Category: Blog

  • 10 things universities can learn from mergers in the FE sector

    10 things universities can learn from mergers in the FE sector

    • James Clark is a Managing Director at Interpath Advisory, the UK’s largest independent Restructuring and professional advisory firm. James is co-lead of Interpath’s Education Team and has advised on over 20 mergers and potential mergers in the FE and HE sectors. In this blog, James explains 10 things universities can learn from mergers in the FE sector.

    Few people connected with the sector would contest that higher education institutions are coming under increasing pressures: a reduction in overseas students due to visa changes, inflationary pressures caused by macroeconomic factors and government policy, increased competition via alternative routes for 18+ students and plain and simple population patterns.

    Many of these headwinds were experienced by further education (FE) colleges not that long ago, and many would agree these have not vanished completely. The Area Review process, led by the FE Commissioner, sought to remove inefficiency across sixth forms and colleges – as this author would put it (admittedly in crudely simplistic terms) – by taking colleges that are half full, removing excess capacity and leaving fewer college groups which are full. Is it time for higher education (HE) to follow suit? Is it inevitable that HE will do so, though perhaps not on the scale seen in the Area Review process? Should we be seeing more mergers, more economies of scale, and more collaboration to navigate the gales?

    I’m not suggesting FE and HE are directly comparable. But they are both in the business of education, both have people at the heart of their institutions (on a major scale), both manage big cost bases and both suffer from similar issues around competition and government policy. So are there things that higher education institutions can learn from a major upheaval started in FE in 2015?

    10 things we can learn from FE mergers

    1. Are the cultures of the merging institutions aligned? One of the major obstacles to mergers (which either create an upfront barrier or mean that post-merger difficulties arise) is that the institutions have very different values and cultures. Existing relationships may help parties understand whether they are a good fit for each other. Management teams contemplating mergers would help themselves by reaching out and starting a dialogue or by increasing the frequency of their catch-ups.
    2. Understand the regulatory landscape. Navigating the regulatory landscape and remaining compliant with educational policy is complex and will be breaking new ground for many management teams. Knowledge of precedents and other case studies will be helpful. Advisor relationships are helpful here. A number of advisors, both in the financial space and legal space, emerged as market leaders during the Area Review process.
    3. Understand your stakeholders and take them on a journey. Banks, governing boards, the Department for Education, the Office for Students, pension scheme trustees. Do not underestimate the different angles each will be coming from. Each will want to know ‘what’s in it for me?’ and care will be needed to ensure each stakeholder feels supported by the merger. Poor communication and a lack of engagement could lead to opposition and unwanted obstacles.
    4. Agree a governance structure at an early stage. Effective and committed leadership is essential for a smooth transition. Conflicts in governance will create unnecessary barriers from the off. Successful mergers I have worked on have had Chairs who have worked together from the off – being like-minded, especially in the desire for success, to leave a legacy and preserve for the next generation has been key,
    5. Grip & Control. Create a steering committee. Set milestones and deadlines and be held to account. Clearly identify what’s on the critical path. If planned well, mergers typically happen on 1 August. Delays to the process could see management teams having to manage critical parts of the merger in term time. Many of the mergers I have worked on have had turnaround directors managing the process.
    6. Don’t assume the plan ends on day 1 of the merger. A 100-day post-integration plan will also be required, with dedicated resource to deliver operational control, as well as the expected benefits of the merger. Failure to plan for this could result in significant operational disruption, for example, if administrative, curriculum support, and IT systems need to be merged. The Area Review process made the 100-day plan part of its requirement for merger support.
    7. Clearly understand the rationale for the merger. Educational improvement? Cost savings? Revenue protection? This may then determine your chosen merger partner.
    8. Crunch the numbers and make sure it stacks up financially. Exploring and delivering a merger will not be cheap, with significant input from legal and financial advisors required, both before, during, and post-integration. Ensuring tangible benefits can be secured from a merger is crucial. Again, those successful mergers involved specialist financial personnel, often interims with expertise in education, to examine the potential benefits prior to the merger.
    9. First mover advantage. Don’t leave it too late to determine that a merger is right, or even essential to your survival. Be front-footed – the more time given over to the proposed merger, the smoother the process will be, and the more optimal the decisions made.
    10. A merger might not be right, but other structures may be available.  Whilst a number of FE institutions decided to abandon merger plans, this gave the institutions time to properly examine their long-term strategy, their cost base, and other potential “alliance-type” shared services models.

    Some would argue that the FE mergers have provided an opportunity for a reset, benefitting from a huge Government funding pot. Many (and not without great leadership) have successfully turned around the fortunes of financially and educationally stumbling colleges.

    One beacon that shines for me, which I had the pleasure of supporting, is the merger of Telford College of Arts and Technology and New College Telford. Within a short period of time, its financial health was upgraded to Outstanding, and its Ofsted upgraded to Good. A remarkable turnaround and testament to a focused and forward-thinking management team and governing body that, when faced with the task, grabbed it with both hands and drove it hard.

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  • Lunchtime Reading: Will having more male teachers as role models solve ‘the boy question’?

    Lunchtime Reading: Will having more male teachers as role models solve ‘the boy question’?

    • Mark Roberts is an English teacher and Director of Research at Carrickfergus Grammar School. He is the author of several books, including Boys Don’t Try? and The Boy Question, both published by Routledge.

    Spurred on by the huge response to the TV series ‘Adolescence’, Bridget Phillipson MP, Secretary of State for Education, has this week called for more male teachers to act as role models for disaffected boys.

    As a teacher who has been writing about issues with boys and education for many years, I’m delighted to see an increased focus on the debate about how best to support boys in school.

    Yet, while the idea of male teachers as role models is an alluring one, the plan is deeply flawed. Even if we can persuade lots of men to take up the call to arms to rescue our boys, there’s little evidence to suggest that the plan will work.

    The case for more male teachers

    Just as we have pushed more girls into STEM professions, we should be pushing more boys into HEAL (Health, Education, Admin and Literacy) professions. As I wrote in my book The Boy Question (2021):

    Seeing more men in teaching roles, and especially in primary settings, would help change attitudes towards both education and society at large. It would probably encourage more boys to consider teaching as a possible future career  option for themselves.

    But, in the rush to save boys from Tate and his ilk, we need to ask a key question: Will more men in teaching actually make a difference? In the age of the manosphere, would more male teachers help shift boys’ attitudes? And, from the perspective of participation in higher education, would these new recruits help improve their academic outcomes?

    The problem with male teachers as role models

    Unfortunately, there are numerous problems with the role model plan:

    1. Men are reluctant to go into teaching

      Given the relatively low pay, workload expectations and lack of status, attracting men into teaching is a challenging prospect. Efforts to recruit 6500 new teachers already look dubious, with only 200 more trainee teachers signing up in 2024/25. Without a plan to tackle negative perceptions of teaching as a career prospect, the idea is doomed from the start.

      2. Nobody can agree on what a male teacher role model looks like

        Cushman (2008) surveyed 250 New Zealand primary school principals to discover what qualities they were seeking in male teachers[i]. The principals had a long list of often contradictory desirable qualities, including outstanding sporting prowess. Research by Brownhill (2014) listed 65 different role model requirements[ii]. Meeting this idealised checklist is a big ask for any individual. Pupils, parents and politicians would also have their own role model requirements. Is any one man capable of being all those things, all the time, to all stakeholders? And even if these Supermen are capable of all this, are they also equally confident talking about misogyny as talking about algebra or Shakespeare?

        3. Children very rarely view teachers as role models

        Even if teachers were willing to try and adopt the position of idealised male teacher, there’s little evidence to suggest that boys would see them as father figures. Bricheno & Thornton (2007) found that between the age of 10-16, boys named relatives as their ‘most important role models’. Compared to 32% of young people who said they looked up to a parent, a mere 2.4% of students identified a teacher as a role model. [iii]

        4. There’s little evidence to suggest boys learn better with male teachers

        One key reason given for more male role model teachers is the suggestion that disaffected boys will respond better to teachers of their own gender. But the evidence doesn’t stack up. A 2010 study by Lam et al. of nearly 5,000 Grade 4 students in Hong Kong found no evidence that boys improved their reading when taught by men[iv]. In 2008, Carrington et al. found no teacher gender effect on attainment data and pupil attitudes in British primary schools[v]. In the same year, Marsh et al. found ‘little or no evidence’ to support the idea that boys will be more motivated by male than female teachers in secondary maths, science and English classes’[vi]. I could go on. While I welcome any efforts to recruit more male teachers, we shouldn’t expect this to lead to better results for boys.

