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The UK's only independent think tank devoted to higher education.

Blog

The HEPI Blog aims to make brief, incisive contributions to the higher education policy landscape. It is circulated to our subscribers and published online. We welcome guest submissions, which should follow our Instructions for Blog Authors. Submissions should be sent to our Blog Editor, Josh Freeman, at [email protected].

  • Leadership during the pandemic: it comes back to community

    7 September 2021 by Mary Stuart & Ceri Nursaw

    Mary Stuart, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Lincoln and board member of the National Centre for Entrepreneurship in Education (NCEE), and Ceri Nursaw, Chief Executive of NCEE, talk about the future of leadership. The NCEE will report in early autumn 2021 on leadership in higher education following a survey of…

  • What can universities do about the Black recruitment gap?

    6 September 2021

    Today’s blog was kindly contributed by Dawid Konotey-Ahulu, Co-Founder and Trustee of 10000BlackInterns. Dawid is on Twitter @Dawid1. UK industry is predominantly male and pale. Everyone knows it and, in the last decade, various initiatives and campaigns have attempted to change at least the gender bias. The 30% Club, for…

  • Ten (basic) points about demand for higher education this year

    4 September 2021 by Nick Hillman

    These are my remarks from yesterday’s UK Student Accommodation Forum on demand for higher education in 2021/22 and on, hosted by Unipol. The event also saw the launch of an excellent new paper on International Students and Factors Affecting Accommodation in the UK. When it comes to demand from home students,…

  • How many of the Chinese Communist Party elite were educated at a UK university?

    3 September 2021 by Michael Natzler

    This blog was written by Michael Natzler, HEPI’s Policy Officer. Michael is on Twitter @Michael_Natzler. Yesterday, we published the 2021 HEPI Soft-Power Index, by Nick Hillman, outlining where around the globe world leaders have been educated. While the UK comfortably keeps the number two spot, having provided education for 57…

  • Why the Government should never bail out a university

    1 September 2021 by Philip Booth

    Today’s blog is by Philip Booth, Director of the Vinson Centre for the Public Understanding of Economics and Professor of Economics at the University of Buckingham. Governments want many contradictory things. They desire high levels of government spending but not high levels of taxation. They want to reduce carbon emissions…

  • The dramatic rise of myopia in young people

    27 August 2021 by Annegret Dahlmann-Noor

    This blog was kindly contributed by Annegret Dahlmann-Noor, Consultant and Director of the Children’s Eye Service at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London and Honorary Clinical Associate Professor at UCL. You can find Annegret on Twitter @AnnegretNoor. Myopia, or short-sightedness, has always been common among young people in higher education. Many…

  • Higher education institutions are right to innovate teaching delivery, but students’ expectations must be managed to avoid disappointment

    26 August 2021 by Paul Raybould

    This blog was contributed by Paul Raybould, Marketing Director at QS Quacquarelli Symonds.  Over the past 18 months, higher education institutions have faced extraordinary challenges as they have navigated government lockdowns and re-openings in response to the COVID crisis. The logistical operations required to manage the shift to fully remote delivery…

  • Listen to students on their own terms

    25 August 2021 by Ben Vulliamy

    This blog was kindly contributed by Ben Vulliamy, Chief Executive of the University of York Students’ Union. Ben is on Twitter @bvulliamy When reading through the recently published set of essays produced by HEPI under the headline of When and how universities and policymakers should listen to students, I found…