Category / Impact

HE Policy update for the w/e 2nd March 2018

Impact, policy

Despite the bright sunshine in the first half of the week, the snowy week caused a fair amount of disruption, but there was plenty to read in the new HE Regulatory Framework launched on Wednesday.

HE Regulatory Framework

On Wednesday the OfS launched the revised HE Regulatory Framework at their inaugural conference. The Minister for Universities declared himself to be the “Minister for Students” and to many in the room his speech sounded fairly ominous.  You can read the speech here (“a revolution in accountability”).  There’s an article by Dods here on Politics home.

You’ll remember the detail on the proposed new framework from the December policy updates and you can read BU’s response to the consultation here.

The main changes are:

  • the Basic category of registration is gone. The regulation of these providers was going to be very light – and arguably ineffective.  There is some concern that these are the majority of the currently unregulated providers, and that the risk from these providers is greater than the (slightly smaller) number of regulated providers.  The OfS will have plenty to be getting on with without dealing with these providers.
  • A stronger role for students in regulation: ““student engagement” has been added to the list of principles, with the governing body having to ensure that “all students have opportunities to engage with the governance of the provider, and that this allows for a range of perspectives to have influence”.
  • The new approach to student protection plans has been welcomed (although it may be very bureaucratic).
  • Compulsory TEF for larger institutions ie those with more than 500 HE students

A Wonkhe guest blogger writes on the danger of over-reliance on data to regulate the HE sector and highlights more innovative design interventions such as ‘nudge’ theory claiming it incentivises compliance from the outset.

The folks at Wonkhe have gathered all the materials here.  It is worth looking at the Ministerial instructions to the OfS to see what the priorities are.

Widening Participation

The OfS released the Access and Participation plans guidance (2019/20) and associated documentation on Wednesday at their launch event.

In the Government guidance to OfS there is a continued emphasis on demonstrating robust evidence of impact for the spending interventions universities support – ‘invest wisely’, incorporating TEF data, and further Transparency measures that the OfS might require universities to publish to advance equality of opportunity. Mention is made of OfS and the ‘levers at its disposal’ to regulating for continuous improvement of access and participation, and the increase in non-continuation amongst WP students in recent years. Flexibility of provision (including part time study, accelerated degrees, degree apprenticeships, evening degrees and foundation years) are also included, as is closing the differential degree and employment outcomes gap.

  • Given the strength of our ambitions for access and participation we will be looking for the OfS to push providers to set challenging targets for themselves within their plans and so drive further improvements across the sector. The goals for higher education2 published under the previous Government remain in place and our expectation is that the OfS will want to consider these when developing its own ambitions for the sector.
  • We understand that given the time-constraints, the OfS will not be able to bring about substantial changes through plans for 2019-20. However, we are clear that we continue to expect high ambition and continuous improvement in the plans that are approved. We would expect the OfS to develop and consult on further enhancements to its expectations for plans in future years. 

(Taken from the Government guidance to OfS)

The links to schools sponsorship, one of Theresa May’s original ambitions, remain although they are relatively low-key:

  • This Government has emphasised its strong desire to harness the resources and expertise of our higher education sector to work in partnership to improve outcomes across the state school system. The Government expects more higher education providers to establish stronger long-term relationships with schools. This could include becoming involved in school sponsorship, opening free schools and supporting mathematics education in schools (although support need not be limited to those means), with the aim of raising attainment and progress for disadvantaged and under-represented groups so that more pupils are qualified to progress to higher education. As part of this providers should be able to demonstrate clearly the impact their support is having on the schools and pupils.

In the OfS guidance to institutions:

  • We expect all providers, in particular those with the weakest performance on access, to demonstrate how they are developing deeper relationships with schools and colleges to raise attainment and enable more students from underrepresented groups to enter higher education if they wish to…We also expect that we will see greater numbers of higher education providers sponsoring schools (either as a main sponsor or co-sponsor) or with advanced plans to do so.

There is also an expectation for universities to ‘do more’ for careers outreach (see page 11).

From the guidance on the wise investment, whereby a university chooses which Access and Participation interventions to support:

  • It is, of course, for providers to invest their own money as they see fit, but it is in their interests to take evidence-led approaches and we think it is important that the OfS challenges investment for which there is little justification, based on evidence and the provider’s targets and performance. We expect the OfS to be firm with providers about the way their investment should be allocated, encouraging more investment in outreach and other activities, and less on financial support where appropriate. We also expect that financial support should be backed up by clear and robust evaluation plans and supporting evidence that shows that the investment is proportionate to the contribution it is expected to make towards widening access.

The guidance also sets out the expectation that the OfS will continue to advise providers on effective practice. And hints the Government are looking for their regulator to bare their teeth more often:

  • The establishment of the OfS provides an opportunity to consider afresh the arrangements for monitoring and reviewing access and participation plans….We will be looking for the OfS to challenge those providers that are not judged to be taking sufficient steps to meet the commitments in their access and participation plans. We would also expect the OfS to consider the action they might take in relation to those providers…that include poorly focused measures in their plans that are not supported by robust evaluation….The OfS will have a broad range of enforcement powers available to it where it considers that a provider has failed to comply with commitments set out in its access and participation plan and so breached an ongoing registration condition. These could include increased monitoring, imposing additional specific registration conditions or imposing a monetary penalty…The OfS will also have powers to refuse to renew an access and participation plan or suspend a provider’s registration (entirely or for specified purposes) or de-register a provider.

Part-time Study

In December OFFA commissioned HESA and CFE to research part-time students aiming to understand the reasons behind the decline and understand an effective provision offer. Existing HESA data has been analysed alongside a fresh survey investigating students’ motivations for studying part-time and identifying the barriers and enablers to access and progression. Case studies are also being undertaken to ‘provide insights for institutions seeking to recruit and tailor their support for different groups of part-time students, as well as improving access and provision across the sector’. The full findings will be released in April, however, on Tuesday HESA published a first update.

The data shows the widely recognised drop in part time recruitment associated with the introduction of higher fees occurred but a downward trend was already visible from 2008/09. The data delves deeper to highlight the overall influence the decline of ‘other’ undergraduate study is having on the overall decline. HESA pose the following questions:

  • Is the demand for part-time courses reducing?
  • Is there a lack of supply of part-time courses?
  • Is it a mixture of both supply and demand factors combining to exacerbate the decline

There is also a drop within the mature student grouping for those aged 40 years and over (with proportionally part time students aged up to 25 compared to the past). HESA state the sector must therefore consider the factors that may be switching mature learners off this type of study – for instance, are the numbers studying for self-interest reducing, or are retraining opportunities becoming restricted?

When combing deprivation factors (Polar 4 – low participation neighbourhoods and highest qualification on entry) there is an even sharper decline in ‘other’ undergraduate entrants. HESA ask:

  • Why do other undergraduate courses now feel less appealing for disadvantaged students when choosing to study part-time?
  • In which subjects are entry numbers collapsing, and what will the knock-on effect be for skills in our economy?

They go on: For example, we know from existing HESA data that entry into Nursing courses continues to decline, so what impact will this have on skills shortages within the NHS, particularly in light of Brexit? We will consider these questions further as the research progresses.

Social Mobility

The Sutton Trust have published Home and Away.  Their research explores how staying at home and studying locally is strongly differentiated by ethnicity and social background.

They found that:

  • Contrary to traditional assumptions, only 1 in 10 students move long-distance to attend university.
  • Disadvantaged students are over three times more likely to live at home whilst they study.
  • State school students are over twice as likely to commute from home to university.
  • British Pakistani and British Bangladeshi students are six times more likely to stay at home whilst they study.

They recommend greater financial assistance to help disadvantaged young people meet the increased cost of moving out and to meet the needs of ‘commuter students‘ – especially given their socio-economic make-up.

  • “The traditional view of what it means to go away to university, moving out and far away, is very much the preserve of white, middle class and privately educated young people from the South of England” – Dr Michael Donnelly, co-author of Home and Away

Home and Away received national coverage from the BBC, The i, The Herald, TES, Press Association, Metro and Buzzfeed among others.

Unpaid Internships

In January The Sutton Trust published Internships- Unpaid, unadvertised, unfair. This week they announced the government has committed to tackling unpaid internships ‘by improving interpretation of the law and enforcement action taken by HMRC in this area’. See pages 17, 37, 46-48, 73 of the Taylor Review for the most relevant detail on unpaid internships and the Government’s acceptance of the recommendations. Here are some key excerpts:

  • The government accepts the recommendation of the review. Exploitative unpaid internships should not exist and we will work to eradicate these. We will take action to improve the interpretation of the law and the enforcement action taken by HMRC in this area to help stamp out illegal unpaid internships.
  • The law is clear that interns who are classed as workers must be paid at least the NMW/NLW. An employer cannot avoid paying someone the minimum wage simply by calling them an ‘intern’ or saying that they are doing an internship. Determining whether an individual is ‘working’ is based on the presence of multiple factors; there is not a single determining feature of a worker.
  • We will take further steps to engage with sectors where unpaid internships are prevalent and with bodies that represent interns, such as university careers services, to uncover good practice examples that should be highlighted and proliferated.
  • The concentration of this problem within particular sectors provides the opportunity for targeted action. This government continues to invest heavily in minimum wage enforcement, increasing the budget to £25.3m for 2017/18, up from £13m in 2015/16. HMRC already pro-actively contacts employers who have advertised for unpaid internships to ensure they are aware and compliant with the law. Over 500 employers have been contacted in the last three months. Furthermore, in the coming year, we will formally ask HMRC to prioritise NMW enforcement efforts to focus activity on employers who use unpaid interns, through intelligence-led enforcement.

