrium”. A low skills equilibrium occurs when the availability of low-skilled jobs is matched by a low-skilled workforce, such that students have limited incentives to gain higher skills (or to remain in that place if they have them) and employers adapt to but are constrained by the skills supply. This is a stable equilibrium that can only be changed if supply and demand for skills are addressed together. If only the supply of skills improves, not the demand, it will create surplus and underutilisation or prompt migration to where those skills are in demand. This suggests that close partnerships between employers and providers of education and training are required to avoid mismatches, or improved infrastructure is needed to facilitate longer commuting distances.
Participation in formal learning declines with age. Adult learning is in overall decline and is disproportionately taken up by wealthier, more highly skilled individuals. Formal workplace training has also declined over the last 15 years. This may in part be explained by the fact that learning by adults aged 55+ has shifted from formal to ‘informal’ channels in the last decade or so, with higher socio-economic groups more likely to engage in such self-directed or peer-driven learning, potentially because of positive prior experience of education. While cost and lack of time are reported as common barriers to adult learning for individuals of all skill levels, individuals with no qualifications are more likely to cite attitudinal barriers including lack of confidence, lack of interest, and feeling too old to learn. However, low skilled individuals or those from poor socio-economic backgrounds and minority groups, reap the greatest rewards from learning. If the former trend persists, it suggests that older and particularly lower skilled individuals will be especially vulnerable in a future labour market that is likely to place a premium on lifelong learning.

And one conclusion:

“Analysis of the wage benefits associated with higher levels of education suggests that the returns on learning are substantial. A 2013 estimate found that an individual who has earned a bachelor’s degree will earn on average £210,000 more over the course of their lifetime, after taxes and loan costs, than someone with only A-levels. The benefit is greater for women, at £252,000 than for men, at £168,0006 (BIS, 2013b, p.5).”

Industrial Strategy

As noted, this was published last week and we are still digesting it (another 100+ pages). However, at least the models are simplified from the Green Paper (10 pillars etc). Now it has 5 foundations: Ideas, People, Infrastructure, Business Environment and Places and 4 grand challenges. The paper says “Our focus on them responds to the detailed feedback to the Green Paper”.

To coincide with the publication of the Industrial Strategy White Paper, UUK has published new guidance for businesses on how best to involve and engage with universities when developing a sector deal.

So what is actually going to happen? There is more detail below – and some practical steps to implement it:

“We will create an independent Industrial Strategy Council that will develop measures to assess and evaluate our Industrial Strategy and make recommendations to the government. The Council will have access to relevant government data and will be funded to commission specific evaluation projects as appropriate. It will be drawn from leading business men and women, investors, economists and academics from across the UK.”
“Investing in R&D to transform our economy. For the UK to become the most innovative country in the world we need a generational increase in public and private R&D investment. In this strategy we commit to reach 2.4 per cent of GDP investment in R&D by 2027 and to reach 3 per cent of GDP in the longer term, placing us in the top quartile of OECD countries. If we meet this target we will transform our economy. It could increase public and private R&D investment by as much as £80bn over the next 10 years, with much wider benefits across the UK economy.”

To do this:

