Category / international

HE policy update w/e 26th January 2018

Fusion, Fusion themes, international

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

Systematic Review birthing centres by CMMPH PhD student Preeti Mahato

international, open access, PG research, Publishing, Student Engagement, student research, writing

BU PhD student Mrs Preeti Mahato published her latest scientific paper ‘Determinants of quality of care and access to Basic Emergency Obstetric and Neonatal Care facilities and midwife-led facilities in low and middle-income countries: A Systematic Review’ in the Journal of Asian Midwives [1].  This paper is co-authored by Dr. Catherine Angell and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, who are both based in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) and Prof. Padam Simkhada, BU Visiting Professor and based at Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU).  Journal of Asian Midwives is a free Open Access journal, freely available for anybody across the globe to read online.

The authors highlight that maternal mortality is a major challenge to health systems in Low and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs) where almost 99% of maternal deaths occurred in 2015. Primary-care facilities providing Basic Emergency Obstetric and Neonatal Care (BEmONC) facilities, and facilities that are midwife-led are appropriate for normal birth in LMICs and have been proposed as the best approach to reduce maternal deaths. However, the poor quality of maternal services that leads to decreased utilisation of these facilities is among the major causes of maternal deaths worldwide. This systematic review studied factors affecting the quality of care in BEmONC and midwife-led facilities in LMICs.

Thematic analysis on included studies revealed various factors affecting quality of care including facility-level determinants and other determinants influencing access to care. Facility-level determinants included these barriers: lack of equipment and drugs at the facility, lack of trained staff, poor attitudes and behaviour of service providers, and poor communication with women. Facility-level positive determinants were: satisfaction with services, emotional support during delivery and trust in health providers. The access-to-care determinants were: socio-economic factors, physical access to the facility, maintaining privacy and confidentiality, and cultural values.  The authors include that improving quality of care of birthing facilities requires addressing both facility level and non-facility level determinants in order to increase utilization of the services available at the BEmONC and midwife-led facilities in LMICs.

This is the fifth paper co-authored by CMMPH’s current most published PhD student.  The evaluation of birth centres in rural Nepal by Preeti Mahato under joint supervision Dr. Angell and Prof. Simkhada (LJMU) and Prof. van Teijlingen.

References:

  1. Mahato, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C. (2017) Determinants of quality of care & access to Basic Emergency Obstetric & Neonatal Care facilities & midwife-led facilities in low & middle-income countries: A Systematic Review, Journal of Asian Midwives 4(2):25-51.
  2. Mahato, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C. (2016) Birthing centres in Nepal: Recent developments, obstacles and opportunities, Journal of Asian Midwives 3(1): 18-30. http://ecommons.aku.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1033&context=jam
  3. Mahato, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Sheppard, Z., Silwal, R.C. (2017) Factors related to choice of place of birth in a district in Nepal. Sexual & Reproductive Healthcare 13: 91-96.
  4. Mahato, P.K., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C., Sathian, B. (2015) Birthing centre infrastructure in Nepal post 2015 earthquake. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(4): 518-519. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/14260/11579
  5. Regmi, P., van Teijlingen, E., Hundley, V., Simkhada, P., Sharma, S., Mahato, P. (2016) Sustainable Development Goals: relevance to maternal & child health in Nepal. Health Prospect 15(1):9-10. www.healthprospect.org/archives/15/1/3.pdf

international

The USA shutdown, following the current budget impasse, has started to affect many federal services across the country, but the effect can also be felt abroad.   I just noted on the PubMed webpages the above warning: “Because of a lapse in government funding, the information on this website may not be up to date, transactions submitted via the website may not be processed, and the agency may not be able to respond to inquiries until appropriations are enacted.”  This delay in funding in the most up-to-date health research database will not have a major effect today (Sunday 21 Jan.) as it will have on hundreds of thousands of federal staff facing unpaid leave and many more people facing interruptions in the provision of basic service across the USA.  It is however a sign of globalisation, with  internal political disputes in the USA affecting people across the globe, including health researchers at Bournemouth University.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

Two papers on health & migration in Nepal

international, open access, PG research, Publishing, student research, writing

This last week two separate papers have been accepted on aspects of health and well-being among migrants workers from Nepal.  The first in the International Journal of Migration, Health and Social Care is based on a completed PhD project in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences with Dr. Pratik Adhikary as first author [1].  This paper ‘Health and well-being of Nepalese migrant workers abroad’ is co-authored by two former FHSS staff Dr. Zoe Sheppard and Dr. Steve Keen, and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen of the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH).

