Debating the Future of Higher Education

In a speech at the end of February, John Denham announced his intention to develop a framework for Higher Education over the next ten to fifteen years. He said:

The world is evolving very quickly and we must be able to unlock British talent and support economic growth through innovation as never before. We need to decide what a world-class HE system of the future should look like, what it should seek to achieve, and establish the current barriers to its development. As I have said previously, I want to do this before we initiate the review of undergraduate fees next year.

As part of this process I am inviting a number of individuals and organisations to make contributions. Not to write government policy but to help inform it and – equally important – to stimulate debate and discussion in the sector.

These contributions have been delivered to the Secretary of State and are now available.

Interestingly there is also a blog on the future of higher education intended to facilitate discussion on each of the themes. It is early days yet (very few comments at time of writing) but a commendable approach from DIUS to engage the community.

The contributions can be found here.

• Academia and public policy making
• Demographic challenge facing Higher Education
  
• Intellectual property and research benefits
• International issues in higher education
• Online higher education learning (E-learning)
• Part-time studies in Higher Education
  
• Research careers
  
• Teaching and the student experience
• Understanding institutional performance