As a first step we will invest an additional £2.3bn over what was previously planned in 2021/22, raising total public investment in R&D to approximately £12.5bn in that year alone.
We will work with industry in the coming months to develop a roadmap for meeting this target. This will provide a framework to drive business investment in R&D and focus on key sectors, technologies and clusters, including by optimising government investment to drive private investment in R&D and considering further opportunities to improve the business environment, including access to finance, regulatory frameworks, and intellectual property. This will maximise the impact of public investment in science and innovation to support businesses to invest more and drive outputs to realise our commitment to invest 2.4 per cent of GDP in R&D.
We will invest a further £725m in a second wave of the Industrial Strategy Challenge programme across the UK to respond to some of the greatest global challenges and opportunities – from climate change to automation….
We will invest £300m over the next three years in world-class talent including in priority areas aligned with the Industrial Strategy, such as artificial intelligence, to enhance our skilled workforce and attract private sector R&D investment. This investment will focus on collaboration and the flow of people between industry and academia and interdisciplinary and cutting-edge research and innovation to support the Industrial Strategy programme and the Grand Challenges. Support will range from Knowledge Transfer Partnerships and PhD programmes, with strong and flexible links to industry, to prestigious awards that support rising stars and the top talent from both the UK and overseas.
We will work with our leading universities, research institutes and UK Research and Innovation to increase global investors’ R&D activities taking place in the UK. Of the world’s 2,500 top R&D investors, just 50 businesses are responsible for 40 per cent of private sector investment globally. If we could attract an additional five per cent of R&D from these top 50, UK based R&D would increase by around a third.
We will work with UKRI to develop a new competitive Strategic Priorities Fund…This will support high quality R&D priorities which would otherwise be missed – multidisciplinary and inter-disciplinary programmes identified by researchers and businesses at the cutting edge of research and innovation. …. UK Research and Innovation strategy will deliver a real-terms increase in council budgets of approximately 20 per cent between 2015/16 and 2019/20. We will also increase support for Quality-Related research through Research England. This recognises the vital importance of providing underpinning funding for our world-leading universities to invest in the excellence and impact of their research and ensure the sustainability of our research infrastructure.
We will improve the UK tax system to support innovation. ….
We will make it easier to finance innovation by increasing the resources for government agencies that promote and fund innovation like Innovate UK – our world leading innovation agency that supports businesses across the UK to collaborate and innovate – and the British Business Bank..
We are also allocating a further £44m of grant funding to enable Innovate UK to fund £150m of responsive grant competitions in 2017/18. This will allow it to support hundreds more high-growth businesses, collaborations and industries to innovate and compete in future global markets. In addition, Innovate UK will pilot new ways of financing innovation: – £50m Innovation Loans pilot over the next two years to target the most promising projects in viable businesses on the cusp of commercialisation, but not yet ready to access loans from commercial lenders; and – an Investment Accelerator pilot to bring in seed equity alongside grant funding by matching the most innovative early stage businesses with investors. …
We will develop an agile approach to regulation that promotes innovation, the growth of new sectors, and innovative market entrants while ensuring effective protections for citizens and the environment. An example is establishing a clear framework for autonomous vehicles and, through our Digital Charter, building agreement on the ethical and effective use of new technologies and data. …
We will improve public procurement as an important source of finance for innovative businesses that does not dilute their equity and gives an endorsement for others to invest. …. we will refocus the [Small Business Research Initiative] SBRI programme to increase its impact for innovative businesses, aligning it with Grand Challenges and building capability in the public sector to drive productivity by adopting SBRI solutions. As a first step, this month we announced a new GovTech Catalyst with a GovTech Fund of up to £20m over three years, which will use SBRI to support tech firms to provide the government with innovative solutions for more efficient public services

“We will:

Ideas:

raise total research and development(R&D) investment to 2.4 per cent of GDP by 2027;
increase the rate of R&D tax credit to 12 per cent;
invest £725m in new Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund programmes to capture the value of innovation;

People

establish a technical education system that rivals the best in the world to stand alongside our world-class higher education system;
invest an additional £406m in maths, digital and technical education, helping to address the shortage of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) skills;
create a new National Retraining Scheme that supports people to re-skill, beginning with a £64m investment for digital and construction training;

Infrastructure

increase the National Productivity Investment Fund to £31bn, supporting investments in transport, housing and digital infrastructure;
support electric vehicles through £400m charging infrastructure investment and an extra £100m to extend the plug-in car grant;
boost our digital infrastructure with over £1bn of public investment, including £176m for 5G and £200m for local areas to encourage roll out of full-fibre networks;

Business Environment

launch and roll-out Sector Deals – partnerships between government and industry aiming to increase sector productivity. The first Sector Deals are in life sciences, construction, artificial intelligence and the automotive sector;
drive over £20bn of investment in innovative and high potential businesses, including through establishing a new £2.5bn Investment Fund, incubated in the British Business Bank;
launch a review of the actions that could be most effective in improving the productivity and growth of small and medium-sized businesses, including how to address what has been called the ‘long tail’ of lower productivity firms;

Places

agree Local Industrial Strategies that build on local strengths and deliver on economic opportunities;
create a new Transforming Cities fund that will provide £1.7bn for intra-city transport. This will fund projects that drive productivity by improving connections within city regions; and
provide £42m to pilot a Teacher Development Premium. This will test the impact of a £1000 budget for high-quality professional development for teachers working in areas that have fallen behind.
These policies, alongside the many others set out in this document, are the first strategic actions of a long-term approach to transform our levels of productivity and our earning power as a nation, as businesses, as places, and as individuals. We are ready to be judged on our performance in implementing them.