        5. It judges female teachers unfairly

        Many of the calls for more male teachers come from voices bemoaning the ‘feminisation’ of schools. Such voices believe that female teachers are incapable of providing guidance for boys and helping them become productive members of society. This deficit model is frankly insulting to the many thousands of female teachers doing a wonderful job of educating boys in often challenging circumstances.

        Rather than getting distracted by the male role model debate, we should focus on fully supporting teachers to help boys succeed academically and get the grades required to, should they wish, enter higher education. Because that, above all, will make the biggest difference to boys’ lives.

        [i] Cushman, P. (2008) ‘So what exactly do you want? What principals mean when they say ‘male role model’’, Gender and Education, 20:2, pp. 123–136.

        [ii] Brownhill, S. (2014) ‘‘Build me a male role model!’ A critical exploration of the perceived qualities/characteristics of men in the early years (0–8) in England’, Gender and Education, 26:3, pp. 246–261.

        [iii] Bricheno, P., & Thornton, M. (2007) ‘Role model, hero or champion? Children’s views concerning role models’, Educational Research, 49:4, pp. 383–396.

        [iv] Lam, Y.H., Tse, S.K., Lam, J.W.I., & Loh, K.Y.E. (2010) ‘Does the gender of the teacher matter in the teaching of reading literacy? Teacher gender and pupil attainment in reading literacy in Hong Kong’, Teaching and Teacher Education, 26, pp. 754–759.

        [v] Carrington, B., Tymms, P., & Merrell, C. (2008) ‘Role models, school improvement and the ‘gender gap’ – Do men bring out the best in boys and women the best in girls?’ British Educational Research Journal, 34, pp. 315–327.

        [vi] Marsh, H., Martin, A., & Cheng, J. (2008) ‘A multilevel perspective on gender in classroom motivation and climate: potential benefits of male teachers for boys?’ Journal of Educational Psychology, 100, pp. 78–95.

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  • One Step Beyond: A View from a School

    One Step Beyond: A View from a School

    • Sarra Jenkins is Director of Future Pathways at Loughborough Grammar School.

    HEPI’s recent report, One Step Beyond, offers an excellent analysis of an important topic – how ready are students for higher education? The findings are in many ways heartening, with students surveyed at university saying they wanted more PSHE (personal, social, health and economic) education around, for example, finance and life skills, more careers education and more academic skills. I say it is heartening as, while these areas are all incredibly important, they are not always areas students recognise the importance of while at school.

    Of course, each student’s experience is unique. Their needs, background, and context will shape their readiness for higher education. But what are the challenges for schools within these findings?

    Careers Education

    One Step Beyond identifies that 44% of students would have liked more support with careers pathways, and recommends a one-to-one interview at 16 with a careers expert. This recommendation is also included in the Gatsby Benchmarks, so what’s the challenge? There are two resulting issues here. Firstly, there is a dearth of careers advisers in the UK. The Labour Government pledged to recruit 1,000 new careers advisers, which would be welcomed. However, training takes time and resources, and careers advisers are poorly paid within the education sector for what is a Level 6/7 role. Therefore, schools may be forced to outsource the provision of such interviews, at a notable cost.

    The second issue is the question of whether one interview is enough. As teenagers research their possible options, differing pathways open and interests evolve. Often, when I ask students who had experienced a one-off, one-to-one interview about its usefulness, their responses were very mixed. I am fortunate in being able to meet students regularly and build up a relationship with them, which allows for deeper and more meaningful guidance. One interview is better than none, but having trusted adults who the students know can allow for more open and honest conversations.

    Life Skills

    The report also identified that students wanted more ‘life skills’. A Children’s Commissioner report into PSHE identified that a majority of 16-17-year-olds had received lessons in staying safe online, puberty, healthy eating, drugs and alcohol, emotional wellbeing, mental health, relationships and staying safe. Like the HEPI report, however, it also identified learning about finances as an area for improvement. To be clear, this is also included in the PSHE Association’s Programme of Study for Key Stage 1-5 PSHE.

    The challenge can be in delivery here. The HEPI report identifies a focus on the ‘knowledge-rich’ curriculum under Gove. This can lower the profile for lessons like PSHE, especially if schools are strapped for time. Similarly, the PSHE Association identify the importance of lessons being ‘planned and taught by trained, knowledgeable and engaged specialists’. However, teachers are trained firstly in their subject. Whilst they may be required to deliver PSHE, and hopefully supported in doing so, it may well not be an area of expertise.

    Additionally, the Govian reforms and the introduction of measures like the Progress 8, plus academic entry requirements to higher education, place a heavy emphasis on grades. This can become a focus for schools, teachers, parents and students alike. However, ‘life skills’ are not – and arguably should not be! – assessed in a similar manner. Perhaps more so than academic subjects, students are also likely to have a hugely varied background in ‘life skills’. So the need for considerable differentiation in a subject that can lack the profile it deserves can make engagement a challenge.

    Academic Skills

    The HEPI report references a high volume of assessments resulting in ‘teaching to the test’, perhaps at the expense of academic skills such as academic writing and independent inquiry. However, Leora Cruddas was right to point out in the webinar on the report that skills do not exist without knowledge domains. Indeed, even if one was doing little more than ‘teaching to the test’, to do so, a teacher would be engaging with academic skills.

    My own subject of Politics has three key assessment objectives that are assessed – knowledge and understanding, analysis and logical chains of reasoning, and evaluation and substantiated judgments. These skills are academic skills, and we use the vehicle of A Level Politics for students to engage within them. Issues can occur however when students silo this knowledge. Despite, for example, similar assessment objectives occurring in A Level English, my colleague and I routinely lament students’ ability to use their skills in an inter-disciplinary manner. This is a similar problem noted in the transition from university to work.

    If it is therefore necessary to have knowledge domains in order to be able to develop skill attributes, one way in which we can highlight this to students is by interrogating the assessment objectives. I often say to my own students, ‘I wouldn’t send you on to a rugby field without knowing the rules, why would I send you into an exam without knowing the rules?’. In this case, the rules are the assessment objectives, and I want my students not to be able to blindly carry them out, but to know what analysis or evaluation is and what it looks like in academic writing.

    This is more challenging for skills not assessed; oracy and independent study are not assessment objectives in many subjects and therefore embedding the teaching of these skills is harder. Hopefully, this is something that may be seen in the upcoming curriculum review.

    Conclusion

    The HEPI report raises many important issues; if students are to thrive in higher education, they need good advice along the way and a malleable set of skills to give them the confidence to succeed in their initial stages. Hopefully, some of these issues will be addressed in the upcoming curriculum review. Ideally however, they need to include methods of resourcing and engagement to run alongside reviewed content for the widest impact in schools.

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  • Building Bridges: Enhancing employability through practically-based higher education

    Building Bridges: Enhancing employability through practically-based higher education

    In the last few weeks we have heard the worrying news that the number of young people aged 16 to 24 not in education, employment or training (NEET) in the UK is close to one million. This is almost 300,000 higher than the same period in 2021 when the UK was contending with the scarred job market after Covid-19.

    The reasons for this trend are multi-faceted, including factors such as mental health issues and insecure and poor employment opportunities. However, in the face of a difficult and competitive job market, universities have their role to play in bridging this divide between higher education and the workplace.

    The need for innovative approaches to bridge this divide by enhancing graduate employability and addressing employer demands for work-ready graduates has never been more pressing. Recent research by the Edge Foundation, in collaboration with UCL’s Institute of Education, sheds light on the transformative potential of practically-based higher education models.

    The research took a case study approach using qualitative methods, looking at two post-92 higher education institutions in England, which included collecting empirical data using semi-structured interviews with a range of stakeholders from the two universities, including members of the senior leadership teams, teaching staff, other professionals and students. In this blog, I will go on to discuss some of the key findings from this research, including some of the challenges and opportunities for universities.

    Supporting employability through collaboration

    The creation of new staff roles has been pivotal in driving the employability agenda. These roles focus on developing opportunities such as placements, mentorships, and employer engagement, while traditional academic roles are evolving to integrate practical, work-focused elements. This holistic approach ensures that curricula are not only theoretical but also aligned with real-world applications.