Policy Impact

Colleagues wanting to engage and have an impact on Government policy may be interested in a new MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) to learn about select committees. UK Parliament Explored the Work and Role of Select Committees launches next week on 5 March. It will cover:

  • An overview of the work and role of select committees’ work in the House of Commons and the House of Lords.
  • The focus of select committee inquiries in each House.
  • Cross-party membership of select committees, including the process for selecting chairs and members.
  • How select committees have evolved and changed over time.
  • How select committee inquiries work, the different steps in the process.
  • A greater understanding of the potential impact of select committee reports and recommendations.
  • How members of the public can engage with select committees.

Future Learn also run an Introduction to the UK Parliament: People, Processes and Public Participation. The course covers:

  • the difference between Parliament and Government including differing roles and responsibilities
  • the three parts of Parliament and the role Parliament plays in scrutinising the work of the Government
  • an introduction to the work of the House of Commons and the House of Lords
  • how Parliamentary Questions are used by MPs and members of the House of Lords to hold the Government to account
  • the difference between oral and written questions, and how questions can be used to seek immediate answers on urgent or important matters
  • what happens during Prime Minister’s Questions and public perceptions of PMQs
  • debates in Parliament, including some of the rules and conventions
  • the role and work of select committees
  • the different types of Bill, and the process of how a Bill becomes a law
  • the effect that changes in the law can have on individuals and on society, with reference to specific case studies
  • the different ways the public can input in the work of the UK Parliament.

Follow this weblink to register interest in the Intro to Parliament course.

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.

OfS Board Recruitment Scrutiny

Despite Toby Young’s resignation from the OfS Board the controversy surrounding his appointment began afresh on Tuesday (and may have made Wednesday’s launch a bit uncomfortable).  The Commissioner for Public Appointments Report on the OfS Board recruitment campaign was published – both Times Higher and Civil Service World cover the report including:

  • the criticism levelled at Jo Johnson for his direct encouragement for Toby to apply for the role,
  • that Justine Greening’s concerns at Toby’s proposed appointment were quashed by DfE officials,
  • that while checking historical social media activity it not considered ‘proportionate’ for Board appointments, and therefore wasn’t undertaken for Toby, such checks were conducted for the student representative
  • and there was a further unpublished requirement that the student representative shouldn’t be linked to Union activity.

Angela Rayner (Labour) asked an urgent question in the House on Tuesday: To ask the Secretary of State for Education to make a statement on the appointment of the board of the Office for Students. Sam Gyimah responded to the question on behalf of the Government

Sam Gyimah (excerpt): The commissioner raises important points with regard to due diligence in public appointments. We have already accepted that in the case of Toby Young the due diligence fell short of what was required, and therefore the Department has already reviewed its due diligence processes and will seriously consider the further advice from the commissioner.

The longer debate covered other issues including why there aren’t any FE representatives on the OfS Board (because it’s a regulatory body for the HE sector and there are already two reps with FE expertise serving double duty).  It also questioned the role of the NUS and OfS in countering radicalism on campus. On the OfS Sam Gyimah stated: It is important that the Office for Students has the relevant skills, and also the laser-like focus and the teeth to do something about this. I am glad that we will have a regulatory body with the teeth to do that very effectively.

Sam Gyimah came under significant fire from the Opposition and other parties during the ensuing discussion which he handled unflustered, rather reminiscent of his predecessor Jo Johnson.

Other news

Schools news: the Department for Education announced plans to introduce an income threshold of £7,400 for Free School Meal eligibility under Universal Credit, and a threshold of £15,400 for free early education entitlement eligibility.

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JANE FORSTER                                            |                       SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor                                                                     Policy & Public Affairs Officer

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

Interdisciplinary Research Week 2018

BU research, Events, Fusion, Impact, innovation, policy, Training

The third Interdisciplinary Research Week (IRW) is being held from 19th to 23rd March 2018. Join us to celebrate the breadth and excellence of Bournemouth University’s interdisciplinary research, and stimulate new collaborations and ideas amongst the University’s diverse research community.

The week-long event includes a programme of lectures, workshops, and discussions, aimed at promoting interdisciplinary workings; to provide an understanding of how to get involved in Interdisciplinary Research.

Programme

Inspirational Speaker – Professor Celia Lury

British Academy Visit – Interdisciplinary Research

Collaborating with Others: Becoming a Better Team worker

Networking: Making the Most of an Upcoming Event

New research realities and interdisciplinarity

Interdisciplinary research with industry

Speed Collaborations event

Lighting Talks: What can and should be achieved in Interdisciplinary Research

 

 

Interdisciplinary Research Week 2018

Events, Impact, international, Training, Uncategorized

The third Interdisciplinary Research Week (IRW) is being held from 19th to 23rd March 2018. Join us to celebrate the breadth and excellence of Bournemouth University’s interdisciplinary research, and stimulate new collaborations and ideas amongst the University’s diverse research community.

The week-long event includes a programme of lectures, workshops, and discussions, aimed at promoting interdisciplinary workings; to provide an understanding of how to get involved in Interdisciplinary Research.

Programme

Inspirational Speaker – Professor Celia Lury

British Academy Visit – Interdisciplinary Research

Collaborating with Others: Becoming a Better Team worker

Networking: Making the Most of an Upcoming Event

New research realities and interdisciplinarity

Interdisciplinary research with industry

Speed Collaborations event

Lighting Talks: What can and should be achieved in Interdisciplinary Research

 

 

Archive warriors: How radio historians research our audio past – new inaugural lecture

BU research, Impact, Knowledge Exchange, Research communication

Listening to the past can be a confusing experience. The voices of previous generations, sometimes captured on low quality recording machines, speak of different ages; pre-war, post-war, cold war, the sixties and beyond. The digital revolution has made that listening increasingly possible and we can now hear stories told by Virginia Woolf, J. B. Priestley, Samuel Beckett and others which require us to makes sense of historic radio and its treasures.

In this lecture, Professor Hugh Chignell will draw on twenty years of listening to the past, including radio talks, news and features but especially radio dramas. The lecture will be presented as a journey into the radio archive and into a different culture where telling stories in sound was a far more experimental and adventurous activity. The lecture will be a combination of words from your guide and extracts from archived radio which inevitably will be both challenging and beguiling.

Hugh Chignell is Professor of Media History and Director of the Centre for Media History at Bournemouth University. His research has focused on historic radio including both factual content and radio drama. He has published books and articles on the history of radio news and current affairs as well as on British radio drama and is currently writing a history of post-war British radio drama which will be published in early 2019. Professor Chignell chairs the UK Radio Archives Advisory Committee and sits on other advisory boards at the British Library concerned with our audio heritage.

You can book your free ticket here.

BORDaR – a new dedicated research data repository.

BU research, data management, Impact, open access, policy

Thursday 8 February saw the launch of BORDaR (Bournemouth Online Research Data Repository), Bournemouth University’s new research data repository, which provides a secure and open access home for data emanating from BU’s world leading research projects.

Our support for Research Data Management (RDM) begins here and is complemented by a RDM Library Guide which has been developed specifically for BU staff.  Use this guide to help you deposit your data Open Access as mandated by your research funder and to increase your research impact for REF 2021 – you can find guidance on developing a Data Management Plan, managing, documenting, depositing, sharing and securing your data.  You can also email bordar@bournemouth.ac.uk with your query.

Back in November a repository naming competition was held and from the Faculty of Science & Technology, Paul Cheetham’s suggestion of BORDaR was chosen as the winner by BU’s RDM Steering Group.  As his prize Paul received a much cherished copy of Armin Schmidt’s Earth resistance for archaeologists, from Pro-Vice-Chancellor Professor (Research and Innovation), John Fletcher.

HE policy update w/e 26th January 2018

Fusion, Fusion themes, Impact, international, policy

It’s been a busy week. We have oodles of news for you, feel free to scan through and find the sections that are most interesting to you!

Ministerial update

The new Universities Minister, Sam Gyimah, has been more active this week.

The HE Review: The much heralded and still elusive HE Review was a popular topic again this week. Responding to a parliamentary question on the HE finance review Sam hinted: “This review will look at providing an education system for those aged 18 years and over that is accessible to all and provides value for money. It will also look how choice and competition is incentivised across the sector.”

Q – Layla Moran (Lib Dems) asked: with reference to Industrial Strategy…if he will make it his policy to extend the Government’s major review of funding across tertiary education to include the education system for people aged 16 years and over.

A – Sam Gyimah (Con): The government will conduct a major review of funding across tertiary education. In the Industrial Strategy, it was stated that the review will consider a range of specific issues within post-18 education. The government will set out further details on the review shortly.

The Telegraph quote Sam as stating a review of tuition fees will be a “positive move” for the Government. The article also backs up other emerging hints that he may champion small aspects of students’ lives such as not paying for a full year’s rent upfront and challenging high printing costs.

  • “I mean it’s a small cost but it just shows there are lots of things around student funding – fees, living costs – I think it is good for us to look at them”
  • “The point I was trying to illustrate is the case for reviewing – when you talk to students directly here are a lot of issues in play, not just fees”.
  • “This regime has been in place since 2012. There are things that are working well and we shouldn’t forget what is working well. I don’t think we will go back to an era where students do not contribute in any way to their fees.”

The minister’s official title has been finally confirmed as Minister of State for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation (there was a little bit of speculation (by us) that the science and research bit had fallen off in the initial announcement, but it seems to have been an oversight). His responsibilities are:

  • industrial strategy
  • universities and higher education reform
  • student finance (including the Student Loans Company)
  • widening participation and social mobility
  • education exports (including international students, international research)
  • science and research
  • innovation
  • intellectual property
  • agri-tech
  • space
  • technology

During the Education World Forum Sam signed an agreement with Egypt meaning UK universities are permitted to open branch campuses to offer education in Egypt. This is reported as giving the UK HE sector a competitive advantage in Egypt. Note: currently 82% of UK HE providers deliver degrees overseas.  He said: “I welcome the contribution that this partnership will make to both UK and Egyptian economies and the wider benefits it will provide to students and institutions in both counties.”