 

The second paper ‘A study of Health Problems of Nepalese Female Migrants Workers in the Middle-East and Malaysia’ was accepted by the Open Access journal BMC International Health & Human Rights [2].  The lead author of this paper is Bournemouth University (BU) Visiting Faculty Prof. Padam Simkhada (based at Liverpool John Moores University) and two of his co-authors are based in Nepal: Manju Gurung (chair of Pourakhi Nepal) and Dr. Sharada Prasad Wasti and one at BU: Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen .

There is  a growing momentum in migration research at BU with further academic papers being published related to studies on migrant workers from Nepal [4-8], relatives of migrant workers [9], migration into the UK [10-12], Eastern European migration issues [13-15], migration and tourism [16], migration and the media [17] as well as migration in the past [18].

 

References:

  1. Adhikary P, Sheppard, Z., Keen S., van Teijlingen E. (2018) Health and well-being of Nepalese migrant workers abroad, International Journal of Migration, Health and Social Care (accepted). https://doi.org/10.1108/IJMHSC-12-2015-0052
  2. Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen, E.R., Gurung, M., Wasti, S. (2018) A study of Health Problems of Nepalese Female Migrants Workers in the Middle-East and Malaysia, BMC International Health & Human Rights (accepted Jan.).
  3. Adhikary, P., Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen E., Raja, AE. (2008) Health & Lifestyle of Nepalese Migrants in the UK BMC International Health & Human Rights 8(6). Web address: www.biomedcentral.com/1472-698X/8/6.
  4. van Teijlingen E, Simkhada, P., Adhikary, P. (2009) Alcohol use among the Nepalese in the UK BMJ Rapid Response: www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/339/oct20_1/b4028#223451
  5. Adhikary P., Keen S., van Teijlingen, E. (2011) Health Issues among Nepalese migrant workers in Middle East. Health Science Journal 5: 169-175. www.hsj.gr/volume5/issue3/532.pdf
  6. Adhikary, P., Sheppard, Z., Keen, S., van Teijlingen, E. (2017) Risky work: Accidents among Nepalese migrant workers in Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi, Health Prospect 16(2): 3-10.
  7. Aryal, N., Regmi, PR., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Adhikary, P., Bhatta, YKD., Mann, S. (2016) Injury and Mortality in Young Nepalese Migrant Workers: A Call for Public Health Action. Asian-Pacific Journal of Public Health 28(8): 703-705.
  8. Simkhada, PP., Regmi, PR., van Teijlingen, E., Aryal, N. (2017) Identifying the gaps in Nepalese migrant workers’ health & well-being: A review of the literature, Journal of Travel Medicine 24 (4): 1-9.
  9. Aryal, N., Regmi, PR., van Teijlingen, E., Dhungel, D., Ghale, G., Bhatta, GK. (2016) Knowing is not enough: Migrant workers’ spouses vulnerability to HIV SAARC Journal of Tuberculosis, Lung Diseases & HIV/AIDS 8(1):9-15.
  10. Scammell, J., 2016. Nurse migration and the EU: how are UK nurses prepared? British Journal of Nursing, 25 (13), p. 764.
  11. Holscher, J., 2017. The effects of Brexit on the EU, the UK and Dorset – a migrant’s account. BAFES Working Papers, 1-11.
  12. Sapkota, T., Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen, E. (2014) Nepalese health workers’ migration to United Kingdom: A qualitative study. Health Science Journal 8(1):57-74.
  13. Filimonau, V., Mika, M. (2017) Return labour migration: an exploratory study of Polish migrant workers from the UK hospitality industry. Current Issues in Tourism, 1-22.
  14. Janta, H., Ladkin, A., Brown, L., Lugosi, P., 2011. Employment experiences of Polish migrant workers in the UK hospitality sector. Tourism Management, 32 (5): 1006-1019.
  15. Mai, N., Schwandner-Sievers, S. (2003) Albanian migration and new transnationalisms, Journal of Ethnic & Migration Studies 29(6): 939-948.
  16. Dwyer, L., Seetaram, N., Forsyth, P., Brian, K. (2014) Is the Migration-Tourism Relationship only about VFR? Annals of Tourism Research, 46: 130-143.
  17. Marino, S., Dawes, S. (2016). Fortress Europe: Media, Migration and Borders. Networking Knowledge, 9 (4).
  18. Parker Pearson, M., Richards, C., Allen, M., Payne, A., Welham, K. (2004) The Stonehenge Riverside project Research design and initial results Journal of Nordic Archaeological Science 14: 45–60.