    Industry partnerships play a crucial role in this effort. By involving industry advisors in curriculum design and creating spaces for students to engage directly with professionals through projects and networking, universities are building a meaningful ecosystem that bridges theory and practice. These collaborations enhance students’ employability and foster sustainable partnerships between education and industry.

    Creating effective learning spaces

    Diversifying learning spaces, both formal and informal, is important to ensure that students are not only taught subject-specific expertise but also equipped with the skills to effectively apply such knowledge in real-world contexts. From practical lab work and virtual simulations to client-facing projects and digital tools, these approaches provide students with hands-on, career-relevant skills. Broader assessment methods – like portfolio work, project-based evaluations, and even film development – align better with employer expectations, allowing students to showcase critical thinking, creativity and applied knowledge.

    Students highlighted how these methods built their confidence – often cited as a key attribute for career success. Exposure to professionals through guest lectures, career fairs and mentorship programmes was particularly impactful in empowering students to navigate the complexities of their future careers.

    In the case study universities, confidence building and the development of transferable skills were further integrated into the curriculum through interpreting and tailoring practice to the sector that is relevant to individual students. Therefore, all courses were developed and updated in line with students’ ‘pathway to professionalism’.

    Yet this is manifested differently for different disciplines to ensure it is relevant and closely links the theory to practice. For example, in the business school at one of the case study universities, students establish a LinkedIn profile and begin to form professional networks through it whilst at university.

    By contrast, the professional landscape exists very differently in arts and media, with professional networks being established in different ways. Students in arts are taught the skill of networking in person and conversational skills. Activities in this discipline have included practice dinner parties with the aim to collect others’ business cards. The activities in these two examples are vastly different, but both help build the social capital of the student, which has the most currency for their industry.

    The challenges and opportunities ahead

    While we witnessed in our case study universities a promising shift towards a practical and collaborative model, challenges remain. Employer engagement, for example, can be fragmented when universities rely on individual academic links without coordinated efforts. Listening to employers as equal partners and ensuring mutual benefit is critical for sustained collaboration.

    Universities must also balance top-down initiatives with bottom-up innovation, ensuring that work placements and experiences are meaningful and adaptable. Structured dialogue and collaboration between all stakeholders—students, educators and industry partners—are vital to refining these opportunities.

    A vision for the future

    As the job market evolves, the traditional academic model must adapt to meet the demands of employers and the aspirations of students. Practically-based HE models offer a pathway to achieving this balance, ensuring that graduates are not only knowledgeable but also work-ready. In today’s dynamic and rapidly changing workplace, employability is no longer confined to the domain of careers service teams. Instead, it has become a strategic priority embedded across all disciplines and interwoven into teaching and learning. The findings shed light on how universities are reimagining employability as a broader part of their agenda, through fostering collaborations and creating innovative pathways between academia and the workplace.

    Furthermore, this research explores how universities can integrate theory and practice to better prepare graduates for the workforce. By fostering collaboration between academia and industry, these models not only enhance employability but also empower students with the confidence and skills needed to thrive in a dynamic job market. As students pursue diverse goals through their education, universities are tasked with striking a balance between career-focused preparation and academic enrichment. By embedding employability throughout the curriculum and fostering collaboration across industries, higher education institutions can empower students with the skills, confidence, and connections they need to succeed.

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  • Free speech and the University of Sussex 

    Free speech and the University of Sussex 

    • Naimat Zafary is a PhD researcher at the University of Sussex and a former Afghan Chevening Scholar.

    There are times, as a scholar from another country, that events in your adopted home catch you off guard. The fears of those around you are so far removed from your own experience that you are baffled by them. Sometimes, this simply demands that you learn more about the society and culture around you or chalk up different perspectives to the rich experience of a global education. 

    At other times, though, there is a desire to share with your colleagues your own thoughts about an issue, especially when you think others are at risk of undervaluing the freedoms and advantages they have. This week was one of those times. 

    First a bit about me. I came to this country at a moment of deep crisis. An Afghan accepted for a prestigious Chevening Scholarship, I had been excited by the opportunity to study at the top university in the world for international development and to gain knowledge that I could put to use in my home country. 

    But even as I packed my cases, the unimaginable happened. The US withdrew its forces and the Taliban entered Kabul. As fearful Cheveners worried whether they would or would not be granted a place on the last flights from the chaotic airport, I gathered my family. I was permitted a small rucksack as I turned my back on my family home and car, my library where local children had studied, and gathered my loved ones for the two-day journey through hell to the airport perimeter fence. When a British soldier finally recognised us and saw my name on the list, he lifted us over the wall and to safety. I kissed his shoulder and wept. 

    From there, we sat on the floor of a military cargo ship and flew to an asylum hotel in London, safe at last from the Taliban, who would see us as a threat for our academic links to the UK and deep commitment to education for all, including women and girls. And so, it was I travelled by train for my first class at my academic home and inspiration, University of Sussex. 

    What I found in Sussex could not have contrasted more profoundly with what I left behind. Sussex has been ranked 1st in the world for Development Studies for seven consecutive years in the QS World University Rankings. And here was a global community of men and women dedicated to the highest standards of education and using academic rigour and debate to acquire knowledge which would benefit not only the immediate community of Brighton but the wider world. 

    My wife Saima and my daughters were also inspired by the women leaders who surrounded me. While former female colleagues and family members in Afghanistan were being barred from education and being driven behind burqas and closed doors, their voices silent, I was at an institution led by a courageous and principled woman committed to supporting diverse perspectives from across the world. I expressed my views in the classroom, at conferences and seminars, and in print without fear of brutal consequences. Sussex has given a platform to voiceless Afghan girls, whereas, in Afghanistan, asking a question about girls’ education is banned; Sussex made sure to value our voices and let us speak with wider audiences.

    This was truly free speech. I was gifted the ability to challenge the accepted norms of government and aid agencies, and in turn, my own ideas were challenged daily by my fellow students, my supervisor, my community. I learned and grew to appreciate the diversity of thought and background which typified the world I had entered. 

    So how do I respond to the idea that a place that has been to me and many hundreds of Chevening scholars from across the globe has been such a haven for free enquiry and open expression has been fined for a breach of free speech? 

    I understand that the issues and debate that led to this circumstance predate the leadership of the institution I have entered. I appreciate that there are deeply held views and profound concerns at play and that the ability to speak without fear of harassment or intimidation is core to educational exchange. 

    But I also know that the commonly held stereotype of my institution in some parts of the media is very wide of the mark. Those who have, like me, known the cost of true tyranny understand that places like Sussex are the very antithesis of that and an antidote to it. And so, I offer my voice and support to the university and community that not only welcomed me but encouraged me to challenge and be challenged in the pursuit of truth and global justice. It is a proud tradition and we undervalue it at our cost. 

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  • Adolescence and Boys will be Boys – time for concrete action

    Adolescence and Boys will be Boys – time for concrete action

    Having been involved in the world of men and boys’ issues (chairing charities, running campaigns, trying to get policy change) for a long time, the last few weeks have been potentially game-changing. We saw the Centre for Social Justice report Lost Boys, Netflix’s Adolescence and the Boys will be boys policy report from Nick Hillman and me for this Institute.

    I felt that the Netflix programme raised serious issues facing some, not all, of our teenage boys, albeit it felt a little tick boxy in places (Tate – tick, Incels – tick, dad not around all the time – tick). I felt a little uneasy about how the dad was portrayed (leaving home at 6am and coming home at 8pm as if it was his fault and it was all his choice). Being the eldest son of a van driver, I am somewhat sensitive to negative portrayals of working-class dads doing the best they can to keep the lights on for their families.

    The report Nick and I wrote highlighted the continuing gender gap between male and female teenagers going into higher education. We estimate it is half a million over a decade with no sign of any change on the horizon, given the main predictor is an attainment gap in school. Boys remain behind girls at every level. Therefore, they are not getting the grades and as a consequence, are not taking enough of the exams to qualify.

    The main commonalities between both are that these issues have been hidden in plain sight. The issues raised by Adolescence about disengaged boys, negative influencers and their impact have been known for a long time. The same is true of the gender attainment gap. It shouldn’t, like last years’ Post Office Scandal drama, take TV to bring these to the fore.

    The main difference between our report and the ensuing debate about Adolescence is what comes next.