Egypt’s Minister of Higher Education Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar declared: “We are excited to see how IBCs [International Branch Campuses] will contribute to the fabric of Egypt’s higher education landscape and be catalysts for broader international partnerships between the UK and Egypt in research, innovation and mobility.”

The next big event is the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (April, hosted by UK), perhaps further partnerships may be forged at this forum.

Technology, IT, STEM and the Industrial Strategy

On Thursday the Prime Minister made a speech from Davos in which the industrial strategy and technology featured heavily. Here are the tech focussed excerpts:

“The impact of technology is growing in ways that even a few years ago we could not have imagined.

  • Just last week, a drone saved two boys drowning off the coast of Australia by carrying a floatation device to them.
  • The use of Artificial Intelligence is transforming healthcare. In one test, machine learning reduced the number of unnecessary surgeries for breast cancer by a third.
  • The development of speech recognition and translation is reaching a level where we will be able to go anywhere in the world and communicate using our native language.
  • While British-based companies like Ripjar are pioneering the use of data science and Artificial Intelligence to protect companies from money laundering, fraud, cyber-crime and terrorism.

We need to act decisively to help people benefit from global growth now.

So we are establishing a technical education system that rivals the best in the world, alongside our world-class higher education system. We are developing a National Retraining Scheme to help people learn throughout their career. And we are establishing an Institute of Coding – a consortium of more than 60 universities, businesses and industry experts to support training and retraining in digital skills.

And I know from my conversations with tech companies how seriously they are taking their own social responsibility to contribute to the retraining that will help people secure new opportunities in the digital economy. But this strategy and partnership with business goes further than getting the fundamentals of our economy right. It also seeks to get us on the front foot in seizing the opportunities of technology for tomorrow.

We are delivering the UK’s biggest ever increase in public investment in research and development, which could increase public and private R&D investment by as much as £80 billion over the next 10 years.

  • We are at the forefront of the development, manufacture and use of low carbon technologies.
  • We are using technology to support the needs of an ageing society, for example by employing powerful datasets to help diagnose and treat illnesses earlier.
  • And we are establishing the UK as a world leader in Artificial Intelligence, building on the success of British companies like Deepmind.

But as we seize these opportunities of technology, so we also have to shape this change to ensure it works for everyone – be that in people’s jobs or their daily lives…we need to make sure that our employment law keeps pace with the way that technology is shaping modern working practices …to preserve vital rights and protections – and the flexibilities that businesses and workers value…we have to do more to help our people in the changing global economy, to rebuild their trust in technology as a driver of progress and ensure no-one is left behind as we take the next leap forwards”.

Catalyst Fund winners: HEFCE’s catalyst funding round aims to support the Industrial Strategy through developing curriculum programmes directly aligned within skills gap areas. Here are the Universities who obtained funding along with the area they will develop. From HEFCE’s press announcement:

…this funding is supporting a range of projects in many different sectors which align with the Industrial Strategy’s ‘Grand Challenges’ – from advanced engineering to data analytics, and from artificial intelligence to bioscience. HEFCE’s investment will help to enhance graduate outcomes and employability, and to upskill the workforce – providing the key skills that industry and employers will need and contributing to the UK’s productivity in the longer term.

And some questions in Parliament:

Q – Justin Tomlinson (Con): how many students have graduated with a degree in ICT & Computer Science in each year since 2010?

A – Sam Gyimah (Con): HESA 2016/17 data:

Academic year  Number of qualifiers

            2010/11           14,505

            2011/12           15,225

            2012/13           15,565

            2013/14           16,080

            2014/15           15,595

            2015/16           15,280

            2016/17           16,805

In relation to increasing the number of students studying for a degree in ICT and computer science, the government is undertaking a range of initiatives to promote digital and computing skills throughout the education system. For example, the government is investing £84 million of new funding over the next five years to deliver a comprehensive programme to improve the teaching of the computing curriculum and increase participation in computer science GCSE.

The government is also seeking to strengthen the role that higher education providers can play in providing digital and computing skills. This will be through supporting the establishment of a new Institute of Coding to serve as a national focus for improving digital skills provision at levels 6 and 7 with a £20 million fund to improve higher-level digital skills, with joint collaborations between universities and businesses, and to focus on computer science and digital skills in related disciplines. This will ensure the courses better meet employers’ needs.

Additionally, there is funding to support universities to develop conversion courses in engineering and computer science that allow graduates from other subjects to undertake further study and pursue careers in engineering and computer science.

Following last week’s National Audit Office report on STEM another parliamentary question to the Minister requested data on the numbers graduating with a STEM degree. Here’s the data which shows growth between 15/16 and 16/17:

Academic year Number of qualifiers

2013/14           174,950

2014/15           170,480

2015/16           172,480

2016/17           181,215

Source: HESA Student Record

Tech skills gap: The House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee continued to investigate Higher, Further and Technical Education this week. Witnesses discussed the skills shortage in the tech sector, they stated that employers struggled to hire employees with the skills and expressed concern as deficiencies in education and training. Concern was expressed at the lack of diversity in those studying STEM subjects. A KPMG representative stated universities needed to encourage a wider curriculum within STEM subjects to encourage greater gender diversity. The (in)adequacy of apprenticeships and the damaging inflexibility of the apprenticeship levy was also discussed. It was felt using the levy to support smaller packages of training would better support the tech skills shortages. As would the opportunity for graduates to return to university to brush up on specific skills necessary for the business environment.

  • The skills gap was attributed to high sectoral growth as well as digitisation in the wider economy. Computer scientists and mathematicians were cited as particular skills gap areas. Alongside challenges filling the higher end of the digital skills section – software development, machine learning and cybersecurity,
  • The lack of mid-grade technicians and apprenticeships was touched upon but the witnesses felt volume of gradates was still a problem even though more were coming through. In particular, the witnesses felt that graduates were lacking ‘soft’ leadership and team-building skills, as well as lacking skills in the artistic and design-orientated side which fed into software development.
  • Universities were criticised for not doing a good enough job in making sure their graduates came out of university with appropriate skills for working in new digital roles. It was stated that Universities should provide every student with some degree of coding experience.
  • One witness stated that traditional university subjects did provide the skills necessary for working in innovative tech startups.
  • Post-graduation support: A witness expressed that graduates should have the opportunity to go back to universities to brush up on skills

Harassment and Hate Crime

Last week there was a partnership announcement detailing funding for a new programme to support universities in tackling antisemitism on campus consisting of a visit to the former Nazi concentration camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau and a seminar dealing explicitly with campus issues and how to identify and tackle anti-Semitism. This week a new question was tabled:

Q – Ian Paisley (DUP): To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to tackle anti-Semitism on university campuses.

A – Mr Sam Gyimah (Con): This government takes anti-Semitism extremely seriously. There is no place in our society – including within higher education – for hatred or any form of harassment, discrimination or racism, including anti-Semitism.

Higher education providers are autonomous organisations, independent from government. They have a clear responsibility to provide a safe and inclusive environment. In September 2015, the government asked Universities UK (UUK) to set up a Harassment Taskforce to consider what more can be done to address harassment and hate crime on campus, including antisemitism. The taskforce’s report, ‘Changing the Culture’, published in October 2016, recommended a zero-tolerance approach to harassment and hate crime.

On 27 July 2017, UUK published a directory of case studies detailing the innovative projects universities have developed to address the taskforce’s recommendations. These include Goldsmith’s hate crime reporting centre (case study 11) which is a joint initiative with the local authority in Lewisham and the Metropolitan Police, which provides students and staff with a safe space to report incidents. These are published on UUK’s website . In addition, the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) has provided £1.8 million for projects to improve responses to hate crime and online harassment on campus. HEFCE is currently working with UUK to test the sector’s response to the Taskforce’s recommendations and the results of this will be published early this year.

Employability

Damian Hinds is advocating public speaking and sport to teach children the resilience needed by the workplace. The Telegraph quote Damian as stating the “hard reality” is that teaching children how to build “character resilience” and workplace skills is crucial for a thriving economy. He also spoke at length on digital technologies noting the current generation of children are “digital natives” that should be taught how to create apps rather than how to use them. He noted that some current teaching staff experience trepidation and are failing to embrace technology. That significant funding (£84 million) is being pump primed to improve computer science teaching, the number of IT teachers will treble (GCSE level) and a National Centre for Computing will be established. The Telegraph also state Damian urged schools to focus on the core subjects such as maths, English, sciences and languages – rather than waste time on alternative qualifications. Too much focus on alternative qualifications was ‘well-meaning but did little to recommend pupils to employers’.

Last week Damian announced a package of measures focused on disadvantaged geographic areas to support underperforming schools. £45 million will go to multi academy trusts (MATs) with a proven track record of success to help them build their capacity, drive improvement and raise standards in areas facing the greatest challenges in England.

BU2025

Work is proceeding on the new BU2025 strategic plan, with announcements this week of an updated draft and a set of responses to feedback. BU staff can read them here.

We will be expanding our horizon scanning work to looking at the Fusion themes and other areas from a policy point of view, with a new regular section in this update covering updates relating to the Industrial Strategy, the work of APPGs (All Party Parliamentary Groups), ministerial announcements and so on.

Widening Participation

Bumper happenings within WP this week – new Access and Participation plans progress through parliament, young carers publication, pupil premium funding, UCAS WP data revelations, parliamentary questions and the failure to make progress with social mobility is examined.