Student visas

The Home Office released quarterly and annual immigration statistics including data on study visas here: Why do people come to the UK? (3) To study

The data relating to study found in the year ending September 2017:

An increase of 8 per cent in Short-term student visas
A 6 per cent increase in University sponsored study visa application
Increases of 9 per cent for Russell Group universities to 87,362,
A decrease of 4 per cent in applications for the Further education sector

Nationalities data for the year ending September 2017 (top 5):

China: +15 per cent
United States: +6 per cent
India: +27 per cent
Hong Kong: +5 per cent
Saudi Arabia: -2 per cent

The lead story is the rise in visa applications for Indian students, with the first annual rise in applications since 2010: THE Article. [thanks to Dods for the summary].

Jo Johnson has tweeted about this.

Committee inquiries

Two parliamentary committees on issues of key importance to the higher education sector are now taking written evidence.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights inquiry into freedom of speech in universities has a deadline for written evidence of 15 December, while the Treasury Committee’s inquiry into student loans will accept submissions until 31 December.

Earlier this week Professor Julia Buckingham, Vice-Chancellor of Brunel University London, represented UUK before the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee in relation to its ongoing inquiry into the economics of higher, further and technical education.

Subscribe!

To subscribe to the weekly policy update simply email policy@bournemouth.ac.uk

JANE FORSTER | SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor Policy & Public Affairs Officer

65111 65070

Follow: @PolicyBU on Twitter | policy@bournemouth.ac.uk

November 6, 2017

Natalia Adamczewska joins the HEIF-6 Virtual Learning Environment project

Awarded & submitted bids, HEIF bhicks

Recently, I was fortune enough to become the Research Assistant on the HEIF-6 project run by Dr Ben Hicks. This is a one year project that aims to develop and evaluate a free Virtual Learning Environment tool that will support practitioners and care home staff wishing to use commercial gaming technology (iPads, Nintendo Wii) with people with dementia and their care partners. We have a number of experts involved in the research, such as Dr Samuel Nyman from Psychology Department and ADRC, Professor Wen Tang from Department of Creative Technology, Dr Sarah Thomas who is Deputy Director BUCRU and Dr Clare Cutler who is Research Skills and Development Officer. We also collaborate with Alive! who are a charity dedicated to improving the lives of older people and people with dementia through delivering innovative activities (e.g. the use of technology) and training dementia care practitioners. They work with 350 Care Homes and Day Centers across the South West of England and we are lucky to have Malcolm Burgin onboard who as the Regional Manager of Alive!.

Being part of such a research team, and having the chance to contribute to the HEIF-6 project is a great privilege and will certainly be beneficial as I begin my journey as an early career researcher.

If you would like further information on the project, please feel free to email Ben on bhicks@Bournemouth.ac.uk

September 22, 2017

Globalisation of the Wessex Portal thanks to HEIF

BRIAN, BU research, Global engagement, HEIF, Public engagement, Student Engagement, student research thompsonk

Over the Summer of 2017, project manager Katie Thompson has been working to redesign and improve the Wessex Portal to include a global conservation theme. The site has been enhanced to target a global audience, still focussing on key themes such as public engagement but also to include a global conservation section.

This new project was one of the outcomes of a recent visit to Kenya and South Africa by WP manager Katie Thompson, who developed collaboration with a school and charity organisation. These international trips focused on wildlife research and environmental education. Katie Thompson liaised with students and teachers, and is working to initiate an environmental club, with participation from the school. Children from the schools will be able to showcase their work online via the WP website and social media pages. This will be shown in the updated WP ‘Conservation Forum’ section of the website with public input (http://www.wessexportal.co.uk/conservation/).

An upcoming visit to South Africa next month will aim to build on these relationships, and expand upon organisations to collaborate with and expand outreach to international countries.

If you would like more information, then please do not hesitate to contact either Katie Thompson thompsonk@bournemouth.ac.uk or Genoveva Esteban gesteban@bournemouth.ac.uk (Principal Investigator) Join our website, and follow us on FB and twitter for regular updates.

July 12, 2017

Reminder of HEIF-6 funding call

HEIF Julie Northam

The deadline is fast approaching for the HEIF-6 funding call – 23rd July.

HEFCE provide Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF) to universities to facilitate a broad range of knowledge-based interactions between them and the wider world, which result in economic and social benefit to the UK. The current round of funding is referred to as HEIF-6 and runs from August 2017 to July 2022.