    We offered a range of policy solutions from schools taking up boy-positive principles to more male teachers and role models. Plus, there should be an increased focus on gender disparities in Access and Participation Plans, a Minister for Men and Boys and re-opening the Select Committee inquiry on boys’ attainment. Many more as well.

    What has been missing with regard to Adolescence at a national political and education level is the lack of commitment for concrete action. More male teachers and role models, came the welcome call from Sir Gareth Southgate. But there was no commitment from anyone to act. The Prime Minister said he was concerned and would look at it, but he made no pledge on action or what that would look like. There was also no huge push on tackling the problems boys have, only talking about the problems boys cause. But of course, tackling the problems boys have reduces the problems some boys cause – to themselves and others, including women and girls.

    My fear is that the media and political agenda will move on as it always does and nothing will change. The higher education attendance gap will remain, 150 plus teenage boys will die by suicide every year, well over 6,000 boys will continue to be excluded from school and 250,000 young men will still be unemployed.

    The higher education sector needs more boys to do well, so more go to higher education, and they do better when they are there. Our economy and society depend on it, too. The lesson from both Adolescence and Boys will be boys is that a continual lack of concrete action will no longer do.

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  • Teachers need support to understand what’s needed in the UCAS personal statement

    Teachers need support to understand what’s needed in the UCAS personal statement

    Our recent paper found substantial misalignment between state-school teachers and university admissions staff on what makes a high-quality UCAS personal statement.

    In our study, 409 state school teachers were presented with ten paragraphs from UCAS personal statements and asked to select between two pieces of feedback. One ‘correct’ feedback was provided by an admissions tutor, and the one ‘incorrect’ feedback was supplied by another teacher. These paragraphs and feedback were all real-world examples derived from Steven Jones’ (2016) study, used as part of Causeway Education’s pre-training programme for state school teachers.

    We found:

    • There was significant misalignment between teachers and admissions staff. In only 56.5% of cases did teachers select the ‘correct’ feedback response.
    • There are a number of pervasive myths regarding the UCAS personal statement. Teachers had a dual tendency to:
    1. Advise for the incorporation of personal content that aimed to demonstrate a holistic view of the student rather than course-related competencies; and
    2. Suggest reducing content that demonstrated course-related knowledge and skills.

    To give one example, teachers were presented with the paragraph below and asked to choose between two pieces of feedback: (1) Strong reasons backed up by detailed examples; and (2) Too much detail; doesn’t give a sense of the student as an individual. The first of these is from an admissions tutor and the second from a teacher in Jones’ (2016) work.

    My main reason for wanting to study Japanese is because I enjoy studying complex grammar rules to see how languages come together. This is why I chose to undertake Latin at A-Level as I enjoy translating pieces of complex texts. Analysing writers techniques in presenting ideas and characters is also interesting, in particular how Tacitus in Annals I, presents Tiberius as an unsuitable emperor by often comparing him to his father Augustus, an emperor who was deemed ‘an upholder of moral justice’.

    In 58.4% of cases teachers selected the first ‘correct’ answer, and 41.6% selected the ‘incorrect’ second answer.

    These findings should not be interpreted as a criticism of teachers. In the context of studies finding a considerable lack of transparency on how universities use the UCAS personal statement (Fryer et al., 2024), the burden of responsibility for misalignment falls primarily on universities. Without clear and transparent guidance, this misalignment between teachers and admissions staff is inevitable.

    There is an important opportunity to address this situation, as many universities will currently be in the process of updating their public-facing guidance in response to the upcoming UCAS personal statement reform. The shift to three short questions for the 2025-26 application cycle and the corresponding need to update guidance present universities with an opportunity to address and counter the misalignments noted in our paper.

    To support this goal, our paper contains a table of key implications (Table 5, pp.14-15), which can be downloaded directly from this link.

    We hope this is of practical use to admissions staff in updating and developing guidance on the UCAS personal statement. We contend that this new guidance, alongside transparent explanations of how the personal statement is used in selection decisions, is crucial to enable UCAS’s reform to widen participation and address inequalities.

    This blog is based on a paper ‘Investigating the alignment of teachers and admissions professionals on UCAS personal statements’ by Tom Fryer, Anna Burchfiel, Matt Griffin, Sam Holmes and Steven Jones. Due to its time-sensitive nature, the paper has been published as a preprint, and therefore has not yet been subject to peer-review.    

    The table summarising the implications for public-facing guidance is available for download here.  

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  • So now will the government take the chainsaw to HE regulation?

    So now will the government take the chainsaw to HE regulation?

    The Prime Minister recently declared that Britain has ‘too much regulation and too many regulators’ before the shock announcement to abolish the world’s biggest quango, NHS England. Since December, the Government has been fighting a war against red tape, which it believes is hindering economic growth. University Alliance, and I suspect most of the higher education sector, has some sympathy with the PM on this – at least when it comes to higher education regulation. I cannot remember a meeting in the past several years when the burden of regulation was not brought up as a key source of the sector’s woes.

    We need to be clear here that regulating higher education is important. The recent Sunday Times coverage alleging serious fraud in the higher education franchised provision system is testament to that, and it is right that the government and the regulator continue to act robustly. The question, then, is less whether higher education needs regulating at all, but rather whether the right regulators are regulating the right activity in the right way. It should be perfectly possible to have a tough regulator that prevents fraud and acts in the student interest while also reducing duplication in the system and focusing in on the areas of highest risk.

    The sheer volume of external regulatory demand placed upon our sector goes well beyond the well-documented teething problems with our fledgling regulator, the Office for Students (OfS). To outside observer Alex Usher of Canada’s Higher Education Strategy Associates, it appears extreme:

    ‘Canada has no REF, no TEF, no KEF. We have nothing resembling the Office for Students. External quality assurance, where it exists, is so light touch as to be basically invisible. This does not stop us from having four or five universities in the Global top 100, eight in the top 200, and twenty or so in the top 500.’

    The volume of regulatory requirements is even higher for vocationally oriented and professionally accredited provision, which is the lifeblood of Alliance universities. In addition to the OfS, courses which provide access to the so-called ‘regulated professions’  are also overseen by a wide range of Professional, Statutory and Regulatory Bodies (PSRBs), each with their own requirements. PSRBs have wide authority over course content, assessment, and quality assurance, with formal reaccreditation required every three to six years on average.

    In some cases, particularly in the sphere of healthcare education, multiple PSRBs can have some degree of authority over a single course. For example, an undergraduate degree course in Occupational Therapy must meet the requirements of the OfS, the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and the Royal College of Occupational Therapists (RCOT). Often, these different processes and requirements overlap and duplicate one another.

    If this seems excessive, it is nothing compared to the requirements imposed upon degree apprenticeships. Not only are they regulated by the OfS and likely PSRBs given their vocational nature, but they are also subject to the fiendishly complex funding assurance review procedure of the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA)  as well as in-person Ofsted inspections at least every 5 to 6 years that can take up to a week. A recent UA report on healthcare apprenticeships found that this means they are more expensive to deliver than traditional degrees.

    The problem of regulatory burden in higher education has been continually flagged by sector bodies and by the House of Lords Industry and Regulators Committee, which called for a Higher Education Data Reduction Taskforce. Despite this, the issue has been mostly ignored by policymakers, bar a few small initiatives. It does not feature in any of the Government’s higher education reform priorities, although the Education Secretary is asking universities to become more efficient and the OfS expects them to take ‘rapid and decisive action’ to avoid going bust.

    With 72% of higher education providers facing potential deficit by 2025/26,  it is a mystery why the higher education sector – an acknowledged engine of economic growth – appears to have been left out in the cold while this unexpected reprise of the bonfire of the quangos is being lit. To our knowledge, neither the PM nor the Chancellor have called on higher education sector regulators to demand a cut in the cost and burden of regulation as they have done for others.

    Universities are rightfully subject to robust regulation, but the current regime is disproportionate, diverting dwindling resources away from teaching, student services and research. In the absence of more funding, cutting the cost and burden of regulation would go a long way. The establishment of Skills England, with its convening power and wide-angle, long-focus lens, should be used meaningfully to cut bureaucracy for degree apprenticeships while maintaining quality. Responsibility for monitoring the quality of degree apprenticeships should be given back to the OfS rather than Ofsted, and the ESFA audit process should be simplified. The OfS should also make a public commitment to cut the cost and burden of its regulation and work more closely with other sector regulators and PSRBs to avoid overlap and duplication.