New Access Plans – content Currently parliament is progressing the Higher Education (Access and Participation Plans) (England) Regulations 2018 to replace OFFA’s Fair Access Agreements with Access and Participation Plans (the motion was approved in Parliament). These are anticipated to be very similar but heavier in their content on supporting students during their degree (on course achievement, skills and personal support measures) as well as improving their employability prospects. Also mentioned are:

  • Closing the gap on the differing achievement outcomes between student groups (e.g. ethnicity gaps)
  • Monitoring and evaluation compulsory, with expectation providers move to invest in the most effective interventions (as evidenced by the monitoring and evaluation)
  • The views of the student body should be taken into account as the provider develops the plan (this has greater importance and emphasis placed on it than past recommendations to include students)
  • OfS powers to enforce and refuse provider’s plans

Section 9.1. talks of the government policy directives to OfS, stating “it is the intention that guidance will be issued to the OfS in due course…in relations to its access and participation activities.”

The annual guidance on plans to the sector will come from OfS early in 2018 for the 2019/20 plans. The process for developing and agreeing the new plans should be the same as the existing Fair Access Agreements with no additional burden.

Access and Participation Plans – Parliamentary Discussion During the parliamentary discussion that agreed the motion to approve the new plans it was stated the Government intends to use HERA (the Higher Education and Research Act) to make further progress on access and participation. Other key points were:

  • Institutional autonomy was acknowledged.
  • New and alternative providers will be able to charge the full higher fee from the outset if their Access and Participation plans meet scrutiny.
  • The expectation that providers will spend a proportion of their higher fee income on Access and Participation continues.
  • Where there are serious concerns that a provider has not complied with commitments in its access and participation plan, or other conditions of registration, the OfS will have access to a wide and more flexible set of sanctions and intervention measures to tackle these issues with the individual provider than were available to the Director of Fair Access previously. This could include further monitoring, monetary penalties, suspension from the OfS register or deregistering providers in extreme cases.

Baroness Wolf (Cross bench) raised concerns about regulation: “I have to say that the very short history of the OfS inclines me to feel that we are faced not with a Government who want to leave a regulator to regulate, but one who wish to tell the regulator precisely how to manage”.

  • Government response: HERA sets clear limitations in this context in order to protect academic freedoms and institutional autonomy. For the first time, it also makes explicit that guidance cannot relate to parts of courses, their content, how they are taught or who teaches them, or admissions arrangements for students. The OFS will absolutely be left to do its job as the regulator.

The Baroness also expressed trepidation about supporting/tracking individual students and risks to marking anonymity

Lord Addington (Lib Dems) was concerned there was no universal guidance, baseline or good practice for support for disabled students, that supporting each student’s individual needs lead to disparities and that universities should be held to a national universal standard as a minimum.

  • Government response: We want institutions to think imaginatively about the support that individual students might need, and we will support them in that. That is because each institution is different: they have different needs and courses, and are based in different parts of the country… it is absolutely essential that they be allowed to decide for themselves how disabled students are looked after. However, the Government spokesperson did undertake to write and set out more on disability adaptation.

Baroness Blackstone (Labour) questioned how the plans and the OfS would address the mature part time decline problem.

  • Government response: We are working towards launching a new maintenance loan for part-time students studying degree-level courses from August this year. In addition, the Government are looking at ways of promoting and supporting a wide variety of flexible and part-time ways of learning [accelerated courses]

The lack of student and sector diversity on the OfS Board was also criticised by other members. The lack of a FE represented was noted by the Government and taken back to DfE for consideration.

Finally, on the WP Tsar:

  • we expect that bringing resources and expertise from HEFCE and OFFA together in a single organisation, while still having a dedicated champion for widening participation appointed by Ministers, will provide a greater focus on access and participation.
  • HERA ensures that the Director for Fair Access and Participation will be responsible for overseeing the performance of the OfS’s access and participation functions, for reporting to other members of the OfS on the performance of its functions.

Library Briefing preceding the Access and Participation Plans

Alongside the Access and Participation Plans legislation the Commons Library has produced a succinct briefing paper on Widening Participation strategy in HE in England. It provides an excellent summary of WP to date and further hints of how the tide has turned in the type of interventions universities are expected to pursue:

  • It notes the increase in disadvantaged young people attending university along with sharp rises in the number of young black students and disabled students. Set against decline in attendance from mature and young white low income males.
  • Section 2 gives an excellent history of the changing policies behind the WP agenda dedicating several inches to the proposals for universities to set up or sponsor schools to improve attainment. The document notes the Conservative manifesto commitment:
  • It notes no further commitments or announcements have been made on this since the election.
  • It is well known that Theresa May is a firm fan of sponsoring schools to raise achievement, however, it remains to be seen whether her Cabinet reshuffle may herald a refreshed push in this direction.
  • An ‘innovative Evidence and Impact Exchange for Widening Participation’ will apparently be linked to the OfS.
  • The transparency duty is mentioned again later on: We will use the transparency duty in the Higher Education and Research Act to shine a stronger light on the universities who need to go further in improving equality of opportunity for students from under-represented and disadvantaged groups.
  • The document notes the alternative providers perform well on WP measures (proportion of WP students within the whole student body).

Finally the report mentions two guides:

Young Carers

The Local Government Association have published Meeting the health and wellbeing needs of young carers which provides basic factual information and shares a number of good practice case studies. The document is a good background read of interest to those with an interest in outreach, social care, or of wider interest to those supporting students who are adult carers.  Leaf through the full document to access the case studies.

A parliamentary question to the Universities Minister on BAME access to the arts:

Q – Alex Sobel (Labour): what steps his Department is taking to assist people from BAME backgrounds to be better represented in university arts courses and stage schools.

A: Mr Sam Gyimah (Con):

  • The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has commissioned research to understand the existing barriers that prevent people from lower income households and under-represented groups, such as those from Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds, specifically from becoming professionals in the performing arts. It is important that the performing arts are representative of society as a whole.
  • One of the ways this can be achieved is by doing more to ensure more people from BAME backgrounds go on to higher education. However, for some groups of students from ethnic minorities there is more to do to improve their participation – their retention, success and progression to higher education.
  • That is why the most recent guidance to the Director of Fair Access in February 2016, asked him to focus on activity to continue to improve access and participation into higher education for students from disadvantaged and under-represented backgrounds.
  • We are also introducing sweeping reforms through legislation. The Higher Education and Research Act includes the creation of the Office for Students, which has a statutory duty to consider the promotion of equality of opportunity for students as it relates to access and participation. It also includes a transparency duty requiring all universities to publish applications, offers, acceptance and retention rates broken down by gender, ethnicity and social economic background. This will help to hold universities to account for their records on access and retention.

Pupil Premium Funding: The Education Endowment Foundation have published The Attainment Gap 2017 considering the value of pupil premium funded trial initiatives aiming to close the achievement gap. Read the Key lessons learned (page 16). They found small group and 1:2:1 interventions were effective but of other trail programmes reviewed 1 in 4 didn’t succeed any better than the current measures schools are taking.

Social Mobility Committee – under questioning: The Education Select Committee’s Accountability Hearings took on the former members of the Social Mobility Commission this week (you’ll recall that previously all the members of the commission dramatically resigned in protest over the Government’s lack of progress in addressing social mobility).

Witnesses:

  • Rt Hon Alan Milburn, former Chair, Social Mobility Commission
  • Rt Hon Baroness Shephard, former Deputy Chair, Social Mobility Commission
  • David Johnston, former Commissioner, Social Mobility Commission

The committee heard that Theresa May’s government lacked clarity around the issues of social mobility and that the Government had neither the ability or the willingness to progress the recommendations of the Social Mobility Commission.

Several questions on FE Colleges took place, with the questions continuing to meander through T-levels, apprenticeship training, and even Learn Direct.

Commencing the second session, the panel were asked whether issues with social mobility had been raised with the government. Alan Milburn, former chair of the Social Mobility Commission asserted the failure of the government to give commitment to the Commission as an independent body, failure to appoint new members leading to a lack of information that the Commission could provide. Baroness Shephard referenced the prime minister’s speech on the steps of Downing Street on the day of taking power where she emphasized social mobility, but went on to criticise her and query the lack of engagement since then. It was stated that since the 2017 election there had been no engagement,

While there had been good initiatives and some good ministers trying to do the right thing, Milburn explained that it didn’t seem that the Government had either the ability or the willingness to put their collective shoulders to the wheel when it came to delivering social mobility and cited the complex Brexit negotiations as the focus of the Whitehall machine. He commented that he felt that the Government lacked the headspace and the bandwidth to really match the rhetoric of healing social division with the reality.

When questioned on whether the Social Mobility Commission was really needed Shepherd responded that if actions and initiatives were left solely to the political process most good initiatives would just fall to the wayside…a more non-political/ cross party body was needed to get things moving.

Milburn concluded by voicing worry that the promises of doing better than previous generations no longer applied with declining youth employment levels and home ownership. He asserted that these issues could not be ignored and stated that there were political, social and economic incentives for parties to put social mobility as the cornerstone of their pledges.

(Excerpts taken from the Committee’s summary by Dods.)

UCAS surprises: Meanwhile amongst the rhetorical doom and gloom of failed social mobility and access challenges an alternative picture emerged from UCAS. With the number of disadvantaged and ethnic minority students entering universities on the rise again. Including a rise in offer rates 71% (2012) to 78.3% (2016/17).

Les Ebdon, Director OFFA, responded:

  • “Today’s figures are a positive sign that further progress has been made in widening access to higher education in England, and that the work of universities and colleges is paying off.
  • “While encouraging, the detail of the figures show that there are still stark gaps between different groups and at individual universities and colleges. The reasons behind these disparities are multiple and complex, and the challenge now for universities and colleges – as well as the new Office for Students – is to bring about a transformational step change in fair access. Incremental change is not enough for those students who are missing out.”