An internal call is now open for applications from BU colleagues who wish to develop innovative projects. Funding will be awarded to those applications that clearly demonstrate how new/existing collaborations will be developed and how societal/economic impact will be achieved. Interdisciplinary and/or cross-Faculty/PS proposals are encouraged, as are proposals with international collaborators.

We anticipate making awards of £10k-100k per project per year. Projects should be between one and three years in duration and must align to one of BU’s HEIF-6 themes:

Advanced manufacturing
Health (focusing on digital health and e-health)
Digital and creative

Colleagues wishing to apply should read BU’s HEIF-6 strategy and the HEIF-6 FAQs before completing the HEIF-6 application form. These documents can be found on the i-drive (I:\R&KEO\Public\HEIF 6). Applications must be supported by the Project Lead’s Faculty and signed by the relevant Deputy Dean (Research and Professional Practice). Any queries should be sent to Julie Northam (jnortham@bournemouth.ac.uk) in the first instance.

Completed applications should be sent to Rebecca Edwards (redwards@bournemouth.ac.uk) by midnight on Sunday 23^rd July. We aim to confirm the outcomes within a fortnight of the closing date.

July 3, 2017

HEIF-6: funding now available for innovative KE projects

HEIF Julie Northam

We anticipate making awards of £10k-100k per project per year. Projects should be between one and three years in duration and must align to one of BU’s HEIF-6 themes:

Advanced manufacturing
Health (focusing on digital health and e-health)
Digital and creative

Completed applications should be sent to Rebecca Edwards (redwards@bournemouth.ac.uk) by midnight on Sunday 23^rd July. We aim to confirm the outcomes within a fortnight of the closing date.

March 23, 2017

The Compound Eye of Calliphora Vomitoria (Bluebottle fly)

BU research, Business Engagement, HEIF, Impact, Info Days, international, Knowledge Exchange jcodling

“Blood feeding activity of flies at crime scenes can be confounding. Experiments were conducted to investigate the blood feeding activity, and blood artefact patterns created by flies following a blood meal. The trials were undertaken in a staged environment where over 500 flies were exposed to 500ml of horse blood in a sealed gazebo for a period of 72 hours. The resulting patterns, a total of 539,507 fly blood artefacts, were then compared to recreated bloodstain patterns commonly encountered during instances of violent assault. These comparisons focused on overall pattern shape, total stain numbers, stain density per cm² and the zone where they were deposited. Informal observations and recordings were also made of individual stain colour and stain alignment, but were not measured.”

This was the abstract submitted to accompany Christopher’s recent submission to the Research Photography Competition, where he won second prize.

Christopher Dwen is currently working as a Research Assistant on an innovation funded (HEIF) project called: “Sherlock’s Window”. This HEIF-funded project at BU aims to produce an odourless growth medium that can be rolled out internationally for use in forensic investigation. Find out more about the project in the latest edition of the Bournemouth Research Chronicle featured in the section: “Innovation in industry:how researchers and the wider community are working together.” –

Follow HEIF on Instagram to find out more about the innovation projects taking place at BU: https://www.instagram.com/heif_at_bu/

March 22, 2017

Research Drove Me to Murder

BU research, Business Engagement, HEIF, Impact, innovation, international, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team jcodling

“As reported by National Policing Improving Agency, the most frequently encountered evidence at the scenes of a crime is footwear impressions and marks. Unfortunately, recovery and usage of this kind of evidence has not achieved its full potential. Due to the cost benefit ratio (time consuming casting procedures, expensive scanners) footprints are often neglected evidence. As technology changes, the capabilities of forensic science should continue to evolve. By translating academic research and technical ‘know-how’ into software (www.digtrace.co.uk) the authors have placed 3D imaging of footwear evidence in the hands of every police force in the UK and overseas.”

This was the abstract submitted to accompany Dominika’s recent submission to the Research Photography Competition.

Dominika Budka is currently working on an innovation funded (HEIF) project called: “Dinosaurs to Forensic Science: Digital, Tracks and Traces”. BU alumni, Dominika, graduated last year (2016) having completed an MSc Forensic and Neuropsychological Perspectives in Face-Processing. Find our more about her role on the HEIF project.

