In a context of policy uncertainty and instability in the tertiary sector, Universities UK has released a blueprint calling for greater collaboration and deeper investment in UK higher education. Universities UK worked with a group of 10 expert commissioners to produce its report.
Opportunity, growth, and partnership: a blueprint for change from the UK’s universities includes recommendations for expanding access, investing in research, and stimulating local growth. It also emphases the need for a coordinated global strategy for UK universities.
Acknowledging multiple challenges – including a recent decrease in demand from key student markets such as Nigeria and India – the report argues that a cohesive strategy is necessary to improve the UK’s global reach, reputation, and impact in the years ahead.
Professor Dame Sally Mapstone, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of St Andrews and President of Universities UK, writes:
“We stand at a fork in the road in the history of the UK’s universities. There is now a clear choice. We can allow our distinguished, globally competitive higher education system to slide into decline. Or we can act together, as institutions and with government, to ensure that higher education is able to deliver for the nation into the 2030s.”
Report arrives at a critical moment
As a new Labour government takes office in the UK, the report is well-timed to engage the government in a conversation with huge implications for the future of higher education in the country.
On 27 September 2024, the new Labour administration announced that it was launching a review of the UK’s international education strategy, a move that could lead to the setting of new student enrolment targets.
The existing strategy, created under the former Conservative government, set a goal of growing overseas student numbers to 600,000 by 2030. This target was reached in 2020-21. Amid growing public concern over immigration figures, however, a series of policies less welcoming to international students were adopted, causing student visa numbers to fall by almost 17%.
More funding needed
To improve the UK education brand in overseas markets, improve access to higher education, increase collaboration, and produce graduates with skills needed by local and national labour forces, the report says that universities need more government funding.
Earlier this month, Universities UK stated that government grants and fees have not kept pace with rising costs and argued for accelerated funding to avoid worrisome budget deficits. Such ongoing deficits, the report suggests, have led to an over-reliance on international student fees to stopgap funding shortfalls.
Yet the government plans to do away with a multi-year tuition freeze and to allow fees to rise with tuition. Prime Minister Keir has also announced that the government is backing away from a pledge to abolish tuition fees.
At the recent ICEF Monitor Global Summit in London, Jamie Arrowsmith, the director of Universities UK International, said that the current situation – in which universities are forced to rely on international student revenue for operations – is unsustainable:
“Fundamentally, basing the long-term sustainability of universities – which should be seen as a real strategic asset for the UK – on a pretty dynamic and actually quite volatile funding stream cannot be in our interest, it cannot be in student interest, and it is certainly not in university or community interest.”
The Rt Hon. the Lord Willetts, who authored the report’s global chapter, says that policy flip-flops regarding international students have damaged the attractiveness of the UK as a study destination.
Call for a coordinated UK global strategy
To strengthen the UK’s reputation abroad, the report calls for a coherent Global Strategy for Universities with this objective:
“To harness the global reach, reputation and impact of our universities to create opportunity, foster prosperity and develop knowledge, both for the UK and our international partners.”
This strategy would be based on broad consultation with stakeholders within education, training, research, and global development. The report envisions the strategy being “owned and coordinated by the Cabinet Office, setting a national framework that recognises and supports the needs and priorities of regions and devolved administrations. It is critical that the Home Office be a partner in this strategy, alongside the Department of Education, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, Department for Business and Trade and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.”
A ‘Compact’ proposed for universities and government
The Universities UK report also advocates for a new Compact between universities and government. This would set a stable policy framework and be geared at securing “sustainable levels of international student recruitment and well-managed growth.”
Such stability would be achieved by universities fully implementing the Agent Quality Framework and Fair Admissions Code of Practice; committing to sustainable levels of international student recruitment; investing in student experience; and diversifying to avoid single-market dependencies.
As for the government, the Compact would see the government demonstrating:
- A long-term commitment to stable, sustainable levels of international student recruitment and well-managed growth, including a commitment to retaining the Graduate Route in its current form;
- Greater transparency when reporting migration trends;
- A review of the removal of visas for dependants, acknowledging the impact this policy has had on equity, diversity and diversification and on the UK’s wider strategic objectives, particularly its effect on programmes designed for students with significant professional experience.
In addition, the report advocates for a coordinated plan to attract global talent; commit long-term to the Turing scheme; consider a future association with the Erasmus scheme; increase funding for global research collaboration; and partnering of universities and government to help mitigate ongoing security risks from hostile outside actors.
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