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HEPI Guest Post

  • Weekend reading: The Launch of the APPG on Students: Commission on Students in Higher Education

    19 July 2025 by Alex Stanley, Saranya Thambirajah, and Alex Sobel

    This blog was kindly authored by Alex Stanley, NUS Vice President of Higher Education, Saranya Thambirajah, NUS Vice President Equality & Liberation and Alex Sobel Member of Parliament for Leeds Central and Headingly. Today, we’re proud to launch the Commission on Students in Higher Education, a project between the APPG…

  • Addressing educational poverty

    18 July 2025 by Pam Tatlow

    The Government’s decision to extend free school meals to an estimated 500,000 primary school children is a win-win, both in addressing disadvantage and supporting learning and attainment. In fact, all primary-age school children in Scotland and London now receive free school meals, with an evaluation of the latter concluding that…

  • Ten Things I Learned at DETcon 2025

    17 July 2025 by Rob Carthy

    Attending Duolingo’s inaugural DETcon London, I anticipated a day focused on the evolving landscape of language testing. What I experienced was a candid, and at times controversial, conversation about the geopolitical, political, and technological pressures facing UK higher education. Duolingo may have been the convenor, but the themes of the…

  • It’s time we moved the generative AI conversation on

    16 July 2025 by Michael Grove

    We are well beyond the tipping point. Students are using generative AI – at scale. According to HEPI’s Student Generative AI Survey 2025, 92% of undergraduates report using AI tools, and 88% say they’ve used them in assessments. Yet only a third say their institution has supported them to use these…

  • Making things happen: Coventry University’s contribution to regional growth

    11 July 2025 by Clive Winters

    When levelling up was popular in political and media circles, it was a source of bemusement to some of us in Higher Education. After all, universities as anchor institutions have been helping level up our communities and delivering economic impact for decades, or even longer. Coventry University Group is now…

  • Beyond Hype and Fluff: Lessons for AI from 25 Years of EdTech

    10 July 2025 by Rod Bristow

    I am an advocate for education technology. It is a growing force for good, providing great solutions to real problems: Products and services that solve these problems will continue to take root. All that said, we have not seen the widespread transformation in education that technology promised to deliver, and…

  • The state of the UK higher education sector’s finances

    8 July 2025 by Jack Booth and Maike Halterbeck

    In recent years, financial pressures have mounted across the entirety of the UK higher education (HE) sector, and have left many institutions in an exceptionally vulnerable position. In England alone, 43% of institutions are expected to face a financial deficit for 2024-25, prompting the House of Commons Education Select Committee…

  • Can a university be civic if it fails to invest in local relationships?

    7 July 2025 by Julian Dobson

    The Government wants English universities to play a greater civic role in their localities. But new research shows universities are failing to invest in the people who perform this work, putting local relationships at risk. A new report from the National Civic Impact Accelerator (NCIA) programme, funded by Research England…