Follow HEIF on Instagram to find out more about the innovation projects taking place at BU: https://www.instagram.com/heif_at_bu/

March 21, 2017

Sherlock’s Window: In search of an odourless growth medium

BU research, Business Engagement, HEIF, Impact, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team jcodling

“A key aspect of forensic investigation is the assessment of the ‘window of opportunity’ during which death took place. Estimations using insects (e.g. blowflies) increase accuracy. Using blowflies to determine post-mortem period requires an understanding of the temperature dependent growth patterns that they develop through their life cycle. In order to understand this, blowfly larvae are reared on growth media in the laboratory.

Sherlock’s Window is a HEIF-funded project at BU which aims to produce an odourless growth medium that can be rolled out internationally for use in forensic investigation. Illustrated here is the head of a third instar blowfly larva. Maggots have no eyes, but the protrusions at the tip of the mouth area are palps, used for feeling and manipulating food particles. The rows of black barbs that are visible are used to pull the maggot forward through the food substrate.”

This was the abstract submitted to accompany Dr Andrew Whittington’s recent submission to the Research Photography Competition.

Find out more about the project in the latest edition of the Bournemouth Research Chronicle featured in the section: “Innovation in industry:how researchers and the wider community are working together.”

Follow HEIF on Instagram to find out more about the innovation projects taking place at BU: https://www.instagram.com/heif_at_bu/

March 21, 2017

BU alumni working on serious gaming project

BU research, Business Engagement, HEIF, Impact, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team, Uncategorized jcodling

Joshua (Josh) Cook graduated in 2016 with a first in BSc Games Programming. He is currently working on an innovation project being led by Professor Wen Tang. ” PLUS” is a gamified training application funded by HEIF, in collaboration with the Dorset, Devon and Cornwall (Strategic Alliance) Police forces in order to provide a virtual learning environment that teaches trainees in a more engaging manner than traditional paper based learning.

As a project team member Wen commented “Josh has been a pro-active and key member of the project team working with both academics , the College of Policing and police forces around the UK to develop this training application.”

Key areas of focus for Josh have included:

Making the system more generic, so that the project can later be expanded to multiple areas and more situations with ease
Improve the visual environment (of the game) with shaders and animations
Include data analytics in order to obtain an understanding as to how trainees are using the game, how long they take, how many mistakes they make etc

Josh didn’t take a placement year during University, so aside from a summer position in a local games position he did not have much work experience. On being given this opportuntity to work on the projetc Josh commented ” The PLUS project seemed like an interesting project to work on, and when I found out a position was open to work on it I applied. I’ve learned some useful things on this project, such as working from and improving upon an existing code base, what it’s like working directly with clients, implementing and using data analytics, and I’m sure I’ll learn more throughout the duration of my employment.”

This project has received funding from August 2015 with the funding ending in July 2017. (HEIF 5+1 and HEIF 5+1+1)

Read more about this project in full: Serious Games for Police Training.

College of Policing Research Map

March 20, 2017

BU alumni supporting innovation projects at BU

BU research, Business Engagement, HEIF, Impact, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team, Student Engagement, student research jcodling

Dominika Budka is currently working on an innovation funded (HEIF) project called: “Dinosaurs to Forensic Science: Digital, Tracks and Traces”. She graduated last year (2016) having completed an MSc Forensic and Neuropsychological Perspectives in Face-Processing

Forensic technology and tools are advancing across the board, with the analysis of digital trace evidence being an exception. The techniques and tools used to capture and analyse footwear evidence have not changed in over a hundred years. This project is already changing the status quo by translating academic research on human and dinosaur tracks into tools for forensic practitioners to use. The product that has been developed, DigTrace, is an integrated software solution for the capture and analysis of 3D data whether in a forensic context (footwear evidence) or in the study of vertebrate tracks and footprints. One of the recent successes is the exhibit the project team are organising at the very prestigious Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition, to be held in London in July.

The project team were looking for a dissemination officer to help spread the word about the software and engage user groups both within the UK and overseas. Dominika’s role involves working with external stakeholder groups, organising dissemination events, developing training materials and events for academics, crime agencies, forensic specialists, and UK police forces.