New paper international midwifery

international, Publishing, writing

Over the Festive Season the International Journal of Childbirth published the latest article from staff based at the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) [1].  This paper ‘Women, Midwives, and a Medical Model of Maternity Care in Switzerland’ is co-authored with Bournemouth University Visiting Faculty Ans Luyben (a Dutch midwife working in Switzerland), Sue Brailey from the School of Health & Education at Middlesex University and Lucy Firth at the University of Liverpool.

This Swiss paper builds on a body of work within CMMPH around a medical/social model of childbirth.  BU academics have applied this model in multidisciplinary studies, including the disciplines of midwifery, [2-4] sociology, [5] and media studies [6].

 

References

  1. Brailey, S., Luyben, A., Firth, L., van Teijlingen, E. (2017) Women, midwives and a medical model of maternity care in Switzerland, International Journal of Childbirth 7(3): 117-125.
  2. van Teijlingen, E. (2017) The medical and social model of childbirth, Kontakt 19 (2): e73-e74
  3. MacKenzie Bryers H., van Teijlingen, E. (2010) Risk, Theory, Social & Medical Models: critical analysis of the concept of risk in maternity care, Midwifery 26(5): 488-496.
  4. Ireland, J., van Teijlingen, E. (2013) Normal birth: social-medical model, The Practising Midwife 16 (11): 17-20.
  5. van Teijlingen E. (2005) A critical analysis of the medical model as used in the study of pregnancy and childbirth, Sociological Research Online, 10 (2) Web address: http://www.socresonline.org.uk/10/2/teijlingen.html
  6. Luce, A., Cash, M., Hundley, V., Cheyne, H., van Teijlingen, E., Angell, C. (2016) “Is it realistic?” the portrayal of pregnancy and childbirth in the media BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 16: 40 http://bmcpregnancychildbirth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12884-016-0827-x

Places still available: Global Challenges STEAMLab 7/2/18

international

On Wednesday, 7th February 2018, BU’s Research and Knowledge Exchange Office will be facilitating a STEAMLab event on Global Challenges, attended by staff from the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), Oxfam, Academics from throughout the M3 universities and other organisations.

Which means…?

We’re seeking to come up with novel research that could form part of the UK’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) commitment.

So, who should attend?

We want anyone who thinks they might have something to contribute, and who is available all day on Wednesday 7th February to come along. We will also be inviting relevant external attendees to contribute to the day.  We welcome academics, NGO/business/government representatives who wish to contribute to having a positive impact through addressing the world’s global challenges.

What do I need to prepare in advance? What will the sandpit entail?

Absolutely nothing in advance. During the STEAMLab, you’ll be guided through a process which results in the development of research ideas. The process facilitates creativity, potentially leading to innovative and interdisciplinary research ideas. These ideas will be explored with other attendees, and further developed based on the feedback received.

What if I don’t have time to think about ideas in advance?

You don’t need to do this. Some inspiring speakers with a range of backgrounds will be coming along to give you ideas…

What about afterwards? Do I need to go away and do loads of work?

Well… that depends! The STEAMLab will result in some novel research ideas. Some of these may be progressed immediately; others might need more time to think about. You may find common ground with other attendees which you choose to take forward in other ways, such as writing a paper or applying for research funding.  Support will be available to progress project ideas after the day.

What if my topic area is really specific, such as health?Woman's Eye and World Globes

Your contribution will be very welcome! One of the main benefits of a STEAMlab event is to bring together individuals with a range of backgrounds and specialisms who are able to see things just that bit differently to one another.

So, is this just networking?

Definitely not! It is a facilitated session with the primary intention of developing innovative research ideas, which also enables the development of networks. It gives you the opportunity to explore research ideas which you may develop over time, together with the chance to find common ground with academics from across BU and beyond.

So, how do I book onto this event?

