Hi,
I work at the DIUS in the UK. Part of what I do is to raise awareness online about a Higher Education (HE) ‘debate’ which we have ongoing here in the UK at the moment (http://www.dius.gov.uk/policy/he-debate.html).
This HE debate was initiated by John Denham, the Secretary of State with responsibility for universities, when he invited a number of individuals and organisations to make contributions on a number of specific HE related themes. The intention being that these contributions will inform thinking on this issue leading to a formal public consultation on a policy framework for HE in the autumn.
He also said that he’d like to hear from a wider audience of those with an interest in HE – particularly those already discussing these issues online – so that these views can be fed into the policy review process in parallel.
Since this is an education focused community focusing amongst other things on HE I thought I should let you know that this is happening and tell you how you can provide input if you wish to.
On our behalf JISC Involve is hosting a blog on the broad HE debate (http://hedebate.jiscinvolve.org/). As you can see the blog is divided into nine individual parts on which comment is possible. The blog is only a few days old and will be live for about seven or eight weeks. As you can see it is early days yet but already we’re starting to see some interesting points raised, and we’re keen to broaden the debate further. Some of the issues being discussed include:
- What will demographic changes mean for the shape and nature of HE?
- How are higher education institutions currently responding to student expectations?
- How should HE respond to the fact that adults, often studying part-time will make up an ever-increasing proportion of the home student population?
- How can the interaction between academia and public policy makers be improved?
- How do we anticipate the international market for higher education will change over the next 10-15 years?
- How attractive are research careers to graduates, and what can be done to enhance this?
While this is obviously a UK focused exercise many of the issues are relevant across the globe. Demographic changes, part-time study, the internationalisation in HE, etc. Input from anyone on these issues regardless of location would be welcome. Broader experiences help I think with a better understanding of the issues.
Thanks for reading and I look forward to reading your comments.
Vincent McGovern