About working on the project, Dominika comented, “I’m thrilled to be able to contribute to the project, which is not only well-aligned with my interests, but has also a huge potential for impact in terms of improving societal security. I’m working with a unique product set which can enhance global security by improving forensic practice, as well as criminal intelligence gathering and ultimately prosecution. The forensic context of the project is what I find most interesting as it links directly to my MSc”

To find out more about the project – click on the link: Dinosaurs to Forensic Science: Digital, Tracks and Traces

March 16, 2017

Tracks in the sand: tracking criminals

BU research, HEIF, Impact, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team jcodling

“Within our lives we leave thousands of individual footprints – in the snow, on the beach, in the park and sometimes even muddy prints on the kitchen floor! Tracks are more numerous than any other form of trace evidence, and record a unique snap shot in time about the track-maker. Not only do they record details of the shoes worn, but information about our body mass, style of walking and the specific wear on the soles of our shoes that record information about the history of our footfall. Reading these clues digitally provides an important forensic tools and HEIF-funded BU research (www.DigTrace.co.uk) in this area is shaping forensic practice both in the UK and overseas. “

This was the abstract submitted to accompany Professor Matthew Bennett’s recent submission to the Research Photography Competition.

This is the first image to go live on the new Instagram account for HEIF. What not follow to find out more obout the exciting innovations projects past and present at BU.

It can be found here: https://www.instagram.com/heif_at_bu/

March 16, 2017

Innovation funding now featured on Instagram !

Business Engagement, HEIF, Impact, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team, student research jcodling

Forming part of a media package to support innovation funding at BU, a new Instagram Account is now live. Oliver Cooke a third year student on the BA Honours Media Production course is developing a number of different media channels to showcase the range of Higher Education Innovation Funded (HEIF) projects at BU.

It can be found here: https://www.instagram.com/heif_at_bu/

This first image to go live comes from Matthew Bennett’s submission to the Research Photography Competition. (Read more about the HEIF project Matthew is leading on here: Dinosaurs to Forensic Science: Digital, Tracks and Traces

(Research Photography Competition now in its third year.)

Ollie is also working on a short video documentary and website as part of this project.

Ollie’s experience with HEIF came from the time on his work placement last year. He worked within the Research and Knowledge Exchange Office (RKEO) as the Student Engagement Co-Ordinator and had the chance to be involved in a number of initiatives including HEIF. Whilst reflecting on his time in RKEO and ideas for his Graduate Project, it was clear that there are many interesting projects at BU.

Commenting on his chosen topic Ollie comented “It also struck me that here was an ideal opportunity to create some really engaging media content in order to showcase the innovation journeys and provide more information about innovation and knowledge exchange at BU. This will aim to highlight the people involved with HEIF at BU, as well as the research.”

Ollie has just started filming and the first footage has been shot involving Andrew Whittington (PI) and BU student Christopher Dwen who are working on the project: “Sherlock’s Window: improving accuracy of entomological forensics at post-mortem criminal investigation using combined cuticular hydrocarbon and internal metabolite analysis.”

(Sherlock’s Window was also featured in the latest edition of the Bournemouth Research Chronicle: Edition 6, January 2017, Page 22.)

March 2, 2017

Graduate Project – Supporting innovation at BU

Business Engagement, Fusion, HEIF, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team jcodling

Oliver Cooke filming compressed My name is Oliver Cooke and I am currently in my third year of study on the BA Honours Media Production course. As part of my Graduate Project, I am developing a media package in order to showcase a number of projects that have been awarded Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF).

My experience with HEIF comes from the time on my work placement that I undertook last year. I worked within the Research and Knowledge Exchange Office (RKEO) as the Student Engagement Co-Ordinator. I learnt about many initiatives at BU including HEIF; so whilst reflecting on my time in RKEO and ideas for my Graduate Project, it was clear to me that there are many interesting projects at BU. It also struck me that here was an ideal opportunity to create some really engaging media content in order to showcase the innovation journeys and provide more information about innovation and knowledge exchange at BU.

The media content I will be producing will include a short video documentary, web content that can be integrated with the BU Research Website and a social media campaign. This will aim to highlight the people involved with HEIF at BU, as well as the research.

I have just started filming and the first footage has been shot involving Andrew Whittington (PI) and BU student Christopher Dwen who are working on the project: “Sherlock’s Window: improving accuracy of entomological forensics at post-mortem criminal investigation using combined cuticular hydrocarbon and internal metabolite analysis.”

(Sherlock’s Window was also featured in the latest edition of the Bournemouth Research Chronicle: Edition 6, January 2017, Page 22.)

