On Monday 26th February, I was kindly invited to speak on a panel at the UCAS Teachers and Advisers conference about AI. The audience was staff who work with young people looking to enter higher education. We talked about HEPI’s recent report on students’ use of AI, and what it…
The higher education sector is still reeling from claims in January by the Sunday Times that some Russell Group institutions admit international students, who often pay much higher fees than home students, with lower grade requirements. Despite swift rebuttals by the Russell Group and Universities UK, the issue remains a…
The Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) today publishes an important new report, Cracks in our foundations: Evaluating foundation years as a tool for access and success (HEPI Report 170), by HEPI Policy Manager Josh Freeman. Foundation years are an additional year of study at the beginning of a higher education…
Short, preparatory ‘foundation year’ courses have exploded in popularity in recent years, but they have drawn criticism from policymakers. Like Access diplomas, they serve to support people from all backgrounds to enter higher education. This HEPI Report asks whether foundation years are effective tools for widening access – or whether,…
This new Policy Note by HEPI and Kortext explores students’ attitudes to AI. Based on a poll of 1,250 students through UCAS, we build a picture of the way students use and view generative AI technologies like ChatGPT and Google Bard. We find that the use of generative AI has…
In a new HEPI Policy Note, Provide or punish? Students’ views on generative AI in higher education (HEPI Policy Note 51 – see it also on the Kortext website) by Josh Freeman, HEPI and Kortext explore students’ attitudes to new generative AI tools like ChatGPT and Google Bard. Since ChatGPT…
We are almost at the end of 2023, and you know what that means – we are due a round-up of the year’s most popular HEPI blogs. The year, we celebrated our 20th birthday and it has arguably been HEPI’s biggest yet, with more website views than any other year…
There were only 22,060 degree apprentice starts in 2022/23 (of 560,000 students accepted through UCAS overall) – but if the 2023 Conservative Party Conference was your first foray into higher education, you wouldn’t know it. This was #CPC23, my first Tory Conference and a wonderfully hectic tour in search of…
HEPI research into the cost-of-living crisis, to be discussed today on Radio 4 Money Box, shows that a significant proportion of universities are open to the possibility of students working part-time during their studies or even encouraging them to do so. The finding is part of HEPI’s recent research into…
This HEPI Report considers the strategies adopted by higher education institutions to support students affected by the cost-of-living crisis. It finds they are adopting a range of measures, such as supporting students with the costs of food and drink, providing means-tested and unconditional funding, subsidising student activities, and opening food…