    At a time when the Chancellor has urged ‘every regulator, no matter what sector’ to enact a ‘cultural shift’ and tear down the regulatory barriers that are holding back growth, cutting the cost of regulation in higher education should be a top priority.

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  • Weekend Reading: Rethinking the Cost of Higher Education – A Lecture Revisited

    Weekend Reading: Rethinking the Cost of Higher Education – A Lecture Revisited

    • This lecture was originally delivered by the Rt Hon John Denham MP, former Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills in Gordon Brown’s Government. He gave this lecture from Opposition in January 2014. More than eleven years later, we revisit his lecture to consider what lessons it holds for today’s higher education sector.

    At the RSA in 2014,  I tried to address the mounting challenges facing the higher education sector:  a system with stressed finances, eye-watering fees,  educationally not fit for purpose in some parts, and in which limited public funds were written off while incentivising the provision of a monochrome one-size fits all teen-focussed education.  The National Accounting rules which framed much of the technical financial analysis have now changed.

    Overseas student fees held the crisis away much longer than I expected, albeit at the cost of financial and reputational vulnerability, but it’s with us now. I’d argue that today, ministers face much the same issues that I discussed.  

    The lecture is clearly a provocation, not a plan, but its key tenets are valid. It is better to use what money you have to teach students and reshape the sector today than write off unjustifiable debts in the future. Ministers should have the courage to incentivise a greater diversity of provision, options for cheaper study, different ways of working and closer relations with employers. Unless a lot more money is to be found, some of these questions can’t be ducked.

    John Denham, March 2025

    RSA Lecture – The Cost of Higher Education

    Good evening.

    Thank you to Matthew for hosting the meeting, Alison for agreeing to respond, and you for coming. You may not agree with me tonight. But if I don’t challenge at least some current assumptions about how we fund and deliver higher education I shall have failed.

    I want to change the terms of the debate, not present a detailed plan for university education.

    What’s the problem?

    But I suppose the first question is, why bother? Isn’t everything going very well?

    UCAS figures show the largest ever number of admissions last September, there’s further progress, in widening participation, and even a small increase in free school meal students going to the 35 most selective universities.

    And the Chancellor is apparently so flush with money he can lift the cap on student numbers, funding an extra 60,000 a year.

    I’m sure researchers and the UCU will say it’s no bed of roses, but cash from new fees means university life has been a lot more congenial than life in local government or the NHS for the past three years.

    The private cost is eye-watering but haven’t the high fees been accepted by parents and students?

    The problem, of course, is that the whole system of university finance for English students is sliding slowly but surely off a cliff.

    •  The £9000 fee is declining in real value
    • Capital spending has been slashed, pushing more universities further into debt driven investment
    •  The science budget will have fallen by 20% in real terms by 2016 – undoing the huge impact of Labour’s ten year investment
    •  The system runs so hot that a small misjudgement about student numbers creates a huge hole in the BIS budget. So we have ministers arguing about whether to cut research or support for poorer students
    •  The NAO have highlighted the black hole of unrecoverable loans, including those to EU students
    •  The cost of debt cancellation– the so-called Resource Account Budgeting or RAB charge – is rising steadily.
    •  The Chancellor’s new expansion – apparently based on the same accounting principles as Merdle’s Bank – has many questions about its sustainability.

    Across universities you hear the same story. ‘We might get through the next few years. But it can’t go on like this for long’.

    We already have the world’s most expensive public university system yet most proposals for change are variations on the theme of asking graduates to pay even more.

    But that’s not the end of the bad news.

    Quality and relevance

    English universities have huge strengths, of course. Our international research reputation is outstanding; we remain a magnet for international students; there is much excellence in our teaching.

    But concerns about what parts of higher education deliver simply won’t go away. Despite improvements, many employers remain deeply critical of the employability of too many graduates. One quote is not evidence, but it’s not hard to find ones like this one:

    ‘Despite our best efforts we have come to the decision that we would prefer to be understaffed than hire poor-quality applicants,’ said Bryan Urbick, founder and CEO of the Consumer Knowledge Centre. ‘As the economy rebalances, we will need more highly-skilled employees, particularly for young people with science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) degrees, but businesses are struggling to recruit good graduates from the UK.’

    And

    ‘Strong overall performance on higher skills participation must not be allowed to mask the skills shortages already impacting upon key sectors of the economy, which point to a mismatch between supply and demand’ said Katja Hall, Policy Director at the CBI.

    47% of new graduates, and a third of those who graduated five years ago, don’t work in graduate jobs. They’re in debt and its not the reason many went to Uni in the first place.

    There’s some big questions here about the links between higher education, the economy and economic growth.

    Social Mobility

    Despite steady progress in widening participation we are still miles away from a genuinely meritocratic, lifelong higher education system. The change in the most selective institutions has been small and there has been a sharp fall in mature student applications and a collapse in part time student numbers. These are the routes which have previously allowed talented individuals to enter higher education later in life.

    Austerity

    And austerity has not gone away.

    £25bn of more cuts, says the Chancellor. Labour may not have signed up to those sums, but every pound will be closely scrutinised.

    As a country, we actually spend too little on higher education. But we can’t even open the case for more until we’ve scrutinised every current pound we spend.

    And that’s not just the public money.

    The cohort of students who started in September 2013 will pay back £7.8bn over the years ahead. You can’t ask people to pay sums like this if you can’t prove it will be well spent.

    Getting more from current spending is not alternative to higher investment. It’s the essential precursor to it.

    My aim tonight

    I will argue that of the £bns taxpayers spend on higher education, hardly anything is spent directly on teaching students.

    I’m going to ask a radical question – what would universities look like if the state actually spent all it could on teaching students things.

    I will argue that we have foolishly turned our backs on modes of higher education which, for the right students, would be more cost-effective and better tailored to the economy’s needs, and do more for real social mobility.

    I’ll ask what a more cost-effective university system would look like.

    I will argue that the £bns that graduates will pay are inflated by all sorts of costs which are not their responsibility, the system lacks transparency and which, despite all the talk of choice, is actually narrowing many of the options students used to enjoy.

    I’ll ask what a fairer, more diverse university system might look like.

    And finally, I will argue that current spending does far too little to foster the real partnerships with employers that would benefit students, business and the wider economy.

    I’ll ask how we could use taxpayers more effectively to boost recovery and growth.

    Taken together, I’ll show how these changes will widen student choice, reduce the costs of higher education and improve social mobility

    I want to change the terms of the debate, not present a detailed plan for university education.

    The independent policymaker faces many obstacles.

    BIS [The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills] doesn’t allow independent access to their higher education finance model so we have to rely on their crude ‘ready reckoner’ published some time ago. An updated version promised before Christmas arrived on Tuesday – too late for today. We have, for example, had to assume a RAB charge of 35%, not the 40% which now seems likely.

    I have drawn heavily on the incomparable Paul Bolton in the House of Commons Library. But I’ve asked Paul to make so many heroic assumptions and approximations that the responsibility for using the figures is mine, not his.

    Higher Education finance

    Let’s take a quick look at the public finance of higher education

    On the government’s figures, by 2015-16 (and ignoring for now the sketchy announcement in the Autumn Statement):

    •  Of the £6.7bn of tax-funded spending, just £700m will be spent directly on teaching grant
    •  Of the rest £4.2bn is spent on debt cancellation (RAB charges)
    •  £330m goes on supporting more disadvantaged students to successfully complete their courses, and £1.5bn goes on maintenance grants to low-income students.

    Taxpayers now spend £6 on debt cancellation for every £1 they spend on teaching students anything.

    Defenders of the current system will say I just don’t understand the system.

    It is fees that pay for teaching costs, they say. And that’s made possible by RAB charges which are a progressive policy which protects graduates from degrees which turn out to be of limited economic value.

    The reality of course is that RAB charges are not so much a progressive policy as a simple recognition of the political reality that you can’t get blood out of a stone.

    According to David Willetts, perhaps 50% of this September’s students will not repay their loans in full.

    Half of all today’s students will pay 9% of all their income above the repayment threshold for the next 30 years and they still won’t clear their debts. And that takes no account of bank loans, credit cards and any other debts that mount up while studying

    We do have to hope that the mind-broadening, growing up, parts of their degree are worth it, because economically it hardly looks a good deal for them, taxpayers or the wider society.

    The RAB charge was 28% under Labour’s fee system, a projected 32% when the new system was introduced, now ministers say it is 40% and many independent experts say it will be higher.

