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].
Our latest guest blog comes from Professor John Vinney, Vice-Chancellor of Bournemouth University, in the form of a constructive response to the TEF proposals. With the green paper response deadline looming, most readers will have settled their responses and, according to recent press reports, many believe that the proposals are bad…
The controversies stoked by the higher education green paper continue to be in the news, not least because of our own response to the green paper (which was published yesterday). That is as it should be, because the volume of proposals on higher education emanating from the Government since they…
This guest blog has been contributed by Mrs Sam Davies, Director of Philanthropy and Alumni Engagement, at the University of Brighton. David was a long-standing and faithful friend of HEPI’s and we are pleased to be able to publicise this welcome initiative. David’s last two publications for HEPI can be found here and…
The Political Economy Research Centre (PERC) at Goldsmiths, University of London, recently put up a post entitled ‘Debt Briefing 01: Student Debt in the United Kingdom‘. This was part of an ESRC-funded project on ‘Crafting an Alternative Politics of Debt’. The piece is a useful summary of some of the debates around…
This guest blog has been kindly contributed by Jon Wakeford, who is Group Director, Strategy and Communications at UPP, a member of the CBI London Council and a member of the Higher Education Commission. The distinction between the academic and vocational route in British education is commonly understood, especially by pupils and their…
In a recent speech to a Universities UK conference, I pooh-poohed various conspiracy theories doing the rounds on the recent higher education green paper, such as the idea that the Government wants to put the right to raise the undergraduate tuition fee cap in the hands of a Secretary of State…
The publication of the higher education green paper a few days ago was a big moment for English policymaking – even if the chilling events in Paris have made such parochial concerns seem less important, as well as serving to remind people of an atrocity in which students at a Kenyan University were murdered in April.…
This guest blog has been contributed by Bright Blue, a centre-right think tank that has today published an important new report on the decline in part-time study and what to do about it. There has been a significant and worrying decline in the number of UK and other EU part-time entrants…
HEPI recently published a lengthy collection of essays on the crisis in part-time study. The book included data on the problem, suggestions for how to tackle it and a chapter from London Economics on how the Government have almost certainly exaggerated the non-repayment of student loans from part-time students. This…
This blog post is based on a speech by Nick Hillman, Director of HEPI, to a Pearson UK Hot Breakfast on 9th November 2015. First, there weren’t many surprises. Mark Leach of Wonkhe has said ‘For UK higher education, the world changed on Friday.’ I’m not so sure. The green…