Handout to accompany a presentation for Sheffield Hallam's Learning & Teaching Exchange conference January 2015, available here: http://www.slideshare.net/SHULT/back-to-the-future-jan-2015

1. Looking forward to 2020
The University of the Future - where will SHU be in 5 years time?
Great Expectations
HEPI - HEA Academic Survey 2014
Full-time undergraduate students in UK universities
express high levels of satisfaction with their
courses: 86% are fairly or very satisfied with their
course.
On average first years have 3 of their weekly
contact hours in classes of over 100 but only 10%
of students in classes of more than 100 found them
beneficial to their learning.
Students with between 0 and 9 contact hours are
notably less satisfied than those with between 20
and 29 contact hours.
Levels of satisfaction decrease above this level,
perhaps because other activities can become
squeezed
Asked about spending priorities students have four
clear priorities emerge (after reducing fees) each
• more teaching hours
• smaller class sizes
• better training for lecturers and
• better learning facilities
This still holds true!
'Because of the ways in which the education market is moving, both
domestically and internationally, it is essential that the
University and its staff have a clear and shared sense of
direction.'
Colin Gilligan, 2006
FT - The future of the University October 2014
Generation globetrotter
Pressure on places at universities in emerging countries has created
globally mobile students that western institutions are eager to tap into
Up with the best
The increasingly international nature of the higher education landscape
poses challenges for the assessment of quality
Northern light
Dame Nancy Rothwell, University of Manchester’s vice-chancellor,
refuses to see students as customers and is grateful for her flirtation with
art
Virtual value
Moocs have undoubtedly created a stir in the world of higher education.
But are they a fad or a credible alternative to the lecture theatre?
Radical Interventions in Teaching and Learning
NUS November 2014
We are at a tipping point in the future of higher
education. The partnership agenda is gaining
traction and it is setting the debate for a radical
overhaul of teaching and learning.
• Learning spaces and teaching methods are
often geared towards surface learning,
• The structure of learning is often
authoritarian rather than democratic.
• Lecturers and teachers are often
constrained by
• standardised and overbureaucratic
processes.
• Learning spaces reproduce existing
inequalities rather than challenging them.
• Standardisation has led to unhelpful
generalisations about students.
• The measures of teaching quality are
problematic.
The Guardian - The university of 2020: predicting
the future of higher education
Funding and finance
• Students will become reliant on alternative
sources for funding:
• Employers will have to start playing a bigger
funding role:
• If we need to rely on industry funding for course
we may lose even more control of our curriculum:
JR: Tax private companies, rather than students,
and use that to fund universities: Hypothecate the
money back to the university where the graduate
studied and do away with fees. That'll encourage
HEIs to run courses the labour market needs and
students to do them.
• HE will be shaped by the pursuit of monetary
objectives, like those being promoted by the EU
right now:
• Quality will be closer to 'value for money' and
accountability
Student experience and widening participation
• Widening participation should be about giving
every person the right opportunities to higher
learning should it be relevant and helpful to them.
• There will be more virtual participation:
• Universities must engage with schools:
Independent, personal contact with advisors and
with information sources is critical if you want
people, who have come from backgrounds with
limited experience of it, to aspire to university.
What do you think ?