To take part in this exciting opportunity, all participants  should complete the Global Challenges STEAMLab Application Form and return this to RKEDevFramework@bournemouth.ac.uk by Thursday, 18th January. Places are strictly limited and you will be be contacted to confirm a place place on the STEAMLab with arrangements nearer the time.  The event will be held in Bournemouth at the Executive Business Centre.

By applying, you agree to attend for the full duration of the event on 7th February (c. 9:30 – 16:30). Spaces will be confirmed on 22/1/18.

If you have any queries prior to submitting your application, please contact Ehren Milner, RKEO Research Facilitator.

HE policy update for the w/e 5th January 2018

international

Welcome to the first policy update of 2018!  Parliament is in recess until Monday 8th so there has been less activity this week. Nevertheless, here is your slimline summary of the activity since our last update.

Office for Students

The Office for Students (OfS) officially came into existence this week. The final 6 members of the OfS board were announced

New members:

  • Simon Levine is the Managing Partner and Co-Global Chief Executive Officer of the global law firm, DLA Piper. A graduate of Cambridge University, he is a Visiting Professor and Lecturer at Imperial College Business School.
  • Elizabeth Fagan is Senior Vice President, Managing Director of Boots.
  • Katja Hall is a partner at Chairman Mentors International, previously she was Group Head of External Affairs and Sustainability at HSBC where she was responsible for external communications, stakeholder engagement, social responsibility and community investment.
  • Monisha Shah is Chair of Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance. She is also a serving Trustee of ArtFund, an independent fundraising charity for art. In December 2015, Monisha was invited by the Prime Minister to join the Committee on Standards in Public Life.
  • Ruth Carlson is a current student at Surrey University, where she is a Student Ambassador for civil engineering. She has experience as a course representative, as a former president of the Surrey University Women’s Football Team and has also worked in other institutional and regional representative forums.
  • Toby Young is the co-founder of the West London Free School, and now serves as the director the New Schools Network. His teaching experience includes working as a teaching fellow at Harvard and a teaching assistant at Cambridge. He is a Fulbright Commissioner.

This appointment has been contentious with both students and academics claiming he is unsuitable (BBC News: Toby Young regrets ‘politically incorrect’ comments). In another BBC article: University job backlash because I’m a Tory the DfE are reported to have spoken of the “vital insights Toby’s experience as the founder of a free school will bring to the role”. Furthermore: “This experience will be vital in encouraging new providers and ensuring more universities are working effectively with schools.”

Mr Young has also been criticised for past derogatory comments about working class students. In response to this complaint Toby claims the number of pupil premium children enrolled at the four schools he has established counters this criticism.

Sally Hunt, general secretary of the University and College Union, said: “If this organisation was to have any credibility it needed a robust board looking out for students’ interests. Instead we have this announcement sneaked out at New Year with Tory cheerleader Toby Young dressed up as the voice of teachers and no actual representation from staff or students.”  [Note – there is student representation as Ruth Carlson has been appointed to the OfS board – see above.]

Twitter has been awash with complaints, including suggestions he is deleting thousands of inappropriate past tweets. LBC have critiqued the DfE for failing to provide a rationale response justifying why the inappropriate tweets were not considered a deterrent factor in Toby’s appointment.

Conservative Minister Margot James has also criticised the choice: “Toby Young is worthy of his appointment but it is a mistake for him to belittle sexist comments by labelling them ‘politically incorrect’, a term frequently used to dismiss unacceptable comments about, and behaviour towards, women and minorities.”

Toby has strong links with the Conservative party who are currently reported as experiencing a generation gap crisis due to the low number of young members they are attracting. Strong student opposition to Toby’s appointment may further damage the Conservatives’ reputation with younger voters further.

Click the link to read Toby Young’s statement: why I am qualified to be on board of new universities regulator

Previously announced members:

  • Sir Michael Barber (Chair)
  • Martin Coleman (Deputy Chair)
  • Nicola Dandridge (CEO)
  • Chris Millward (DfAP)
  • Gurpreet Dehal
  • Kate Lander
  • Prof Carl Lygo
  • David Palfreyman
  • Prof Steve West.

League Tables

League tables often attract a collective groan within HE institutions because positioning is important but the criteria and methodologies change making interpretation difficult. On Thursday the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) and the Higher Education Strategic Planners Association published A Guide to UK League Tables in HE. The report is a simple introduction for those who’d like to understand the limitations of league tables without getting bogged down in the complex terms and data.