Admissions & Marketing

A HEPI guest blogger describes Lessons for higher education from private – and quasi-private – schools it talks of the increasing influence of parents in their children’s HE institution choice. Comparing private schooling and HE decisions on matter of affordability, pay off (HE as a conveyor belt into higher-paying employment), and the rise in alternative routes to the workforce: In a world where university itself is no longer the unquestioned guarantor of career success, ‘savvy’ parents are motivated to seek more cost-effective and/or efficacious routes.

It states the hands-on parental influencing has implications for:

  • the positioning of marketing material and events;
  • universities’ outreach to sixth-form influencers; and
  • the stress placed upon students by their increasingly expectant parents.

It concludes by commenting: While the sector remains as rich as ever in statistical data, the appetite of higher education institutions to seek real insight into the buying behaviour of their prospective market remains, in comparison to the business sector, surprisingly weak. The guest blog was written by Mungo Dennett, Director or a strategic research company working with schools and universities.

HE regulation

There’s an interesting article in Friday’s FT about a National Audit Office blog Is the market for HE working?. The blog pulls out key aspects from the increasing marketisation within HE. It provides a good, simple introduction to this multi-faceted debate. It highlights the (market failure) struggles students face when choosing a HE institution:

  • Users find it difficult to discern quality and service differences when exercising choice because the ‘product’ is complex, personalised and/or they are unlikely to purchase the service more than once in their lifetime.
  • Users struggle to make well-informed choices due to too much or too little information.
  • Users’ knowledge of the service is only discernible during, or after, ‘consumption’.
  • Users are, or feel, ‘locked in’ once the service is bought and switching provider is not considered realistic or desirable.
  • Users play an important role in co-producing the value that they derive from the service.
  • Disadvantaged groups struggle to access the services, and or have worse outcomes than other user groups.
  • It’s difficult for providers to enter the market or poorly-performing providers to exit it.

It notes there are too few incentives for providers to push take up of the government’s priority courses (e.g. expensive science); that providers have other routes to attract learners when teaching quality isn’t impressive; and that the DfE’s plans for new providers to enter the market (and more providers to exit) are untested and risky because its unclear how well students will be protected during provider exit (nor whether an influx of new providers creating competition will help drive HE quality improvement).

It raises two major concerns associated with the government’s current objectives:

  • Increased competition creating a two-tier system will see WP students suffer worse, and graduate employment gaps widen.
  • Increased competition will not result in providers charging different tuition fee levels

During the parliamentary consideration of the new Access and Participation Plans this week Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour) tackled marketisation stating: The key to our concern is whether Ministers, instead of promoting scholarship and encouraging research or a concern for truth, have as their goal turning the UK’s higher education system into an even more market-driven one at the expense of both quality and the public interest. It is worth reminding the House that this is not a broken system which needs shoring up and intervention. It is the second-most successful higher education system in the world, with four universities ranked in the top 10. When and how will the Government give us an assurance that they are stepping back from their market-driven obsession and that they intend for the OfS to be a sensible, balanced regulator?

Freedom of Speech

The Select Committee on Human Rights continued its investigation into Freedom of Speech in Universities. Sir Michael Barbet (Chair, Office for Students) was one of the witnesses called this week. The session considered the approach to the issue adopted by the newly formed Office for Students, and the impact of Charity Commission regulations on student events with external speakers. It looked in detail at how the Charity Commission worked with students’ unions, where the responsibility for dealing with events that breached human rights and the law lay, and the clarity of Charity Commission guidance. When asked if Sir Michael had considered how the Office for Students might work with the Charity Commission he confirmed that the two organisations would be preparing a Memorandum of Understanding around their future working

The session also explored the role of the Office for Students in promoting freedom of speech in universities in England. Sir Michael explained that he wanted to see maximum freedom of speech throughout universities, not just in the students’ unions. He acknowledged the universities’ need to have policies in place because they have a responsibility for what happens on their campuses. He acknowledged that some codes of practice were over-complicated, but that good practice did exist. He did not want the Office for Students to issue a single code of practice, saying that would be up to universities and students’ unions.

Questioning how the Office for Students would monitor compliance with the duty to promote freedom of speech among universities followed. Sir Michael reiterated his commitment to maximum freedom of speech and said he would only review university codes of practice on a risk basis. Any intervention would be to promote free speech, he told the committee. Sir Michael clarified that the Office for Students would have no jurisdiction over the students’ union.

When questioned whether the Office for Students was the right body to receive Prevent returns, questioning whether it would have the right expertise. Sir Michael emphasised the need to protect the institutional autonomy of universities and the need to balance that with security. He believed the Office for Students was the right body to this, as the agency that would know about universities, rather a policing agency. He continued to receive challenge on this point.

(Summary courtesy of Dods, Political Monitoring Consultants.)

Contact Sarah if you would like further information on the content of the session.

Other news

International Students: This week the Financial Times ran another story on the economic benefits of international students. The article rehashes HEPI’s study and last week’s mayoral letter, however, the main thrust calls on parliament to unite and overrule what it sees as Theresa May’s lone standpoint of negativity towards international students through their inclusion in the net migration targets. On international students the FT states: the evidence is overwhelming – they bring widespread economic benefit to the UK.

HM Opposition: The Fabian Society issued a report on Labour’s National Education Service plans.

The report  features an introduction from shadow education secretary, Angela Rayner MP and contributions from experts in further and higher education, including shadow minister Gordon Marsden MP, former education and employment secretary Lord Blunkett and leading figures from the NUS, UCU, Open University the Learning and Work Institute.

Between them the report contributors argue for a National Education Service that is:

  • Accountable  – democratically account­able and open at every level
  • Devolved  – with local decision-making which delivers coherent, integrated local provision, albeit within a national framework
  • Empowering  – ensuring that learners, employees and institutions are all ena­bled and respected
  • Genuinely lifelong  – with opportu­nities for retraining and chances to re-engage at every stage, and parity for part-time and digital distance learning
  • Coordinated  – flexible pathways for learners between providers and strong partnerships involving providers, employers, unions and technology platforms
  • Outcome-focused  – designed to meet social and economic needs, with far more adults receiving productivity-en­hancing education but also recognising that learning brings wider benefits

The report also suggests that the ultimate price-tag for the new service may be more than Labour pledged in its 2017 manifesto.

Wonkhe blogger and VC of the Open University Peter Horrocks considers Labour’s National Education Service within the context of the relentless industrial automation in Five things that might save us from the robots, a quick focussed read (with only one shameless Open University plug).

The Universities team within parliament regularly run training events for academics to understand how to begin the process of utilising their research to influence government policy. The Government increasingly leans towards evidence-based policy making and understanding who, when and where the best opportunities are to influence the Government is crucial. Here are the event details:  Book a place at Research, Impact and the UK Parliament at Plymouth Marjon University on Wednesday 21 March 2018 at 1.30pm.

At the 3 hour training event, you will learn:

  • How to contact MPs and Members of the House of Lords from Parliament’s Outreach & Engagement Service
  • How to work with Select Committees from a clerk of a House of Commons Select Committee
  • How Parliament has been cited in REF 2014 impact case studies from the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology

“This event was excellent – well organised, highly relevant, focused, all speakers strong, content highly practical” – RIUKP Attendee

Tickets cost £40 and include afternoon tea. Here’s the link to: Book your place at Research, Impact and the UK Parliament now.

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JANE FORSTER                                            |                       SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor                                                                     Policy & Public Affairs Officer

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

Research Impact – parliament and policy

Events, Impact, policy, Research news

The parliamentary outreach service are running an event aimed at academic researchers who would like to engage with parliament for their research to inform policy making.

Here are the details:

Want to have an impact in the UK Parliament?  Discover how your research could broaden debate and better inform our democracy

Book a place at Research, Impact and the UK Parliament at Plymouth Marjon University on Wednesday 21 March 2018 at 1.30pm.

At our 3 hour training event, you will learn:

  • How to contact MPs and Members of the House of Lords from Parliament’s Outreach & Engagement Service
  • How to work with Select Committees from a clerk of a House of Commons Select Committee
  • How Parliament has been cited in REF 2014 impact case studies from the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology

“This event was excellent – well organised, highly relevant, focused, all speakers strong, content highly practical” – RIUKP Attendee

Tickets cost £40 and include afternoon tea. If this fee is a barrier to your attendance, please contact us; we may make exceptions in some circumstances.

 

Book your place at Research, Impact and the UK Parliament now.

RKEDF Event – Commissioned research for impact

BU Challenges, BU research, Events, Impact, RKE development framework

This workshop will cover the merits of working with business. Attendees will learn the small details that need to be considered in order to turn working with business into research that can lead to major impacts.

The intended learning outcomes of this session are:

  • Attendees will learn why working with industry can have a major impacts
Title Date Time Location
Commissioned research for impact Monday 22nd  January 2018 14.00 – 16.00  TBC

To book a place on this event please click here. If you wish to find out more about this event, do get in touch with Ehren Milner (emilner@bournemouth.ac.uk).

HE Policy update for the w/e 15th December 2017

EU, Impact, international, policy

Despite Sarah and Jane donning their sparkly Christmas jumpers there has been no let up this week – here is your fully stuffed pre-Christmas policy update (and not a turkey in sight)!
We’ll be back in the New Year unless anything really exciting happens next week.

Accelerated Degrees

The long awaited consultation on accelerated degrees has finally been launched.  The proposals are for students to study over the summer to complete their degree within two years. These degrees would be subject to the same rigour and quality assurance standards. Institutions will be able to charge higher fees per year (to a maximum which will be 20% less than the total for 3 normal years) to cover the additional costs of teaching through the summer, research time squeeze, and rental income lost on summer lets of student rooms. However, the overall cost to the student will be less, with lower living costs as well, and interest will accrue over a shorter time before the student starts work. The OfS will be responsible for determining whether a degree course can be defined as ‘accelerated’.

