Universities UK (UUK) has released its blueprint for the future of the higher education sector, primarily focused on England.
It aims to articulate how the country’s universities can be “better in 10 years’ time” than they are today.
While much of the attention has focused on the proposals to shore up the immediate finances of the sector, the report’s remit goes far wider and is based on the thinking of several high-profile “commissioners” who each delve into a key aspect of university life.
Five big “shifts” are identified as being needed: expanding opportunities, improving collaboration, generating local growth, securing research and establishing a new global strategy for universities.
To achieve these, UUK says it is necessary to put universities on a firm financial footing, streamline regulation and improve the way the impact of these institutions is assessed.
Each section also includes a series of further recommendations aimed at achieving these aims. Here we break down some of the key reforms proposed by the document.
Finances
As expected, UUK is pushing for a hybrid solution to the current financial turmoil: indexing tuition fees to inflation so they rise over time and restoring the teaching grant so that the public pay more to cover the cost of universities.
Estimates show there is a deficit of around £3,000 per student between the current annual tuition fee figure and what it would be had it been indexed previously. If fees were indexed, they would go up to around £9,600 (the annual cost of fees in 2024-25 is £9,250), leaving the taxpayer with a considerable bill to cover the rest.
This is seen as the first phase that would stabilise the sector, with a view to then carrying out longer term transformation projects that may not necessarily save a lot of money straight away. This, according to UUK, could include:
- A review of teaching models to “institute a more streamlined approach, while maintaining the high quality of provision”
- Universities may be encouraged to review their research and focus their efforts only on certain areas
- More use of AI and other technologies to save staff time
- New group structures akin to the University of London federated model
- Collaboration between regional providers to reduce duplication and “unproductive local competition”
- There is also a call for the government to remove VAT on shared services and create a transformation fund to facilitate the above changes.
Widening participation
Since reaching Tony Blair’s 50 per cent participation target, the UK has somewhat soured on setting targets for how many people should go to university. UUK’s blueprint however proposes a new goal: 70 per cent participation in tertiary education – that’s level 4 and above – for 25-year-olds by 2040.
This would be a steep rise from the current 49 per cent. It is somewhat less ambitious than the 80 per cent by 2050 proposed by Australia’s recent Universities Accord process. Ministers have been highlighting recently how few people go to university in certain areas of the country, so it is perhaps no surprise that UUK set a further target of increasing the rate of participation of 18- and 19-year-olds from low-participation neighbourhoods from 30.5 per cent to 50 per cent.
Other reforms include:
- The need to reinstate maintenance grants for students from the most disadvantaged backgrounds and increase maintenance loans in line with inflation.
- A “more consistent approach” by universities to contextual admissions, and extending careers support beyond graduation
- The creation of a tertiary education opportunity fund to support collaborative programmes.
Research and innovation
Commissioner Lord Mandelson highlights how the cross-subsidy of research using international student fees is unsustainable, not least because that income source is increasingly unpredictable. His recommendations therefore focus on relieving the cost burden of doing research on universities including:
- A “sustained real-terms” increase in quality-related funding
- Businesses should fund 100 per cent of industry-sponsored research
- Funders should review requirements that universities match-fund projects, lowering the amount they are expected to contribute to below 20 per cent.
The blueprint also recommends government sets a new gross domestic product-based research and development target, covering both public and private investment, to “match that of the most competitive and innovative countries in the world” and launches an innovation fund to pay for research that aligns with its “missions” for government, something science minister Lord Vallance of Balham recently hinted was in the works.
Internationalisation
Recognising the controversies surrounding international students in recent years, the blueprint says a new global strategy is needed that goes beyond student recruitment and considers the “global reach, reputation and impact of our universities”.
What’s more, Lord Willetts, who acted as commissioner for this section, says universities and government should develop a new “compact” with each agreeing to take action to “secure sustainable levels of international student recruitment and well managed growth”.
Other recommendations include:
- A review of immigration costs for academics, entrepreneurs and technical staff with a view to benchmarking them against comparable countries
- Committing to the Turing scheme for the lifetime of this parliament and considering whether to associate with the next Erasmus scheme
- Engaging with the next European framework programme for research, with a view to forging an early agreement on the UK’s association.
Regulation
There are a series of recommendations for reforming the Office for Students, many of which mirror Sir David Behan’s recent report into the regulator, which he is now enacting as its chair.
They include:
- A streamlining of the priorities of the OfS to focus on quality, access, international competitiveness and financial sustainability. New regulatory requirements should only be introduced “where the public benefits are clear and the costs justified”
- The OfS “should establish a transparent risk-monitoring and assessment process to guide its engagement with providers”
- Realigning the English system to European Standards and Guidelines “as a priority”
- UUK also want government to consider how it measures the private and public benefits of universities, beyond the focus on student completion rates and outcomes currently used by the OfS.