Sally Turnball (author) said: League tables are both interesting and useful. But, as is the case in much of today’s knowledge society, we need to be able to navigate and understand this information effectively, so that it aids – rather than drives – what we do.

In summary, some difficulties are:

  • Data is old – doesn’t present an accurate picture of a provider as it is today. This is exacerbated as league tables are used by pupils to make choices when they are 12-18 months away from enrolling – meaning by enrolment the institution was selected based on its performance 4 years ago.
  • While the league tables collect and compare consistent data across institutions the HE sector is diverse so the data used often focuses on a narrow student population. Making it virtually meaningless for mature, part-time and postgraduate applicants.
  • League tables use NSS data as a proxy to represent teaching quality – its an easily accessible data source but being opinion based its usefulness is limited because it’s not a robust or impartial evaluation of quality.
  • Often providers cluster around the same scores so the rankers have to resort to decimal place levels to differentiate and allocate position on the league table – even though the differences are infinitesimal. Furthermore, changing the weighting of some criteria and excluding extreme scores – which is statistically sensible – results in exaggerated differences between provider scores and their resultant ranking position.
  • Many of the valuable things done by institutions cannot be easily measured and are not incorporated into the rankings.
  • Page 17 lists the metrics used to calculate the league tables, and pages 18 to 35 set out the problems associated with each metric in simple language.

The report concludes: League tables are not created for higher education providers to use as core management information. They are not based on thorough in-depth analyses of the datasets and they do not take many of the known contextual factors into account – for example, graduate employment data are not adjusted for local employment markets, despite differences in the profile of employment opportunities across the country. Yet league tables bring together a range of different sources of information about higher education providers to give a general overview of factors that prospective students might find useful when considering where to study. They provide information at both subject and institutional levels and they generate media coverage, putting areas of supposedly stronger and weaker provision in the spotlight. League tables are here to stay, and it would be ill-advised to ignore them. However, using them as the sole basis for policymaking or strategic decision-making is equally ill-advised.

Nick Hillman, Director of HEPI said: Universities are judged by their position in the league tables. Rankings determine reputation, prestige and student numbers. That is why university governing bodies hold their vice-chancellors to account for their league table positions. But users of the league tables tend to know little about how the rankings are put together. In other words, they do not know, precisely, what it is they are holding people to account for. The main league tables are not going to disappear any time soon because they provide comparative information and people find them useful. But they are easily and often misunderstood. My hope is that everyone who holds our universities to account will set themselves a new year’s resolution to look under the bonnet of the league tables before using them.

Free Speech

Jo Johnson spoke about free speech at the Jewish Limmud Festival on 26 December: “Our universities…should be places that open minds not close them, where ideas can be freely challenged and prejudices exposed. But in universities in America and increasingly in the United Kingdom, there are countervailing forces of censorship, where groups have sought to stifle those who do not agree with them in every way under the banner of “safe spaces” or “no-platforming”. However well-intentioned, the proliferation of such safe spaces, the rise of no-platforming, the removal of ‘offensive’ books from libraries and the drawing up of ever more extensive lists of banned “trigger” words are undermining the principle of free speech in our universities. Shield young people from controversial opinions, views that challenge their most profoundly held beliefs or simply make them uncomfortable, and you are on the slippery slope that ends up with a society less able to make scientific breakthroughs, to be innovative and to resist injustice.”

Of the OfS Johnson stated: “Promoting freedom of speech within the law will be at the heart of its [OfS’] approach to the regulation of our higher education system. The OfS will go further than its predecessor in promoting freedom of speech. …as a condition of registration with the new regulator, we are proposing that all universities benefitting from public money must demonstrate a clear commitment to free speech in their governance documents. I am pleased to say that this freedom is as important to the OfS’s new chairman, Sir Michael Barber, as it is to me. While he hoped the OfS never has to intervene in a university in relation to freedom of speech, he undertook that, if it does, it will be to widen it rather than restrict it. I’m confident freedom of speech in our universities has a bright future under the OfS. But we will continue to watch the system carefully.”

Finally Johnson reiterated: “And I want to be clear about this: attempts to silence opinions that one disagrees with have no place in the English university system. Academics and students alike must not allow a culture to take hold where silence is preferable to a dissenting voice. Universities cannot afford to be complacent about complying either with their duties to protect freedom of speech, or anything less than vigilant against hate speech (or other unlawful activity) masquerading as the exercise of the right to freedom of speech.”