    It’s not just that rising RAB charges are a problem for the government and the public finances.

    Debt write off also forces up everyone’s fees by top-slicing money which could have been spent on teaching, so keeping fees down.

    So it’s equally true to say that every time the RAB charge goes up it means fewer and fewer successful graduates paying off the debts of more and more economically less successful graduates.

    Or to put it another way,’ if your son didn’t go to that unsuitable course at that weak university, my daughter could pay lower fees for her degree at her more prestigious college.’

    That may not be an issue in English politics today, but it will be.

    Ever rising fees will lead more and more students and parents to ask what and who they are paying for.

    I don’t know of any progressive principle which thinks it is a good idea to induce people, generally from lower income backgrounds, to take on huge loans, demand big payments, and then to tell them they don’t have to pay after all. It’s not how progressive parents bring up our children, and the state shouldn’t do it to them either.

    Of course, some people will die, fall ill, devote themselves to their children or do what I did and spend 18 years after graduation working in low paid jobs in the voluntary sector.

    But a sound, progressive, politically sustainable system would have loans sufficiently affordable that the great majority pay them in full. If we want wealthy graduates to pay more we should tax them fairly.

    The economic and political costs of a high fees policy

    If you look at HE funding again, something else may stand out.

    Look at how many elements were the consequence of introducing a high fee market system. They are either economically unavoidable, or politicians had to introduce them to allay public concerns about high fees.

    A high cost of debt cancellation is simply unavoidable, but the repayment threshold also reflects a political calculation.

    The £150m a year National Scholarship Programme which flared and died in just three years was otherwise known as the Save Nick Clegg’s Face fund.

    In one of the largest politically driven programmes, the Office of Fair Access requires universities charging more than £6000 to plough around £700m of their fee income into bursaries, fee remission and the like of little proven benefit. The cost-effective AimHigher scheme was scrapped by the coalition

    The maintenance grant was increased by Labour and again by the Coalition to offset criticism of fees – even though there is little logical connection between the two.

    Received wisdom is that this spending is politically untouchable.

    But we must dare to think differently. Crude politics has created too many bad policies in the past.

    Let’s start by taking the radical step of putting all this money into teaching. And then, put back, working from first principles, the programmes that are really needed.

    Positive feedback

    As you put more money into teaching the cost of fees comes down. As fees fall, RAB charges fall, and the % of debt repaid increases. So you plough these RAB savings back into teaching, fees fall, RAB charges come down, you put the money into teaching and so on. The effect is striking.

    In our model, which also builds in some other changes I’m going to outline, spending on teaching rises from £700m to £4800m – a seven- fold increase. The spending on debt cancellation falls from £4,200m to £2,200m. In other words we have transferred £2bn from debt cancellation into the education of students!

    My first aim was to see what happens if we put all public funding into teaching. It turns out it would nearly halve current fees.

    But I’ve explored other changes which, though they contribute to reducing the cost of fees further, are really there because they are inherently desirable.

    In my view our university system would be stronger if it offered more choice to students who cannot or do not want to spend three years full time studying for a degree; if it gave students more choices of ways to reduce their living costs; if it made it easier for employers to partner universities in the delivery of degrees; and if it freed up other resources for re-investment.

    Cutting fees and debt repayments will ease the burden on graduates. The more immediate problem for most students is surviving while they study.

    Recent NUS research shows a £7000 shortfall per year between student living costs and the maximum income from grants and maintenance loans.

    I don’t want to sound like a party hack but the term ‘cost of living crisis’ comes to mind here.

    There’s just no prospect of finding the sort of public money which could make a significant impact on student incomes. The only way is to give students more choice of less expensive modes of study, whether

    studying more intensively for a less time, mixing part-time and full time education, combining work and study, or studying from home.

    Yet we seem to be going in the opposite direction.

    A one size fits all university system?

    Even the most fervent advocates of Labour’s 50% target would surely be surprised that it has been achieved almost entirely through the most expensive mode of higher education – the three year degree studied away from home.

    Part time education is collapsing. The number of two year honours degrees has barely changed. Labour’s employer backed degrees have been dropped. Fewer mature students are applying.

    Higher education is becoming ever more a one size fits all approach.

    It is almost a rite of passage for young people, defended as much for the so-called ‘student experience’ as the quality of education.

    I wouldn’t knock it; I enjoyed it myself.

    But should our universities be so focussed on this single mode of study?

    No one suggests that Open University graduates do not have real degrees, even though they – by definition – eschew the entire ‘student experience’.

    There is second reason for challenging our ever growing reliance on the three year degree study away from home.

    Of all the OECD countries, the UK has the highest percentage of young graduates. And this was before the fall in mature and part time student applications. Today, 90% of full time English students at university are under 25.

    More than anywhere else in the OECD we have made higher education a one-shot deal, for young people to do as early as possible.

    What on earth have we done?

    Our schools system fails more than most in overcoming inequality and social disadvantage by the age of 18 or 19. Yet on top of this inequitable schools system we have imposed the youngest HE system in the world.

    It is is impossible for all young people to compete fairly in such a system.

    Now, I don’t think we should give up trying to get the Russell Group to take admissions seriously. We should support Alan Milburn’s efforts to open up the professions. We should challenge the abuse of interns.

    But for the foreseeable future, a genuine commitment to social mobility will require the construction of routes for the late developers, those who went to weak schools and those whose parents had low aspirations.

    So as part of my thought experiment I’ve looked at the role of more intensive degrees, studying from home and combining work and study.

    Two year degrees

    Two year degrees exist in both the public and private sector.

    The private University of Buckingham repeatedly tops the National Student Survey for student satisfaction.

    We can’t know the real demand for two year courses – current financial rules make it hard for public universities to introduce them. Research for Kaplan, albeit an interested party, suggests an untapped market and good awareness of the pros and cons of intensive study.

    It certainly looks as though some students could study more intensively.

    David Willetts says that students study 5 hours a week less than in the 1960s. On average, students study for 30 hours a week for 30 weeks of the year.

    The Higher Education Policy Institute and Which study highlighted variations between similar courses in different institutions.

    And according to HEPI, EU students on the Erasmus programme find our courses less intensive than in other European countries.

    I have suggested that 30% of courses – half of them employer co-sponsored – should be taught intensively.

    Suggestions of two year degrees always bring out fears of dumbing down. But given their potential to save money both for students and the taxpayer, knee jerk responses are irresponsible unless soundly evidence based.

    In my model I’ve assumed a two year intensive degree – say 39 weeks of study a year– would cost 20% less to deliver than a three year degree. This is based on both public and private sector charges.

    But I’ve also set out to graduate the same number of students – three two year cohorts every six years rather than two three year cohorts if you like.

    So at any one time, teaching costs are about 7% less than at present, and there are 10% fewer students in the system.

    But I’ve also designed the system so that overall university income remains unchanged.

    So we have fewer students at any one time, lower costs, and the same resources. Better student-staff ratios. Less pressure on facilities. New options for research time and staff sabbaticals

    There is no reason at all why standards should fall.

    The key thing here is the use of intensive periods of study.

    Someone in work could work four intensive half years over a four year period. Someone else might do a couple of part-time years at a local college followed by an intensive full year at another university.

    Intensive study may not be for everyone. It will require commitment and a maturity of approach. In fact, perfect for the somewhat older student with work experience who needs a route into higher education but neither wants nor can afford a leisurely three year degree.

    ‘Studying from home’

    In our model, the public finance effect of more students studying from home is relatively small and not enough to justify taking choice away.

    My real motive in raising this issue is to challenge the lazy assumption that it does not matter if vast numbers of students have to leave home to study a suitable course. If anything, the current competitive regime has forced more universities to trawl a national market, not their more local communities.

    The effect is to impose quite avoidable costs on students which inevitably hit the poorest hardest. A new social divide is opening between those students who can only afford to study from home and those whose family gives them the choice to study away.

    We should give students a real choice to study from home because it is much cheaper and is the only realistic way of bridging the gap between the maintenance system and the real costs of studying.

    I’ve assumed that 60% of students might choose to study from home if they could.

    We can’t make students study from home. Many couldn’t for personal or geographical reasons.

    But we are a densely populated largely urban society with many universities; there is a network of FE/HE colleges already delivering respected degrees; it should be possible to offer the vast majority of students a real, quality, choice of courses within reach of their own homes.