February 20, 2017

Flying the KEIT for knowledge exchange and impact at BU

HEIF, Impact, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team, Uncategorized Joanna Pawlik

It’s been a busy month for BU’s Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team and below is a small selection of our activities. If you’d like to find out more about our team and how we can support your research, do get in touch or come and see us (We’re based in Melbury House).

Research Communications

Our new research magazine has been published and is now available to share! It can be found online here and there are a number of print copies available for anyone who wants them – just talk to Rachel Bowen.We also have a partnership with the Conservation, which is a news site designed to support academics to comment on stories in the news, based on their expertise. Beginning of February one of the business editors came down to talk to the Faculty of Management and the health editor will be coming to talk to HSS this month. If you would like to reach a wider audience, make sure to talk to Rachel Bowen or PR team.

Knowledge Exchange (KE) – Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF)

The latest round of HEIF funding is HEIF 5+1+1, and runs from 1 August 2016 until 31 July 2017. There are twelve projects currently live and more information on each project can be found using this link to the BU Research Blog. Subject areas are broad, ranging from forensics to environmental sciences to health apps, musical technologies and virtual sculpting tools. January 2017 marks the half-way stage of this current HEIF funding round with reporting well underway in advance of the next committee meeting in March.

BU submitted to the call for proposals for HEIF 6 . These results are due to be announced by March 2017.HEIF in the media spotlight

HEIF projects continue to be featured in the media including the latest edition of the Bournemouth Research Chronicle (P22/23).

We are currently working with previous RKEO work placement Oliver Cooke (Ollie) as part of his final year project. Ollie is an undergraduate media production student who is developing a number of digital channels including social media, web and video content to showcase the HEIF projects and the HEIF journey at BU. This will form part of his final year assessment. He was part of the Research & Knowledge Exchange Team last year as he was successful in securing a 12 month placement with the department.

Knowledge Transfer Partnerships

Student Research Assistantship scheme is now live for academic applications. There is a post about the scheme and if you have any questions, make sure to get in touch with Rachel Clarke.

Student engagement

Submissions closed for the Research Photography Competition at the end of January. We’ve seen some fantastic entries this year and voting is now open with the winner being announced at an exhibition on 9 March, in the Atrium Art Gallery.

First of this month 14:Live saw BU students and staff learning more about osteoarthritis and what is ORI currently working on to make a real difference for people suffering from this common form of joint disease. As well as having a chance to hear about the life changing research and work from ORI, attendees were able to test out the Laser Speckle Contrast Imager (LSCI) which is used to visualise blood flow and measure micro circulation just below the skin’s surface. The presentation also included videos of ORI’s specialist equipment and lab which is going to be open for the public during Festival of Learning 2017.

Next 14:Live with FoodSMART is on 28 February.

Public Engagement

This month’s Cafe Scientifique with Dr Sharon Docherty was very popular and seen many new faces. Next month we are back with Dr Darren G. Lilleker and talk about facts and beliefs: ‘It’s just the way it is: ‘ why humans doubt facts if they contrast belief’ – 7th March, Cafe Bosconova at 7:30pm.

We are currently looking for activities for Festival of Learning on-tour event taking place as part of Poole Maritime Festival. There is a blog about this opportunity and if you’re interested please get in touch with Joanna Pawlik.

Naomi Kay who has joined us as a Public Engagement Officer in 2014 has recently left BU so if you have any queries please get in touch with Genna West or Joanna Pawlik instead.

Feeling inspired? You can get in touch with KEIT below.Becca Edwards– Knowledge Exchange and Impact ManagerCharlene Parrish– Student Project Bank Project CoordinatorGenna West– Engagement and Impact FacilitatorHannah Jones– Student Engagement and Communications Coordinator

Jayne Codling– Knowledge Exchange Adviser

Joanna Pawlik– Public Engagement Events Organiser

Rachel Bowen– Research Communications Manager

Rachel Clarke– Knowledge Exchange Adviser (KTP)

February 8, 2017

HEIF project on managing peatlands for biodiversity and cultural heritage

Festival of Learning, HEIF, Impact, Knowledge Exchange, Public engagement, REF Subjects, Research themes, Student Engagement, student research pgillingham

Improving the Condition of Natural and Cultural Capital in Dorset and Hampshire: A HEIF project

By Alexander Lovegrove

Dorset and Hampshire are counties rich in natural beauty, biodiversity, and sites of archaeological importance. Within both counties, there are organisations dedicated to either conservation or preserving areas of historical importance, but they rarely work together or manage both. This new HEIF-funded project, led by Dr. Phillipa Gillingham, aims to bring these organisations and BU students together to change this and use their collective knowledge to preserve areas of natural beauty and historical importance. “We want to be able to manage them both for conservation purposes and for their rich archaeological heritage,” says Dr Gillingham. This project focusses on peatland ecosystems, which have significant importance both locally and internationally for their biodiversity, ecosystem services and cultural value. “Ultimately, we hope to be able to develop a case study of the area to demonstrate how you can manage peatlands for the benefit of both archaeologists and conservationists. This will make a difference locally and for the further research we hope to do in the Atlantic regions.”

