TEF ‘cost more than £15 million’ but most students unaware of it

The latest Teaching Excellence Framework is estimated to have cost the English higher education sector more than £15 million but has had a limited impact on students, according to new research.

As it prepares to “transform” how it assesses standards, the Office for Students (OfS) has published a series of feedback reports on the 2023 TEF, an evaluation of student outcomes that is designed assist prospective applicants to make informed decisions.

A poll by Savanta in April and May last year of about 800 students found that just 42 per cent had seen the TEF ratings for any of the universities they were interested in.

Just over half of respondents were aware of whether their university was rated “gold”, “silver” or “bronze”, and 44 per cent agreed that an institution’s rating did not interest or affect students – even when they were aware of the score.

However, the survey found that TEF does have an important influence on the decision-making process of university applicants who are aware of it.

Among those who viewed the ratings, 73 per cent considered them extremely or slightly important, and 88 per cent said a gold rating would make them more likely to apply.

And 84 per cent said the TEF rating helps a university gain a good reputation for teaching.

In a series of focus groups with prospective undergraduate students, Savanta found that TEF served as a “confirmatory tool rather than a decisive factor in their university choices”.

“The limited awareness and understanding of the TEF and its aspect ratings hindered its use,” the report says.

“Participants had difficulty understanding the detail of how TEF ratings were decided and the criteria used, which led to confusion about the differences between gold and silver ratings and the comparability of different providers with similar ratings.”

The report urges further promotion of the TEF through teaching personnel and advisers, improving the clarity and transparency of ratings and the decision-making process, and making information more concise.

“By addressing these areas, the TEF has the opportunity to become a more valuable and effective tool for prospective students in making informed decisions about their higher education choices.”

In a separate piece of research, the OfS also published analysis of the “considerable” costs and effort associated with the 2023 exercise – which triggered a wave of institutions challenging their rating.

It estimated that the total cost to the participating providers was between £7.8 million and £12.2 million, with a mean estimate of £10 million.

In addition, the estimated cost to the OfS of delivering the assessments over the 18-month period was £4.3 million – which included staff costs, panel member and assessment costs, and other delivery costs. Another estimated that £3.8 million had already been spent on developing the TEF in the years prior to this.

On top of the financial element, the research found a heavy administrative burden for institutions. The average provider spent 116 days on TEF submissions – ranging between 30 and 410 days.

Another publication from the OfS found that most providers care about doing well in the TEF and the reputational impacts of their ratings, and that participation in the TEF has helped them understand their performance better and identify areas for improvement.

In a blog post, Graeme Rosenberg, the OfS’ head of student outcomes, says that the findings would fit into the regulator’s “wider review of student information so that students can understand and use this information to make well-informed decisions”.

“We’ve already been speaking with sector representative groups and staff at providers about our initial thinking to develop an integrated quality system,” Rosenberg writes. “We’ve heard that we should build on the elements of the TEF that worked well and improve on areas that worked less well for some providers.

“As we consider our future approach, we’ll continue to engage with students, student representatives and providers to develop a system that delivers as much value as it can – this will complement and strengthen their current work to enhance student outcomes and their experience.”

patrick.jack@timeshighereducation.com