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].
This is a guest blog contributed by Professor Steven Spier, Vice-Chancellor at Kingston University. Helping people achieve their aspirations and unlock their potential are surely two of the key missions of higher education. And while it should not be necessary to add to that mission, regardless of one’s background, the…
Lucian J. Hudson writes in a personal capacity. He is Interim Director of Public Affairs and Communications at Oxford University, and a past Director of Communications at The Open University and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office At the HEPI Annual Policy Briefing Day, the starkest of conclusions was reached by…
Each year, HEPI and Advance HE publish the Student Academic Experience Survey. It was originally designed to track alterations in the student experience as student finance changes. The Survey started in 2006, in the months before £3,000 fees came in, and has continued through the various financial changes since, including the…
This is a guest blog kindly contributed by John Claughton, who was Chair of HMC Sports Committee from 2009 to 2016 and the Chief Master of King Edward’s School, Birmingham from 2006 to 2016. Professor Clough of Huddersfield University produced research for HMC that proved that taking part in competitive…
This is a guest post kindly contributed by Louis Coiffait, Head of Policy at London Metropolitan University. He writes here in a personal capacity. HEPI had no role in the placement of organisations on the graphs below. It’s a common question, but one that’s tricky to answer. Here are two…
Thank you, OfS, for publishing Contextual admissions – promoting fairness and rethinking merit. The fundamental premise is that access to higher education is being unfairly denied to disadvantaged students, as evidenced, for example, by the fact that ‘in 2018, 18-year-olds from the most advantaged areas were 2.4 times are more likely…
A guest blog kindly contributed by Dr Anna Bull, senior lecturer in sociology at the University of Portsmouth and a founding member of The 1752 Group, a UK-based research and lobby organisation working to end staff-to-student sexual misconduct in higher education. The #MeToo movement has led students who experience sexual harassment at…
The UCL Institute of Education regularly hosts fascinating ‘What if …‘ debates about topical education issues, expertly chaired by Professor Becky Francis. I have just had the pleasure of taking part in one on access to higher education alongside Anna Vignoles, Paul Jump and Claire Fox. My speech is below,…
A guest blog kindly contributed by Dennis Sherwood, founder of Silver Bullet Machine. I’m an outsider. As neither an academic nor in HE administration, I have no right to interfere. But as an outsider, and one who has worked closely with many academic teams, perhaps I can act as an…
Tonight, a new book on the state of independent education will be officially launched by Routledge. With 57 short contributions, many of the authors will be well-known to HEPI’s readers for they include a Vice Chancellor, a peer, various academics, a former special adviser to a Conservative Secretary of State for Education, think tankers, an education journalist and a former Labour Secretary of State for Education. My own chapter in the book draws comparisons between independent schools and UK universities. It is reprinted below, with kind permission of Routledge. The post-war school system in England and Wales was established by the 1944 Education Act. Section 81 of the Act that enabled Local Education Authorities…