The Minister’s statement said that “The current means-tested living cost support package (the “long course loan”) available to students whose courses last for longer than 30 weeks and three days each academic year will continue to provide maintenance for students on accelerated degrees on the same terms.” It is not clear whether this will be enough to cover the additional costs for students on these courses.”

Jo Johnson says that these courses will appeal to: “highly motivated students hungry for a faster pace of learning and a quicker route into or back into work”.

He continues: “The growing dominance of the classic three-year residential degree reflects more the convenience of the sector and financial incentives on providers than the needs of students for flexible ways of pursuing higher education. I believe there is significant untapped potential for accelerated courses, starting first with degrees, in higher education. They offer benefits to students of lower costs, more intensive study, and a quicker commencement or return to the workplace. Innovative providers would like to offer more of these courses but face significant financial and operational disincentives in the current system.”

And later:  “Our aspiration is for the number of students enrolled on accelerated degree courses to build over the next decade to around 5% of the total undergraduate population[currently its 0.2%], and for an additional 100,000 students to have studied on this basis over that period.”

Accelerated degrees are expected to commence in September 2019, subject to parliamentary approval of the new fee arrangements.  The consultation press release sets out the benefits for the public purse:

“For the taxpayer, it means significantly lower tuition loan outlay, higher rates of repayment and therefore a lower cost to the public purse of higher education. A higher proportion of students on accelerated degrees will also repay their loans in full”.

Jo Johnson and Les Ebdon expect the accelerated degrees to appeal to mature students. It’s clear that individuals currently in work, looking to take a sabbatical to upskill, then return to the sector are perfect candidates for accelerated provision. This scenario is certainly a perfect fit with the Industrial Strategy’s aspirations.  It also provides students with more options –depending on how may institutions offer them and the range of subjects covered. However, there could be some bumps in the road. Presumably the admissions process will select those most capable of intense study and who do not need to work part-time to fund their living costs– which leads to questions around widening participation. How will contextual admissions apply to accelerated provision? Will mature students with family commitments be considered to have the capacity to cope with an intensive degree? And what happens to those who find the pace too much or run into financial difficulty and switch back to the traditional 3 year model – would they end up paying more in fees in total? There may be concerns about student experience in the summer when services are often reduced and building maintenance is carried out.

Sector responses:

Angela Rayner MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Education: “It seems that every higher education policy from this government comes with another plan to raise tuition fees, with students on part time degrees now facing charges of over £11,000 a year. With universities facing uncertainty over Brexit, ministers must address concerns like the impact on staff workload before imposing more major changes. So far they have offered no concrete evidence that squeezing three years of learning into two will stem the huge drop in part-time students, or lead to better outcomes.”

Professor Les Ebdon, Director of Fair Access to Higher Education: “Accelerated degrees are an attractive option for mature students who have missed out on the chance to go to university as a young person. Having often battled disadvantage, these students can thrive in higher education and I hope that now many more will be able to take up the life-changing opportunity to get a degree.”

Karl McCormack, who teaches accelerated degrees in Accounting & Finance at Staffordshire University, commented on the increased focus of students on accelerated courses. “I find that the accelerated degree offers so much more to students, including the extra focus, the drive and the immersive experience of constantly learning over the two years. Accelerated degrees appeal to a broad spectrum of students, including mature students who want to retrain and enter the workplace more quickly, and those who do not take a traditional A-level route into higher education.”

Nick Hillman, Director of HEPI: “Making two-year degrees more attractive makes sense as the current rules aren’t great and more diversity is generally good in higher education – so long as quality is maintained. So the overall idea of altering the financial rules for two-year degrees is sound or even overdue. Lower fees for two-year degrees might increase demand, probably from older students as many school leavers are remarkably price insensitive and like the idea of staying at university for three (or more) years. It also might increase the supply of two-year degrees, although getting £11,100 to educate students for 40 weeks a year (£280 a week) rather than £9,250 for 30 weeks a year (£310 a week) is unlikely to make a major difference. ‘But it remains an open question whether there is sufficient support in Parliament for a higher tuition fee cap for a minority of courses. Overall, today’s announcement may not be a game changer.”

Read more on the consultation on accelerated degrees: widening student choice in HE.  Please contact Sarah if you would like to contribute to BU’s institutional response to the consultation.

Brexit

This week the Government and EU agreed continued contributions to the annual budgets for the years 2019 and 2020 (the remaining 2 years of the EU budget after the exit) as if the UK were remaining in the EU. This enables continued participation in Horizon 2020 and Erasmus+ until the end of the programmes. On Thursday evening the BBC reported this story.

The phase one negotiations concluded with assurances for citizen’s rights – hopefully reassuring for the 46,000 EU nationals within the UK university sector who can remain to work and gain settled status. Some questions remain, but it was clarified that EU citizens can live outside the UK for up to 5 consecutive years without losing their settled status.

In response UUK have stressed that phase two of the negotiations continue to be ‘hugely important’ for universities. They continue to push for access to the next European research and innovation programme (FP9) and to the Erasmus+ mobility programme. “Developing a post-exit immigration system, with minimal barriers to allow talented European staff and students to work and study in the UK, is a priority.”

Research Professional have a simple article tacking the main points of the Brexit progress: Now the real work begins. Amongst other points they highlight that with a majority of students registering an interest in studying abroad 12 months in advance the need for decision on whether EU citizens will be eligible for home fee status and loans for 2019/20 entry remains urgent.

Parliamentary Questions

Q – Joanna Cherry: What assessment she has made of the effect of the UK leaving the EU on staffing levels in universities.

A- Jo Johnson: EU staff make an important contribution to our universities. The UK and the EU have reached an agreement on citizens’ rights that will allow EU citizens to continue living here broadly as now, which will help to provide certainty to such staff in our institutions.

​Joanna Cherry: Heriot-Watt University and Edinburgh Napier University in my constituency have made staff redundant, citing Brexit and the UK Government’s immigration policies as a proximate cause. Napier University has advised me that potential staff members from other EU countries are turning down job offers. What concrete reassurance can the Minister give these international award-winning universities that Brexit will not further affect their staffing levels?

Jo Johnson: That uncertainty is completely unnecessary. I point the universities to the joint report issued last Friday by the Commission and the UK Government that points to our continued participation in programmes such as Horizon 2020 not just up until March 2019, but until the end of 2020. They should appreciate that important reassurance.

Paul Masterton (Con):  Many of my constituents in East Renfrewshire work in academic research and are concerned about the impact of Brexit on collaboration with European institutions. What reassurance can the Minister give to my constituents that Brexit will not put that collaboration in doubt?

Jo Johnson: They can take reassurance from the statement that was put out on Friday. We will participate in Horizon 2020 and Erasmus+ beyond the point of Brexit—until the end of 2020. That is of fundamental importance to our scientific endeavour.

Policy impact

A Research Professional article: University research ‘failing to influence parliament’ discusses the dominance of other sectors in capturing the parliamentary ear. Non-governmental organisations are most successful in translating their lobbying into policy with ‘other interest groups’ having far greater influence. University research contributed less than 10% of the evidence to elect committees. David Willets pointed out that the public funding of R&D is weighted heavily towards universities – which are having a very small impact on policy.

A Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology report stated “academic research frequently arrived too late to influence their work or never came at all, and was often “poorly presented with overly technical jargon”. David Willetts advises, “academics should try to engage more with what parliament’s policy preoccupations actually are”; he criticised REF and stated, “there is a need for a change in the incentives that drive academics”.

Mark Walport (former chief scientific adviser) commented that for politicians want an overview more than what the latest paper says. “If you’re advising government, what you’re interested in is the totality of the research.”

BU’s Policy team support academics to present their research to Westminster. Contact Sarah if you would like to consider how your work could influence Government policy.

2017 – a year in Admissions

UCAS published the final two elements of the End of Cycle report for 2017 this week. Here is the full set – read the summary, the analysis of patterns of entry to HE, patterns by age, patterns by subject, patterns by geography, patterns by applicant characteristics, offer making, and an analysis of entry by qualification types and academic performance.

Here is Wonkhe’s summary of the last report: Overall, applications across the UK decreased by 3.1% (18,220) to 572,285 since last year, and acceptances are down by 0.5% to 462,945. Both the numbers and proportions of 18-year-olds accessing higher education in the 2017 admissions cycle were the highest they’ve ever been. 282,380 18 year-olds applied to higher education, up 0.5% on last year, and 241,585 were accepted (+1.1%). The overall decline in UK acceptances comes from a drop in older age groups entering HE. The number of 19 year-olds applying fell 5.2% on last year, while numbers for those aged 21-25, and over 25, fell 7% and 9.8% respectively.

And a Wonkhe blog neatly rounds up the key details of all reports in just 1,500 words, concluding: the data draws our attention to some important trends. The stark difference in patterns among different age groups within higher education, the changing demographics of the international student population entering the UK, and the largely unchanged gap in access between the least and most disadvantaged all require attention … and action.

Education and Society debate – House of Lords

This week during the Lords Education and Society debate there was critical comment about the value of the University sector. This comes at the end o f a year in which there has been very serious and sustained criticism of the sector across a range of topics and issues. It will be interesting to see whether everyone just needs a break – or whether this continues in the New Year.

Lord Adonis (Lab, former schools minister) called for “bold action” on apprenticeships, recommending that the Government should require every large public service organisation, including the Civil Service, the NHS and local authorities, to recruit as many apprentices as graduates. He also continued to campaign for tuition fees to be reduced to around £3,000 and a reduction in the student loan interest rate.

Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale (Lab) described the importance of having a good teacher, and argued the role of individual teachers shouldn’t be forgotten by policymakers. He went on to discuss the role of colleges, claiming they were being unaddressed and that they were “fundamental to the life opportunities of a section of the population who, in many ways, need them much more than people who go to university.”

Lord Rees of Ludlow (Crossbench, academic scientist and lecturer) said that the extreme sophistication of modern technology was, ironically, an impediment to engaging young people with reality and learning how things worked. Speaking as a lecturer he stated that the traditional honours degree was too specialised for almost all students.

Lord Storey (Lib Dem) questioned the Minster about the impact to reputation and integrity of essay mills on higher education.

The Archbishop addressed the business community’s calls for graduate to be “work ready”. He challenged this call asking “who here was work ready on their first day of employment?” Furthermore, he pushed back declaring that it was the “duty of employers to invest in their employees to take them from the first day of their employment to the last…and build up their skills.”

Widening Participation (WP)

Justine Greening spoke at the Reform social mobility conference on Thursday on why Britain has not ‘cracked’ social mobility and her ambition for education to turn disadvantage around. It called on all sectors of society to be part of the solution: “everyone’s problem needs everyone’s solution – if we’re going to achieve anything then social mobility, equality of opportunity needs to be a common ambition – with schools, colleges, universities, but also businesses, civil society, local communities all playing their part.”

She described a comprehensive strategy for lifelong learning. A national strategy that (in keeping with current Government trends, like the industrial strategy) is differently tailored to meet localised needs. The strategy: Unlocking Talent, Fulfilling Potential was accompanied by a short summary. References to universities are interwoven but not addressed specifically, and fit with current political themes around productivity through the promotion of technical education. For example:

Creating high-quality post-16 choices for all

“We have more people going to university than ever before, including more disadvantaged young people, but we need to expand access further to the best universities. We need a skills revolution which includes making technical education world class, backed by a half a billion pounds’ investment at the last budget.” (Excerpt taken from the Minister’s speech.)

The messaging of the strategy is consistent with the Careers Strategy launched last week. Read BU’s summary of the Careers Strategy here.

Chinese internship programme

Earlier in the week the Minister also announced an expansion to the UK-China government-funded internship programme. It will offer 300 young people from a disadvantaged or less represented background the opportunity to live and work in China on an internship. “This scheme allows our young people to immerse themselves in different cultures, broaden their horizons and develop the skills they need to thrive in an increasingly global jobs market. Many of them will be people who were the first in their family to go to university and programmes like this help young people to experience first-hand just how far their talents can take them.”  (From speech at the UK- China People-to-People event.)

Parliamentary Questions

Q – Justin Madders (Lab): As chair of the all-party group on social mobility, I am very concerned to read the Social Mobility Commission’s report and the subsequent comments from the outgoing chair. Will the Secretary of State, or one of her ministerial team, agree to meet the all-party group to discuss where we go from here?

A – Justine Greening: I hope the hon. Gentleman will be able to welcome the plan I will set out later this week. I think the time has come for us all to move on from talking about the problem, which we have done a lot for many, many years, to deciding that we have it within us to work together up and down the country to now tackle it. [This is the policy paper described above.]

Q – Gordon Marsden: With reference to paragraph 34 of the Government’s Careers Strategy… what discussions her Department has had with the Director of Fair Access to Education on the continuation of targeted career outreach interventions for disadvantaged pupils.

A – Anne Milton: The government’s careers strategy is clear that we want higher education institutions to continue working with schools and their pupils to encourage them to go on to higher education. We have spoken to the Office for Fair Access about their role in helping to deliver the strategy. Our most recent guidance asked the Director of Fair Access to be firmer with institutions to make sure that investment through access agreements is allocated to the most effective interventions, encouraging more investment in outreach.

Q – Gordon Marsden: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what [the] budget is for the National Collaborative Outreach Programme.

A – Jo Johnson: The Higher Education Council for England launched the ‘National Collaborative Outreach’ programme in January 2017. The programme budget was set at £120 million over two years. It has established 29 consortia to target those areas of the country where progression into higher education is both low overall and lower than expected given typical GCSE attainment rates. One of the consortia, Future U, led by the University of Central Lancashire and involving three other universities and five further education colleges, targets Blackpool and will receive a little under £2.3 million in funding over the two years.

Q – Eddie Hughes: What steps the Government is taking to ensure that more students from disadvantaged backgrounds go to university.

A – Jo Johnson: There are already record numbers of disadvantaged English 18 years olds benefitting from full-time higher education, and universities expect to spend over £860 million in 2018/19 on measures to improve the access and success of disadvantaged students, up from £404 million in 2009, through their access agreements.

The Higher Education and Research Act includes a transparency duty requiring all universities to publish applications, offers, acceptance and retention rates broken down by gender, ethnicity and social economic background. This will help to hold universities to account for their records on access and retention.

Q – Luciana Berger: who is responsible for the provision of counselling and wellbeing services to university students in England.

A – Joseph Johnson: As autonomous and independent organisations, it is for Higher Education Institutions to determine what welfare and counselling services they need to provide to their students. Each institution will be best placed to identify the needs of their particular student body, including taking actions in line with any legal responsibilities under the Equality Act 2010.

In addition, the department is working closely with Universities UK (UUK) on their ongoing programme of work on Mental Health in Higher Education. As part of this, UUK launched their Step Change programme on September 4, which encourages higher education leaders to adopt mental health as a strategic imperative and implement a whole institution approach. UUK has also worked in partnership with the Institute for Public Policy Research to strengthen the evidence-base on mental health in higher education. Their independent report, Not by Degrees: Improving student mental health in the UK’s universities was published on 4 September 2017.

Q – Luciana Berger: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of access to mental health services for university students.

A – Jo Johnson: Mental Health is a priority for this government. This is why the Department for Health, together with the Department for Education, have published a joint green paper on Children and Young People which sets out plans to transform specialist services and support in education settings and for families.

In higher education, there is already much work underway to improve the quality of mental health services for students, alongside services provided by the NHS, including through the NHS programme ‘Improving Access to Psychological Therapies’. The recently published green paper sets out plans for a new national strategic partnership with key stakeholders focused on improving the mental health of 16-25 year olds by encouraging more coordinated action, experimentation and robust evaluation.

Differential fees would undermine social mobility, argues MillionPlus

In advance of the UK Government’s review of higher education funding in England, promised by the Prime Minister Theresa May at the 2017 Conservative Party Conference, MillionPlus, the Association for Modern Universities, on 13 December published a new policy paper focusing on differential fees and student maintenance grants.  The paper outlines why differential fees linked to graduate earnings or courses would undermine social mobility and lead to greater inequality in student funding. Instead, MillionPlus urges Ministers to adopt a ‘common-sense’ approach and restore student maintenance grants to help students now and save taxpayers’ money in the long run.

Pam Tatlow, Chief Executive of MillionPlus, said:

“All students deserve to study at well-funded universities, wherever, whatever and however they choose to study – full or part-time. Linking differential fees to graduate earnings or courses would switch resources to students from wealthier backgrounds and would simply rob Peter to pay Paul. Rather than promoting the social mobility that both Theresa May and Justine Greening, Secretary of State for Education, support, differential fees would create greater inequality in funding. 

“If Ministers want to help students and young people, they should restore student maintenance grants. This would reduce student debt and offer a lifeline to students for whom the cost of living while they are studying, presents huge challenges. In 2015, the government said that maintenance grants were ‘unaffordable’. It was a claim that never really stacked up and it’s time for Ministers to move on. Restoring maintenance grants is ‘common-sense’ economics and would be good for students but also cost-effective for taxpayers who would have to write-off less in unpaid student loans in the future.”

And the British Academy have published a report showcasing “practical, evidence based interventions which could be replicated in other parts of the country to improve relationships between communities of different ethnic backgrounds and to help new arrivals feel welcome”. “If you could do one thing…” Local actions to promote social integration

Parliamentary Questions

Q – Melanie Onn: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether student loans are classed as complete income for the purposes of calculating universal credit eligibility.

A – Damian Hinds: When Universal Credit calculates eligibility, it takes into account the elements of student loans or grants which provide for the student’s basic maintenance. Universal Credit disregards elements paid for specific additional costs the student has, such as tuition or books. Once the total annual loan is calculated, Universal Credit applies a flat rate monthly disregard of £110 whilst the claimant remains a student.

Q – Lord Adonis: In respect of the duty of the Chief Executive of the Higher Education Funding Council for England to safeguard the efficient use of public funds, what assessment they have made of the value for money of salaries paid to vice-chancellors.

A: Viscount Younger Of Leckie: The government is determined to ensure that students and taxpayers can be confident that they get a good deal from higher education (HE). Over recent years, the government has become increasingly concerned about the level of remuneration for senior staff in the HE sector. It has asked the Higher Education Funding Council for England to look at this issue using its regulatory powers, which has resulted in updated guidance to the sector on senior pay and greater transparency in relation to vice-chancellor salaries. Holding universities to account for value for money has been a key objective of the HE reforms, enacted in the Higher Education and Research Act, and it continues to guide the government’s work as the Office for Students (OfS) is launched. The OfS has a statutory duty to promote value for money in the sector. The government will ask the OfS to use its powers to take action to protect value for money for students and taxpayers in the future.

Q – Lord Adonis: Whether Ministers and the Higher Education Funding Council for England plan to investigate the decision-making process at the University of Bath which led to an “exit package” being paid to the Vice-Chancellor… and whether they consider this was consistent with the proper and efficient use of public funds.