    It is a scandal that, too often, that choice does not exist and universities in the same locality barely talk to each other.

    I’ve no illusions about how challenging this is.

    On the one hand, it would be big cultural shift in the way many young people and their parents see university education.

    On the other, it would be an even bigger cultural challenge to universities.

    It would actually mean – heaven forbid –suggesting that they sit down together at local or sub-regional level; Russell Group members and Million+; Alliance and GuildHE, to actually cooperate and collaborate on the delivery of courses. Real flexibility of study would enable students to study mutually recognised credits at universities within their locality.

    Some may think this is where my thought experiment breaks down completely!

    But shouldn’t we challenge universities to change their insular attitudes?

    Employer sponsored degrees

    Finally let’s look at the end product of all this.

    Of course, university education is not all about getting a job; etc; etc.

    But, you know, for many students the idea of getting a decent job is probably in there somewhere.

    The ONS figures tell us that nearly 50% of new graduates, and a third of those who graduated five years ago, don’t work in graduate jobs. Things have got steadily worse during the recession, but they were not great before the banking crisis.

    The figures don’t prove we are educating too many graduates. They do show that producing more graduates doesn’t automatically increase the demand for graduates – the drivers for that lie in research, development, innovation and the incentives for long term business investment.

    But they probably also tell us that employers are not wrong when they say many graduates lack the employability which would make employers to want them in graduate jobs.

    ‘One way to address this is to develop more partnership-based provision, with greater levels of business involvement in colleges and universities, as well as boosting apprenticeships. But the market in ‘learn-while-you-earn’ models – such as higher apprenticeships and more flexible degree programmes like part-time study – is underdeveloped.’

    CBI Tomorrow’s growth: New routes to higher skills (2013)

    So my final proposal is to subsidise employers to put their employees – current employees or potential students they recruit – through university. I’ve aimed for 50,000 a year – that’s half the total number of intensive two-year degrees.

    I would base this on the workforce development programme I introduced at DIUS [Department of Innovation, Universities and Skills] which after just three years was creating 20,000 places a year with employers paying wages and an average of £3000 towards the course costs. I’m not proposing a rigid system. We already have some companies, like JLR at Warwick, who pay the full fee costs. Others could not pay much at all. It’s the principle that matters.

    Employers and universities would work together to design the right course. Big companies can do it for themselves. Smaller companies will need to work together, but that may be a real strength if employers, perhaps under the umbrella of the Local Economic Partnerships, come together to shape provision in local universities.

    Bringing it together

    I have looked at four changes.

    • We put as much money as possible into teaching.
    •  We use public and private contributions more effectively by encouraging more intensively taught degrees
    • We ensure that more students can minimise the cost of study by providing a genuine choice of quality courses within reach of home, and that there are more routes for older students
    •  And we incentivise new collaboration between employers and universities.

    A brief financial overview

    It may be helpful to run back over the key changes this makes to HE finance

    These tables will repay a longer look when I publish this lecture, but they’ll give some idea of what is going on.

    The approximate financial impact shows how we have switched resources into teaching and away from RAB charges. By putting money from widening participation and maintenance grants into teaching, and by shortening courses, with more students studying at home, and employer backed courses, we make an initial savings of £2.3bn. The second and third round impact on RAB charges releases an additional £1.2bn.

    The next slide shows that we have kept public sector spending on higher education constant – at £6.730bn.

    And the next slide on institutional steady state income shows that the total university income also remains constant – allowing for rounding errors – at £9.430bn.

    Institutional income remains the same even though we have more students on cost-effective intensive courses and fewer students in the system at any one time. That’s why, as I mentioned earlier, student-staff ratios improve and there are resources to invest in teaching quality.

    Not shown almost £700m OFFA tells universities to spend on widening participation. With fees slashed, the case for such central dictation falls away. If you end this requirement, the money available to universities rises to £10.1bn.

    We shouldn’t overstate the case.

    One of the quirks of my model is that, while graduate numbers remain constant in the first few years, overtime they would decline.

    Clearly, we don’t want this to happen. The first call for more investment would be on the spare capacity built into our model and the second on the current OFFA spending. The next model will address this but here is more than enough money in the system to deal with it.

    Investment in widening participation by the most selective universities remains essential. But even so, I believe substantial sums could be freed up for research.

    The model has considerable flexibility.

    If you feel I have pushed for too many intensive courses, aimed for too many home students, been over optimistic about employer contributions, or the student

    Estimated institutional steady state income directly connected to full time English undergraduates: higher loans fully replace grants for low income students, and 15% premium

    premium is too low, then we can draw on these funds to adjust the system or make relatively modest changes to the level of the student entitlement and fees.

    I’ve pushed change as far as I can – partly to show what could be achieved, and partly because, frankly, I think it is essential to free up resources for research if we possibly can.

    We could deliver this system in different ways, but I think we need a fresh start; as clear, transparent and fair as it can be. So let’s make a radical break with both the current system and that left by Labour.

    The student entitlement

    I suggest that every student accepted on an honours degree course attracts a flat rate student entitlement which goes to their university. Flat rate, irrespective of institution, course, length of course or current fee level charged.

    So, you take the £4.7bn we have now allocated to teaching. You top slice, of course, the extra money required to support science, engineering and other high cost courses. And then you divide the rest amongst the students.

    In the simplest form, this produces a student entitlement of £14,800 per student.

    The fee now payable is the difference between the current cost of a degree and the value of the entitlement. It would be financed and paid back as at present.

    The total fee cost of the average three year degree – and remember that in my model the great majority of degrees, 70% – would be three year degrees or longer – the average total would be less than £10,000 – about the levels fees were at when Labour left office.

    And the total fee cost of a full cost university – currently £27k – would fall to about £12,000.

    The total fee cost for a two-year degree would be less than £5000.

    For those on employer sponsored degrees of course, there would be no fees and they would receive a wage as well.

    There are many different routes through this system. But this example – a three year degree studied away from home (so the most expensive option) – show how total debt falls, total payment falls, and the % repaying in full increases.

    The second example is a two-year degree – but again, assuming study away from home, so the most expensive choice – shows an even more marked difference.

    Students get a lot of choice. Money follows the student.

    But it is an entitlement, not a voucher.

    It is high time we set aside the childish fad which said that every public service reform had to be expressed in the banal and vacuous language of consumer capitalism.

    If my proposal were adopted it would be because the people of England had decided to establish an entitlement for their children to go to university, and that’s how it should be described.

    Support for low income students

    Significant fee reductions come from investing in teaching, rather than the political and economic costs of a high fee system.

    But some students from non-traditional backgrounds do need more support to complete their courses successfully. Students from poorer homes do have to live while they study. So we need to ensure these needs are still met.

    I doubt that the OFFA-mandated money has much effect. Bursaries may shift students between institutions, not get them to apply in the first place. Fee remission is simply inequitable in a system of graduate repayments. Much of this money could be better spent either on teaching or on research.

    The needs of students who need extra support are real as Million+ have argued. We could simply retain the current widening participation spending or student opportunity as it is now called.

    But I would rather create an additional student entitlement, a student premium if you like, which would clearly make disadvantaged students financially more attractive to universities. My model builds in a 15% enhancement to the student entitlement.

    My model replaces the student grant with a loan. By doing so we ensure that the low income student has just as much money to live on as at present.

    While their maintenance debt will go up, their fees have fallen dramatically, and it is the total debt – fees and maintenance – which determines how much graduates have to pay back.

    In all the modelling we have done, low-income students will end up owing less money and paying back less money on every single mode of study and length of course. But still have as much to live on while they study.

    This is such a radically different picture to the one we have today – lower fees, lower debt, lower payments, as many graduates, and new money for research and teaching – that you might be forgiven for thinking there is some sleight of hand. Mistakes aside, there isn’t.

    All I have done is ask a few basic questions about using money better.

    What George Osborne should have done

    In the Autumn Statement George Osborne announced that he would put money from the sale of the student loans book into creating 60,000 additional student places. He says it will cost £700m a year.

    There’s too little information to incorporate it into our modelling.

    But all other things being equal, if George had invested £700m in this system, he could have created as many additional graduates, at lower cost, and had money left over to invest in teaching quality or research.

    A few closing thoughts

    I’ve packed a lot into a short lecture, so I want to allow time for Alison’s response and your questions.

