Graduates preparing for work (where available)

From the BBC: Students should get work experience to boost their chances of getting jobs in the downturn, the head of the CBI says. Richard Lambert says students must get skills and first-hand experience of work while still at university. In launching the report with Universities UK on preparing graduates for the world of work, …

Student loans good. Graduate tax not so good

Good piece by Nicholas Barr in the Guardian on the reasons the current loan system is better than the NUS-preferred Graduate Tax: The bottom line is that we have the best of both worlds. Graduates face what looks like a graduate tax, but one that does not go on for ever. And universities face a …

More on Departmental Headship (as or versus Stalinism)

Following up an earlier post on this topic (with thanks to John Dale and the author for the prompt): Nice post in which Mark Harrison draws on substantial knowledge and experience to compare and contrast Stalin's Soviet Union with his reign as Head of Department: The big difference was this: I had no barbed wire. …

Cambridge avoids extra accountability (for a while at least)

"Cambridge dons retain control of university" According to the Guardian, Cambridge has fended off pressure to change the composition of its Council to include a lay majority. The extent of the additional accountability requirement which has been agreed seems to be an annual meeting between the chair of the Audit Committee and a Hefce officer: …

VCs protest: what do we want? Higher fees!

When do we want them? Er, as soon as possible really but it is recognised that there might be the tiny problem of electoral arithmetic to contend with, so bad luck everyone. The BBC has done a survey of a selection of VCs on their fee preferences: Many universities in England and Wales want a …

Magical mystery tour? A new MA in the Beatles

Guardian carries some news about a new course at Liverpool Hope: The long and winding road to an MA in Beatles songs. Just the kind of stuff to get the IUSS Select Committee going: The masters degree in The Beatles, Popular Music and Society is being billed by Liverpool Hope University as the first such …

RAE Funding Results

RAE funding results out Following the results published in December 2008. Handy summaries of research funding outcomes are published by the Times Higher Education. Resources have been spread more thinly and there are some perhaps surprising recipients of significant growth in research income: Biggest winners by cash increase (growth, % increase) University of Nottingham, £9,685,797, …

Accountability costs “cut by £50 million”

Times Higher Education: Accountability costs cut by £50 million. A Hefce-commissioned report from PA Consulting claims universities’ administrative burden has been reduced by £50m. As reported in THE: Between 2004 and 2008, it says in the report, the costs of accountability fell by just over a fifth, broadly in line with Hefce’s targets. This fall …