Do we need more ways to measure HE?

Clearly we do…

There seems to be a new review of performance indicators for higher education underway. This is, it appears, a “fundamental review” of how higher education is measured in the UK.

The review has been commissioned by HEFCE’s Performance Indicators Steering Group (the acronym for which I get a childish pleasure from saying out loud) and the details can be found at the site “Measuring higher education in the UK“.

The review is asking a number of important questions:

1. Is there are need for performance indicators – why should we measure the performance of higher education institutions?
2. Who are the users of performance indicators, and what sort of measures do they need?
3. Are the existing performance indicators fit for purpose, and how do they link with other measures?

They are keen for lots of people to contribute:

We are looking to involve a wide range of stakeholders who have an interest in how performance in higher education is measured. These may include universities and other individual HE providers; HE representative bodies; data users; funders, data owners and statistical bodies; employer representative bodies; and organisations representing and supporting prospective and current students and their parents.

Whilst I fear I have come to late to this to enable more contributions as the deadline has already passed (and there are no other links on this page to take you anywhere useful), it will be interesting to see how many do contribute and what the results are. What will those new performance indicators be? Or will everyone agree that there aren’t any meaningful indicators which can genuinely measure university performance?