HEFCE Annual Conference 2012

Alan Langlands on putting our best foot forward in the next spending review

Alan Langlands emphasised the need for the sector to begin to prepare for the next spending review. In so doing, he said that it would be important to understand the context in which we are operating: both the higher education policy context, and the wider context of economic growth. In building the case for continuing public funding of higher education, the sector will need to have a unified view about who it is, what it does and why higher education is important. It will need to make the practical case for the right mix of public/private funding, and it will need to have a clear focus on how higher education contributes to long-term economic growth.

He drew on Jamil Salmi's representation of world class universities, which highlights the importance of the intersection between learning and teaching, research and knowledge exchange. Universities are in a strong position to support economic growth and society at the regional, national and international level. This will involve new and continuing challenges for the sector: there are 2.5 million HE students in the UK with a wide range of talents, needs and ambitions.

The sector will need to quantify its achievements: the social, economic and cultural contribution of universities and colleges, and the world-leading reputation of our research and knowledge exchange activity.

The 'right' mix of public and private funding for higher education is a key issue. HEFCE funding helps to meet the costs of provision - for widening participation activity, high-cost subjects, postgraduate study, and strategically important and vulnerable subjects - that cannot be met from fees and that supports thousands of students. How well can the balance be maintained, and how might this impact on Government calculations related to the student loan book?

Alan Langlands concluded by reminding delegates that HEFCE is the only national agency that works at the intersection of learning and teaching, research and knowledge exchange, and assuring them of its continuing commitment to supporting an orderly transition to the new fee and funding arrangements, respecting institutional autonomy.

Rana Mitter on the humanities going global

Professor Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China, University of Oxford described the humanities as a terrain where society is in conversation with itself, and noted that this has now become a global conversation. He spoke of a humanities-driven public sphere, and the importance of story, narrative and creativity to global conversations.

He noted the potential of broadcast and public events to get people interested in issues, and to nurture an appetite for further learning. By way of example, he noted that China and Singapore were strongly committed to the humanities.

He asked the delegates to value the precious mixture that the UK has in its public life, and the important contribution the humanities make in this respect. He stressed that it would be a matter of regret if this mix were lost.

Robert Winston on Saxophones, science and society

Robert Winston, Professor of Science and Society and Emeritus Professor of Fertility Studies at Imperial College London outlined some key developments in human knowledge from Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' to synthetic biology.

He noted that there has been a growing crisis over communicating with the public about technologies, emphasising the need for listening and for two-way exchanges. He also said that it is important the sciences learn from the social sciences, and that science is part of culture, not separate from it.

Lord Winston spoke of teaching being at the core of a university's function, and suggested that a way has not been found to value teaching in the same way as research.

He also spoke of the need for an open mind in research investigations, and how results which are tempting to disregard as mistakes can lead to new insights. He underlined the need for humility among academics, stating that the more science we do, perhaps the less certainty there is.

Frances Cairncross on a volatile world economy

Frances Cairncross, Rector of Exeter College, University of Oxford, spoke on higher education and a volatile world economy, noting that higher education now encompasses a wide range of subjects and is important globally. She emphasised the rise in the importance of human capital in relation to physical capital for national competitiveness, and noted that this was recognised across the world. With universities being a major source of this human capital, she described universities as a global success story.

For Britain, she described higher education as an international trade, being a source of revenue and jobs, a source of income for higher education specifically, and a means of attracting global talent.

However, the challenges for fair access were also drawn out, with reference to the difficult decisions for universities in balancing the recruitment of international students and ensuring access for those from non-traditional HE backgrounds in the UK. She saw a key challenge as ensuring excellent education from the earliest years for people from these backgrounds.

She spoke of a need to acknowledge that, while individuals benefit in many ways from higher education, one of the key reasons people study is linked to future earnings and the employment market. There are also public gains from higher education, including higher economic growth and greater social participation. She therefore saw student fees as a good policy, as individual students benefit, but that public funding was a good policy too, as there is a public benefit.

She concluded with the observation that over time university education would become the standard for the majority of young people in much of the world, that as a result there would be increasing diversity, and that the challenge for developing countries would be to build good mass university education.

Liam Burns on promotion, protection and resistance

Liam opened on a strongly positive note - that at the moment we have some of the best provision in the world for students, providing significant personal, social and cultural benefits.

However, he felt that a substantial critique of current policy could be offered, noting among other things that the complexities of the student finance system allows higher education institutions to charge more than would otherwise be the case. He also noted that there were potential risks for lifelong learning, with those who have already obtained higher education qualifications being only able to return for further study if they find their own means to finance it.

In response to the changes, Liam outlined how he felt the sector might respond through sustaining previous good relationships between students and their universities and colleges, and further developing these into a truly partnership-based relationship, including on issues where students and institutional leadership might disagree. The sector might also seek to address issues of student protection, with one suggestion being that the sector might itself develop options for supporting students in the case of their courses being unable to continue. He also challenged HEFCE in building in a focus on the interest of students across the range of its work.

Liam told the audience to expect student resistance to policy that does not work in their best interests, including through the development of positive alternative ideas. In closing, some ideas he offered were: breaking down boundaries between further and higher education, to create a unified tertiary education; breaking down what he saw as the myth of a gulf between academic and vocational forms of learning; and a deeper attention to the possibilities for learning over the life course.

David Willetts provides the Government's view

The Minister of State for Higher Education, David Willetts, opened with reflections on the value of diversity in higher education, spurred by the venue of the conference, the Royal College of Music. He committed that the Government would do all it can to protect this diversity in the system.

This diversity was placed in the setting of the Coalition's reforms of higher education, with the Minister calling the changes radical and recognising both the amount of change and what universities and colleges were doing in response. In relation to this, he later referred to the AAB policy, which affects around a quarter of all student places in 2012-13, and the core-and-margin policy, which he said has begun to make higher education more accessible, notably through higher education in further education colleges.

The Minister emphasised the entitlement of students to excellent education, while recognising that students are not just consumers. He had already heard of responses from universities and colleges to the new levels of demands being placed on them by students.

Key to empowering students is, for the Minister, the availability of high quality information. However, his ambition is for this to be coupled with an easing of the burdens of data collection on universities and colleges in the coming years.

The Minister invited policy ideas from the delegates in a number of areas - including how to finance postgraduate provision in future and, in response to a question, how to communicate opportunities to mature learners. He also expressed a desire to develop a stronger evidence base in relation to widening participation, looking at what works best both in the UK and overseas. He gave reassurance that universities and colleges would retain control over admissions, with no introduction of quotas. He also noted that admissions can be founded on more than simply A-level results, wanting to work for a genuine meritocracy.

International opportunities also figured strongly in the Minister's address, and he spoke of developing 'system to system' offers, with strong partnerships between higher education in England and other nations. He urged ambition in developing a broad proposition in this area, where he felt that we are still only scratching the surface of the possibilities.