A – Viscount Younger Of Leckie: The government expects the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) to look into issues related to value for money with regard to English higher education institutions…We understand that HEFCE is currently considering whether it should investigate the governance processes concerned with the Vice-Chancellor’s retirement.

Q- Gordon Marsden (Lab): Friday’s National Audit Office report on the higher education market is hugely damaging. It says that the market is failing students and that such practice anywhere else would raise questions of mis-selling. Meanwhile, the Student Loans Company is in crisis. This is all under the watch of the Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation. What does he say now to the NAO?

A – Jo Johnson: The National Audit Office rightly pointed out that students want value for money, which has been the guiding objective of our entire suite of HE reform programmes. That is why we have set up the Office for Students, which will ensure that universities are held to account for the teaching quality and value for money that they deliver to our students.

Credit Transfer

Sheffield University, in partnership with HEFCE, have published Should I stay or should I go? drawing on student perception of mobility and credit transfer. It calls for the OfS to consider these issues from the student perspective and press for HE providers to facilitate easier transfers between courses and institutions. Students felt universities only offer limited support at present, which exacerbates their difficulty at such a transition point in their lives. It also notes that students are concerned about the message transferring to another university sends. Contemplating whether it devalues their degree (lecturers also expressed concern about the intellectual integrity of a degree ‘broken’ across institutions) and whether changing course and/or institution makes the student look unreliable. The report recommends an independent and impartial advice service to help students identify when transfer to another provider is the right for them.

Industrial Strategy – Engineering and Technology Crisis

The Institution of Engineering & Technology published a report on skills and demand in industry which noted the industrial strategy needs to tackle the skills gap if it is to work. The report describes the lack of diversity in the workforce as contributing to the recruitment shortage.

  • 81% stated employers need to provide work experience to help improve the supply of engineers and technicians
  • 87% of employers don’t have LGBT/BAME diversity initiatives in place
  • Only 15% of employers make particular efforts to attract and retain women in engineering and technical roles (beyond the statutory equality requirements)

Joanna Cox, IET Head of Policy, said: “As the UK goes through a period of economic uncertainty, the skills shortage in engineering remains an ongoing concern for engineering companies in the UK. Employers tell us that tackling this problem is fundamental to making the Government’s Industrial strategy viable. We must now bring businesses, academia and Government together and strengthen their working relationships to ensure that the next generation of talent has the right practical and technical skills to meet future demand. “

Read more here.

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.

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Policy Advisor                                                                     Policy & Public Affairs Officer

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

BU commissioned to analyse future energy needs in UK homes

Awarded & submitted bids, BU research, Impact, Research news

  • Bournemouth University and Baringa selected to deliver data analysis and algorithm development to the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI).
  • The High Frequency Appliance Disaggregation Analysis project will analyse real world data from the ETI’s Home Energy Management System (HEMS) in five homes to gather detailed energy data from water, gas and electricity use.
  • This data will help develop algorithms to forecast domestic energy needs of the future and provide industry with valuable insight into consumer energy use to develop efficient energy services.

Bournemouth University, under the lead on Professor Hamid Bouchachia, and  specialist energy advisors Baringa Partners have both been selected by the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) to undertake data analysis in a new knowledge building smart energy project that will investigate domestic energy use.

The High Frequency Appliance Disaggregation Analysis (HFADA) project builds upon work undertaken in the Smart Systems and Heat (SSH) programme delivered by the Energy Systems Catapult for the ETI, to refine intelligence and gain detailed smart home energy data.

The project will analyse in depth data from five homes that have been trialling the SSH programme’s Home Energy Management System (HEMS) to identify which appliances are present within a building and when they are in operation. The main goal of the HFADA project is to detect human behaviour patterns in order to forecast the home energy needs of people in the future. In particular the project will deliver a detailed set of data mining algorithms top help identify patterns of building occupancy and energy use within domestic homes from water, gas and electricity data.

Bournemouth University and Baringa, working in partnership with ASI Data Science, will work independently to provide information derived from the water, gas and electricity use in these UK homes, from the end of 2017 to middle of 2018.

Should anyone be interested in further details, please contact Prof Hamid Bouchachia at abouchachia@bournemouth.ac.uk.

HSS academic publishes articles on North Korea in The Conversation

BU research, Events, Impact, international, Knowledge Exchange

Congratulations to Dr Hyun-Joo Lim, Senior Lecturer in Sociology for her recent publication entitled: “A terrible fate awaits North Korean women who escape to China” in The Conversation.

This piece draws on findings from Joo’s research with North Koreans and is a moving reminder of on-going challenges faced by many. Joo concludes with a challenge to us all –

“If governments are to act, their citizens and media must pressurise them to make this issue a higher priority. If a global campaign can gather enough momentum and strength, the Chinese government will be forced to listen and reconsider. It may be a significant obstacle, but it is a challenge we can all play our part in. By demanding action, we can all support the fight against the sustained human rights abuse of desperate North Korean defectors and their invisible children. We might not be able to see it, but we know it’s happening – and we have a human duty to act.”

The full article can be accessed here. This has now been read by over 120,000 people so if you are thinking about wanting to achieve impact with your research The Conversation is a great place to start. If you’re in FHSS and keen to write for The Conversation then do get in touch with me.

If you wish to hear more about Joo’s important work then please head along to her event next week: ‘Still no freedom: From North Korea to being ignored’. It’s on Tuesday 5th December, 1-2pm in FG04. Tickets are available here.

Well done Joo and all the best for your on-going work in this area.

Clare Killingback

Impact Champion FHSS

ESRC: Miracles in the mundane: hitchhiking and micro-adventures

Events, Impact

As as part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science 2017, organised by Bournemouth University, I ran an event about hitchhiking and micro-adventures. You may wonder, when did the practice of hitchhiking need to be thought through social science. By inviting six speakers (hitchhikers and social scientists) to Bournemouth University, we spent 3 hours thinking with and through hitchhiking and micro adventures to explore the modern experiences of passengering, ethical encounters, trust, the cost of speed and acceleration, driverless cars, social entrepreneurship, self-sufficiency, automobility and infrastructure. Other Topics Included –

  • Hitchhiking and the nature of being a passenger (agency, performances and resistance to standardized categories);
  • Contrasted affects, bodies and emotions of being on the road;
  • Role of media and social media in accessibility, inclusion, and diversity of micro adventures;
  • Systems, technologies and practices linked to friction/ frictionless travel;
  • The move back towards so-called ‘active’ and human powered mobility cultures that gives value to turbulence, friction, risk and the social exchange they engender;
  • The future of hitchhiking.
  • The role of gender, race, class, age and sexuality and other social and intersectional relationships of domination at play;
  • Understanding and potentially overcoming physical, mental, emotional barriers to microadventures;
  • Hitchhiking as Sustainable, Subversive Mobilities, Slow Mobilities;

Poster for the Event

The speakers
– Antonin Borgnon, an hitchhiker and photographer spoke about his project “Art of Hitchhiking.”
– Anick-Marie Bouchard is a travel blogger specialized in Hitchhiking, Female Solo Travel, and spoke about putting adventure back into ones life, even without having to travel far.
– Patrick Laviolette, PhD spoke about the recurrent material and bodily techniques employed in hitching a lift. He’s presentation also touched on certain cross-cultural points of comparison between the decline of hitching in the West versus its persistence in Eastern Europe.
– Max Neumegen spoke about his life of travel, and what travel and adventure means to him.
– Ali Hussain spoke about his experiences as a non-white hitchhiker and solo male across different regions, Ali spoke about his  relationship with money in a money-centric culture and hitchhiking as a values-oriented practice rather than as a means to an end.
– Dego from Glasgow, who has been hitchhiking for 30 years, spoke about hitchhiking as central to his lifestyle and work.

Ali Hussain presenting.

 
Some signs from the event” Miracles in the Mundane: hitchhiking and micro-adventures” held last  Saturday,

This event was FREE to attend, and was superbly supported by Natt & Devon at the University. The event was attended by approx. 20 people and was shown LIVE on twitter and Facebook. The experience of been part of the ESRC festival of Social Science was a very positive one.  It has provided a public engagement opportunity, helped me engage with new research partners, and provided more inside into an under researched phenomenon. It has also led to discussions about organizing an event with similar topic areas in 2018.

 

Organizer Michael O’Regan, Faculty of Management

 

For further information please contact FestivalofSocialScience@bournemouth.ac.uk or please visit the event website at nomadx.org

The slow process from public health research to law

Featured, Impact, international, policy, Publishing, Research communication, Research news, Uncategorized, writing

We know that public health works and thinks long-term. We’ll typically see the population benefits of reducing health risks such as tobacco use, obesity and high alcohol intake in ten or twenty years’ time.  But we often forget that preceding public health research into the determinants of ill health and the possible public health solutions is also slow working.  Evidence-based public health solutions can be unpopular with voters, politicians or commercial companies (or all).  Hence these take time to get accepted by the various stakeholders and make their way into policies.

I was, therefore, glad to see that Scotland won the Supreme Court case today in favour of a minimum price for a unit of alcohol. As we know from the media, the court case took five years.  Before that the preparation and drafting of the legislation took years, and some of the original research took place long before that.  Together with colleagues at the Health Economic Research Unit at the University of Aberdeen, the University of York and Health Education Board for Scotland, we conducted a literature review on Effective & Cost-Effective Measures to Reduce Alcohol Misuse in Scotland as early as 2001 [1].  Some of the initial research was so long ago it was conducted for the Scottish Executive, before it was even renamed the Scottish Government.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

 

Reference:

Research started years ago! Ludbrook et al.(2002) Effective & Cost-Effective Measures to Reduce Alcohol Misuse in Scotland: Lit Review, HERU, Univ. of Aberdeen. [ISBN: 0755932803] http://www.gov.scot/Resource/Doc/1124/0052548.pdf