On the following day Angela Rayner (Labour, Shadow Secretary of State for Education) said: “It is a false choice to suggest that universities are either places of free enquiry or places of safety. They can be both. Denying access to groups and individuals who incite violence and hatred is a perfectly sensible step to keep students safe from harm. The NUS have a ‘no-platform’ policy for a handful of racist, anti-Semitic and extremist organisations, some of which the Government itself has also banned. If Jo Johnson is opposed to that policy, he needs to be clear which of those groups he actually wants on campus.”

International Students

Leader of the Lib Dems, Vince Cable, is optimistic the PM will remove international students from the official immigration figures. He said: “…the Home Office has wildly exaggerated the number of those who overstay. This absurd policy has fuelled concerns over immigration numbers and done serious damage to our universities. We should be encouraging more students to come and spend their money in the UK, instead of needlessly hampering one of Britain’s most successful export industries.”

Theresa May has been vehement in continuing to count students within the net migration targets. Without fresh evidence it seemed unlikely the PM would change her stance, however, Politics Home has speculated May is likely to back down to avoid a vote defeat during the forthcoming Immigration Bill.

Meanwhile, the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) continue their work to assess the social and economic impacts of international students studying within the UK. BU are currently preparing their response to the MAC call for evidence. Contact us at Policy if you’d like to contribute this this response.

Institutes of Technology fund

In December the Government announced a £170 million fund to establish Institutes of Technology delivering high level technical skills that meet employer needs. The Institutes of Technology will combine business, education and training providers within technical (particularly STEM) subjects to deliver the specific provision needed by local, regional and national employers. It forms part of the Government’s Industrial Strategy that will directly target skills gaps through upskilling existing and new entrants to the workforce. The first Institutes of Technology are expected to open in 2019.

Justine Greening said: “Institutes of technology will play a vital role driving our skills revolution with business and unlocking the potential of our country’s young people through better technical education. By bridging the country’s skills gaps, these new institutions will drive growth and widen opportunity.” “This Government continues to invest in developing our homegrown talent so British business has the skills it needs and so that young people can get the opportunities they want.”

Consultations

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

Other news

The year that was: HEPI review the major happenings of 2017 – a handy and brief refresh if you tuned out during the relentless sector debate and change last year. And Times Higher lists their 25 most popular articles of 2017 – the top spot went to the TEF results.

Research policy news: read our round up of the research news this week. And David Sweeney reflects on the change in mindset required to understand the approach to submissions in REF 2021.

Access to non-religious pastoral carers: Humanists UK published the results of their survey calling for non-religious support workers to be appointed to university chaplaincy and pastoral support teams. The survey sampling is limited in that it was only drawn from their student membership.

Industrial Strategy: The House of Lords has produced a library briefing on the Industrial Strategy and the UK Economy

Artificial Intelligence & Automation: The House of Commons Library has produced a briefing paper on Artificial Intelligence and Automation in the UK. Increasing digital skills, filling employment gaps, and funding for AI research are key issues for Government who seek to grow the AI industry. A sector deal for AI was announced in the Autumn 2017 Budget. This briefing paper considers the impact of AI and automation on the UK workforce, including how working lives may change. There are a broad range of predictions caveated by uncertainties such as the rate of technological development, rate of deployment, and the geographical variations. The paper concludes that the impact is likely to be significant and the Bank of England predicts that 15 million jobs will be influenced by automation over the next 20 years. You may also find the THE article from May 2017 Which countries and universities are leading on AI research interesting.

New(s) Year Resolutions?

Are your colleagues’ new year’s resolutions woefully inadequate? Supplement their diet and exercise plans by encouraging them to subscribe to the exceedingly palatable weekly policy update – simply email policy@bournemouth.ac.uk to be added to the list!

JANE FORSTER                                            |                       SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor                                                                     Policy & Public Affairs Officer

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

Last publication of 2017?

international, Knowledge Exchange, Publishing, writing

The final issue for 2017 of the Dutch Journal for Midwives, Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Verloskundigen, published our contribution on midwives and the media [1].  The two-page article ‘MEER BEMOEIEN MET MEDIA’ argues (in Dutch) that midwives as individuals and as a profession must try to engage with the media.  Midwives should be open to starting a dialogue concerning issues around maternity care and midwifery.  This article published in a practitioners’ journal builds on the collaborative research conducted at Bournemouth University around midwifery and the media [2-4], and our recently published edited book on the topic [5].

