At last week’s Labour Party conference, the Opposition’s spokespeople for education were parroting some neat lines – while, frustratingly, offering next to no detail – on their proposed National Education Service (NES). One of these was that the NES will deliver ‘cradle to grave education’. If this means anything, it…
This guest blog has been kindly contributed by Michael Draper and Philip M Newton of Swansea University. It is the first time HEPI has addressed the issue of essay mills. Introduction There are renewed calls for the Government to legislate against essay mills – companies which offer, for a fee, to…
This blog has been kindly contributed by Professor Dave Phoenix, Chair of MillionPlus and Vice-Chancellor of London South Bank University. In April, the Open University released a report showing that, a year after its introduction, 92 per cent of apprenticeship Levy funds went unspent, to the tune of almost £1.3 billion.…
This guest blog has been kindly provided to HEPI by Mary Curnock Cook, Senior Adviser to Cairneagle, a member of the HEPI Advisory Board and the former Chief Executive of UCAS. HEPI’s report on means-tested tuition fees and / or maintenance support is a welcome contribution to the debate about…
The UK’s Higher Education Policy Institute and Canada’s Higher Education Strategy Associates are jointly publishing a new research paper on charging people from poorer backgrounds less for higher education. Targeted Tuition Fees: Is means-testing the answer? by Alex Usher and Robert Burroughs is being simultaneously published in the UK and Canada.…
This HEPI report focuses on international higher education financing, discussing the concept of ‘targeted free tuition’ – the idea that, while tuition fees backed by income-contingent loans can improve access, they still do not do enough to help people from the very poorest households, who are typically the most debt…
They have very odd things to say about including students in a net migration target. In fact, they are trying to ride two horses at the same time. First, they say there is no problem with including students in the target because most students leave the UK after their studies (which…
The HEPI year runs from the start of August to the end of July and so, recently, we have been taking stock of our 2017/18 year. It was (by far) the busiest one ever on our website. The top 20 most-read entries were, unsurprisingly, headed by our ground-breaking research with Kaplan…
The Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) is publishing a report on the past, present and future of students’ unions in the UK. Released just before the new academic year begins, the report traces the history of student representation in higher education to show its role in higher education debates. David…
In this report, Mike Day and Jim Dickinson look at the past, present and future of student unions. Although almost every university has a students’ union, there is little research or reliable data on their form, role or successes. They are often seen and judged through a ‘student politics’ lens…