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HEPI Guest Post

  • Edinburgh and Imperial excel in QS Sustainability Rankings

    5 December 2023 by Andrew MacFarlane

    In 2023, QS launched the pilot edition of its Sustainability Ranking. University of California Berkeley took the top spot, in a Top 10 comprised of institutions from Canada, Australia, the UK, the US, Japan and New Zealand. After gathering sector feedback, reviewing the impact of the metrics and the robustness…

  • Why we need more nurses in London and how HE can help

    4 December 2023 by Emily Dixon and Jolanta Edwards

    This year’s UCAS deadline is fast approaching. One area of particular interest will be student applications to healthcare and nursing, where the government is keen to see increases to meet targets set in the NHS Workforce Plan. These students will go on to support an ageing population, and will operate…

  • Excellent outputs demand excellent people, cultures and environments

    1 December 2023 by Professor Stephen Curry

    If you have only learned about the proposed changes to the Research Excellence Framework (REF) from Professor Sir Nigel Thrift’s recent HEPI Policy Note, then you are likely to be alarmed. According to Thrift, the proposal to reduce the weighting on research outputs in REF 2028 from 60% to 50%*…

  • What Universities Can Learn from Artistic Citizenship in Practice

    30 November 2023 by Fiona Walsh McDonnell

    In September, GuildHE launched a report which called on the sector to address the balance for small and specialist institutions receiving funding to support their knowledge exchange activities, with these activities being transformative for institutions’ approach to their communities, to student engagement, and in the impact they could make in…

  • We need to talk about staff retention in the sector

    28 November 2023 by Leo Hanna

    Universities are in a difficult spot. Demand for higher education is high, with more and more young people seeing the value of a university education, which is obviously great news for the sector. On the other hand, we’re hearing from university leaders that there are fewer and fewer staff around…

  • Good practice in investigating allegations of sexual assault and harassment on campus

    27 November 2023 by Owen Bubbers-Jones

    Allegations of sexual harassment and assault by students aren’t going away with awareness campaigns and helplines. A new Oxford University study has found that one in four female students at the university had experienced some form of sexual assault in the previous year. While there are sector-wide standards in place, there…

  • Building Bridges to Beijing?

    23 November 2023 by David Law

    In common with most institutions in the sector, Keele is aiming to expand its connections in China.  As part of this work, in September 2023 I joined a mission of Vice-Chancellors, Pro-VCs, and senior staff from 20 UK universities.  We visited Beijing, Shanghai, and some other cities.  The meetings were…

  • Four cost-neutral ways to alleviate universities’ financial woes

    22 November 2023 by Susanna Kalitowski

    Not a week goes by these days without a story in the print or broadcast media about the dire finances of UK universities. Why? As a university chair neatly put it in these pages, ‘all our costs are rising fast, and our largest single source of income is constrained by…