Ann Luce, Vanora Hundley & Edwin van Teijlingen

 

References:

  1. van Teijlingen, E., De Vries, R., Luce, A., Hundley, V. (2017) Meer bemoeien met media (In Dutch: more engagement with media). Tijdschrift voor Verloskundigen (in Dutch: Journal for Midwives), 41 (6):28-29.
  2. Luce, A., Cash, M., Hundley, V., Cheyne, H., van Teijlingen, E., Angell, C. (2016) “Is it realistic?” the portrayal of pregnancy and childbirth in the media BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 16: 40 http://bmcpregnancychildbirth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12884-016-0827-x
  3. Hundley, V., Duff, E., Dewberry, J., Luce, A., van Teijlingen, E. (2014) Fear in childbirth: are the media responsible? MIDIRS Midwifery Digest 24(4): 444-447.
  4. Hundley, V., Luce, A., van Teijlingen, E. (2015) Do midwives need to be more media savvy? MIDIRS Midwifery Digest 25(1):5-10.
  5. Luce, A., Hundley, V., van Teijlingen, E. (Eds.) (2017) Midwifery, Childbirth and the Media, Palgrave Macmillan

 

Last review of the year

international, open access, Publishing, writing

This morning as Associate Editor I reviewed one academic paper resubmitted to BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth.  After this I had to invite three reviewers for another paper newly submitted to BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth. 

This afternoon I peer-reviewed a paper submitted to Women & Birth.  For readers of our BU Research Blog who are not involved in academia, the volume of requests to review for scientific journals has gone through the roof in the past few years.  And these are legitimate requests from high quality journals.  There is a whole heap of so-called predatory journals pestering academics for reviews (and papers and editorial board memberships).

All that is left to be done before the Christmas Break is editing six short book chapters, submitting one scientific paper, and answer seventy odd emails.

Merry Christmas and a Happy & Healthy 2018

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Erasmus+ 2018 Call and Programme Guide Published

Funding opportunities, international

If you are planning to apply for funding in 2018 through Erasmus+, the European Union’s programme for education, training, youth and sport, you can start to prepare your grant application now. The Erasmus+ Programme Guide, which provides detailed information on how to apply, is available here.

This year’s budget has increased by €200 million since 2017, representing an increase of 8%.

The major changes since 2017 include:

  • Additional opportunities for Erasmus+ higher education students to carry out traineeships aimed at gaining digital skills;
  • The ErasmusPro initiative under VET mobility projects to boost long term mobility for VET learners;
  • A new “Schools Exchange Partnerships” format under Strategic Partnerships to help schools better finding their way into cooperation projects;
  • The action “Sector Skills Alliances” has been reintroduced to this Programme Guide;
  • The funding rules for most actions have been fine-tuned;

As in 2016 and 2017, the 2018 Programme Guide places a special focus on encouraging projects supporting social inclusion (notably of refugees and migrants), as well as preventing radicalisation.

The call deadlines for all three Key Actions can be found here. A few Key Action 2 deadlines to be aware of are;

Knowledge Alliances 28th February 2018

Strategic partnerships in the field of education and training 21st March 2018

Capacity building in the field of higher education 8th February 2018

If you are interested in applying to any of the calls then please contact your RKEO Funding Development Officer, in the first instance.

 

Congratulations to PhD graduate Dr Carlton

international, PG research, Publishing, student research, writing

Congratulations to Dr Edward Carlton (an ex-PhD student at BU supervised by Professor Ahmed Khattab and Professor Kim Greaves) on his co-authored paper published in JAMA.

Data from Edward’s original work (The TRUST Study, part of his PhD thesis) has now been published in JAMA (Impact Factor 44.4) in a collaborative meta-analysis.  This showcases the work from one of our fully funded PhD studentships at BU.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2662908

 

Well done! Congratulations to both former PhD student and his supervisors.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

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

international

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.

New consultations and inquiries this week:

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JANE FORSTER                                            |                       SARAH CARTER

Policy Advisor                                                                     Policy & Public Affairs Officer

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