    But in closing, let me touch on a few other issues

    Firstly, we have cut private repayments by £2.4bn without reducing university income. I wanted to lower the private cost of a degree.

    But this does also substantially reduce payments by the wealthiest graduates; would that be fair?

    The option is there to introduce a free standing graduate tax. A 1% tax above the threshold would produce £1bn a year after 20 years and £2.5bn in the longer term. It would take time to start as you wouldn’t want anyone to be paying more than the current 9%. But it soon be generating useful funds.

    My model doesn’t depend on it. But it may be part of the longer term answer of generating new, hypothecated income for our universities.

    Second, no one is going to price a part-time degree higher than a full time degree, so part-time degree costs will fall. So we can trigger a renaissance in part time education.

    Thirdly, you would really want to integrate these reforms with higher level apprenticeships and the real problems of taught masters. We can at least see the analogies between higher level apprenticeships and employer co-sponsored degrees, and it’s worth noting that an integrated masters degree, with intensive teaching, would cost students less than a current three year degree.

    Fourth, It won’t be long before the most research intensive universities – come along and ask ‘can we put our fees up now please?’. This is indeed more politically feasible than under the current model.

    But we shouldn’t rush into it. We’ve raised university spending by £700m, largely by reducing obligations on the more expensive universities. So we need to know more about the impact of these reforms on different types of university.

    But, in any case, tough conditions would have to be met. We would need a self-limiting clawback mechanism of the type proposed by Browne; universities would have to take responsibility for any additional fee loans and write-offs; they would have to demonstrate collaboration with other local universities on courses and mutual recognition of credits; and they would have to deliver progress, not aspiration, on widening participation.

    Fifth, I’ve not looked at implementation. But I would note that if we started now we could take advantage of the current demographic decline and reduce the number of three year degrees more than the proportion of students taking them. We could build demand for intensive courses, beginning by ring-fencing money for the growth in employer co-sponsored degrees.

    Several people have already asked whether this is about to become Labour policy.

    I certainly hope Labour will look at this, but I hope others will too.

    The modelling is crude, the assumptions broad, the approximations considerable. It’s not a detailed plan for higher education and it’s in no state to go into anyone’s manifesto!

    We’ve had enough damage done by enthusiastic politicians working on the back of envelopes already.

    Wouldn’t it be good if BIS now took this concept, put it in their more sophisticated models, and informed a genuine public debate? But that would take Ministers who don’t feel personally or ideologically wedded to the current system.

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  • Collaboration in Action: The Third Sector Forum and the OfS Equality Agenda

    Collaboration in Action: The Third Sector Forum and the OfS Equality Agenda

    Last month, the Office for Students (OfS) confirmed the successful bids for their £2 million Equality of Opportunity Innovation Fund, launched to ‘support institutions to undertake new and innovative collaborative work or projects that will reduce risks to equality of opportunity’. 

    It is the culmination of three years of collaboration, beginning in February 2022 when Impetus hosted John Blake in his first external speaking event as the OfS’s Director for Fair Access and Participation.

    This seminal event gave rise to the Third Sector Forum – a quarterly dialogue between the Office for Students and third sector organisations working to support young people into higher education.   

    As an impact funder supporting the best attainment, engagement, and employment interventions for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, we recognise the invaluable role of the third sector in addressing deep-seated barriers. We wanted to support this knowledge-sharing in the widening participation space.  

    Three years on, I spoke to some of the CEOs of Third Sector Forum organisations on what’s made the forum a success.

    Trust and openness  

    I was struck by the number of CEOs who cited the forum’s format as key to its success. While we fund widening participation organisations, Impetus itself is not a direct delivery organisation, meaning we can provide an independent middle ground. As a result, many emphasised the forum’s open and trusting nature and the uniqueness of this set-up. Anna Searle, CEO of The Access Project, reflected on how ‘you don’t often have the [governmental regulatory body] being as open with their constituent group’.  

    Another key factor in the success of the forum was the genuine engagement from the Office for Students, and particularly John Blake. Jayne Taylor, CEO of The Elephant Group, emphasised how John ‘genuinely listens to the voices around the table’, while Anna was quick to note how he went beyond discussing challenges for the OfS and what was next and provided his genuine views and reflections.  

    Collaborating and knowledge sharing

    Sam Holmes, CEO of Causeway Education, mentioned how participating in the sessions enabled him to form partnerships with other organisations in the space. Sitting next to Jayne when the Innovation Fund was announced, he says they were ‘immediately having conversations about […] potential collaboration’. 

    For organisations such as Causeway, which occupy a different space to programmatic organisations, it was also valuable to hear from colleagues across the sector. Forum members were able to share updates which, for Sam, demonstrated the wealth of collective knowledge and painted a picture of the higher education landscape.

    Shifting the narrative

    Action Tutoring is another member of the forum who wouldn’t ordinarily describe itself as a widening participation organisation. Susannah Hardyman, then-CEO, initially wondered if it was the right place for Action Tutoring, whose tutoring stops at age 16.  Organisations focusing on Level 2 outcomes have not always been seen as part of the widening participation space, but John Blake’s conscious decision to widen the focus of the equality of opportunity agenda brought them within scope. Over time, Susannah began to feel Action Tutoring had a place, helping to shift the narrative of what ‘widening participation’ means.

    At Impetus, we know that each step up the qualification ladder halves your chances of being NEET. We also know that early intervention is critical – before the barriers that young people face become acute – making the case for the importance of Level 2 pathways in achieving equality of opportunity. For Susannah, both the dialogue and John Blake’s emphasis on GCSE attainment, ‘[genuinely] did change the narrative of how we understand widening participation’. The implications of this reverberated beyond the four walls of the forum, opening up opportunities for organisations like Action Tutoring, which was later funded by the University of Brighton to work with two secondary schools on GCSE attainment.

    What next? 

    Policy professionals will know how rare it is to attribute policy change to their work. So, while Third Sector Forum members should undoubtedly shout about the fact that their expertise and dedication have helped to bring about £2 million of funding and a change to regulatory guidance, the work doesn’t end there. 

    Last year, the widening participation gap grew to 20.8 percentage points – its highest recorded level. The number is staggering, and even more bleak when coupled with a higher education sector on its knees and a ‘fiscal blackhole’ with seemingly no money to plug it up. It is clear that fighting to achieve equality of opportunity is more important than ever, but how?

    That a key pillar of the updated regulatory guidance is collaboration with the third sector is a testament to the success of the forum, but we can and must go further. 

    For Jayne Taylor, this looks like working groups or direct-action areas to facilitate collaboration, leveraging the collective knowledge and resources of the sector. With further investment, the forum could even evolve into an ecosystem, with opportunities for publishing research, bidding and running events together. 

    Collaboration also looks like an ever-evolving partnership between third sector organisations and the regulator. Anna Searle suggested implementing mechanisms for feedback loops, such as regular newsletters, to continue to foster a transmission of knowledge between forum members and the Office for Students. 

    For some, it feels like public policy is waiting for a return to pre-pandemic conditions. They believe that to truly move forward, we need to adapt to the present socio-economic landscape. One CEO pointed out the need for realistic conversations about the economic realities of the sector. With 40% of higher education institutions thought to be in deficit in 2023/24, providers and organisations are operating in an unprecedented funding landscape. For Sam Holmes, clearer messaging for charities that have relied on university contracts is increasingly necessary. He suggests there may even be benefits to involving funders in these discussions, alongside considering alternative partnerships, funding models and strategies.

    For others, such as Susannah Hardyman, we must continue to reevaluate our understanding of ‘equality of opportunity’.  With a record 56% of students now working part-time while studying, foodbank usage doubling since 2022, and 60% stating that money concerns affected their university choice, the landscape has undoubtedly changed. Where two decades ago the focus was relatively narrow – focused mostly around supporting high-achievers from deprived areas into high tariff institutions – this understanding has moved on. For Susannah, this needs to be taken into account, not to quash ambition but to broaden the definition of opportunity to reach as wide a group as possible. 

    When we hosted the Director for Fair Access and Participation three years ago, he said,

    ‘We are not short on people who will give up days, weeks, years of their time to pour into projects supporting the vulnerable and disadvantaged. We are not short on good suggestions, possible solutions, and rough ideas how things could be better. No, what we lack, still, is enough commitment for all those dedicated people to work together…’ 

    While the past few years have demonstrated the commitment that may have been missing previously, if we are to give every young person equal opportunity to succeed, our work is far from over. 

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