Key objectives of the project will include collecting data on the pressures reducing these natural and cultural assets, such as recreational use and land use change – including a Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis of land managers (which has already begun) and Student Environment Research Team (SERT) work by students carried out over the easter break. This will lead to scientific output documenting the pressures and impacts facing these valuable environments. Further scientific work will investigate the changes in condition of these ecosystems over time, using palaeoecological and archaeological evidence together with recreation of ecological surveys carried out in the 1950s.

One of the most important aspects of the project will be the opportunity to bring together several different conservation organisations in the local area in order to share knowledge and build new relationships. This will involve building a network with stakeholders to exchange knowledge on current approaches to assessing the condition and trends of natural and cultural capital assets in peatlands. Additionally, sharing of best practice guidelines for monitoring and managing the condition of natural and cultural capital assets will be carried out through this network, an exhibition on Dorset and Hampshire peatlands, an event at the Festival of Learning and reports from the SERT teams.

The project, led by Dr Pippa Gillingham, includes ecologists (Dr Anita Diaz, Prof. Adrian Newton, Alexander Lovegrove), archaeologists (Prof. Mark Brisbane) and Palaeoecologists (Dr John Stewart). The team also includes in its network Dr Lawrence Shaw from the New Forest National Park Authority, Toby Branston at the RSPB and David Brown from the National Trust, who manage land locally for both cultural heritage and biodiversity, and Prof. Nigel Webb from Dorset Wildlife Trust. “We hope that the knowledge we develop will be of real benefit to them.” Funding is provided through HEIF – HEIF 5+1+1 – with funding running from 1 August 2016 until 31 July 2017. Please contact P.I. Dr Phillipa Gillingham (pgillingham@bournemouth.ac.uk) or Research Assistant Alexander Lovegrove (alovegrove@bournemouth.ac.uk) if you have any questions about the project.

February 7, 2017

Access to Music: Music Technology in Special Educational Needs Settings

HEIF, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team tdavis

Access to Music is a HEIF funded project situated in the department of Creative Technology and the Emerge Research Group.

The aim of this project is to work collaboratively with local schools for children with Special Educational Needs (SEN) to increase access to music technology.

UK SEN schools face multiple barriers when using music and music technology to engage and improve the wellbeing of children with Severe Learning Difficulties (SLD), Profound, Multiple Learning Difficulties (PMLD) or issues such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). This project will explore and identify these barriers in order to develop a suitable solution to promote and unlock new avenues for music technology for both children and music specialists in the surrounding SEN schools.

So far we has initiated links with Montacute & Linwood schools to establish collaborative projects working with a range stakeholders within these settings. Each school has its own unique barriers to content with, so the main challenge is to come up with bespoke solutions for each setting.

Key people involved in the running of this project are Dr Tom Davis, PI, Phil Hallet Co-I (CODA music coda.org.uk) & Dr Ane Bevan Co-I.

The project is supported by Dan Pierson who has been employed as a research assistant.

Recent activity has been a 2 day hackathon (see photo) to prototype possible technical solutions to issues identified by stakeholders.

Outcomes from this project will be presented in a number of settings including a Festival of Learning event on 8th July 2017.

Category / HEIF

Free speech still in the news

Student Loans, RPI & HE Funding

Cost Effective Universities – Student Spending

Research Commercialisation

LEO

Mental Health

Technical Education

Consultations

Other news

Subscribe!

Knowledge Exchange Framework

Student Loan Repayment threshold

Research news

HE Review

Prevent

Transforming the service economy

Subscribe!

The KEF is coming

And…the major review of fees and funding….

Future of skills and lifelong learning report

Industrial Strategy

Student visas

Committee inquiries

Subscribe!

Other services

Don’t miss a post!

Recent posts

Search by Category

Search by popular post topics