The most striking trend in international student mobility over the past forty years is the increase in the number of globally circulating students, from approximately 250,000 in 1965, up to an estimated 3.7 million at present (OECD 2011: 320, UNESCO 2006: 34). Perhaps as important as the growing numbers of students is the fact that the traditional…

Since 1998-99, when the Scottish Parliament, National Assembly for Wales and Northern Ireland Assembly were established, higher education policies appear to have diverged across the four "home countries" of the UK. This divergence is most visible in the contrasting tuition-fee and student-support arrangements for students entering HE in 2012, and…

The renewal of strategy development and implementation is important in the context of the changing higher education landscape. Changing government policy and the political agenda require a university to engage in careful strategy development and implementation which result in long-term sustainability. The political interest of the government will…

The author has been asked by the Editor-in-Chief to write about the impact of fees on the sector. He does so with concern for the impact on and implications for applicants, students, graduates and their families. Home and European Union undergraduate tuition fees are of course only part of the fee picture for higher education institutions (HEIs),…

Inside the academy there is a cultural perspective that it should run itself, in the sense that "business as usual" should be done with no one's hands obviously on the levers. This theory reaches its high point in the "self-government" of Oxford and Cambridge colleges. In this article, the author explores the question, "who runs our…

In a conversation between Francis Fukuyama, the Stanford-based political scientist, to publicise his new book "The Origins of Political Order," and Martin Wolf, the distinguished financial journalist, Fukuyama compares political systems in countries like China and Singapore with the liberal West. Without taking the analogy too far the same might…

During the half century of the AUA's existence UK universities have experienced the fastest rate of growth and most far-reaching changes in their history. Funding arrangements in particular have changed radically. Since 1961 the finance office has been transformed from a small group of bean counters into a key management group at the heart of all…

This paper discusses a way of thinking about disability which has emerged out of the UK Disabled People's Movement over the last three decades in opposition to the preceding medical model of disability which viewed disability as synonymous with problem. Disabled people are increasingly challenging the notion that their embodiment is inherently…

Not for the first time in its history, the UK Higher Education sector finds itself in a position of significant financial constraint. The current coalition Government's actions to address the budget deficit have led to sweeping cuts across many public sector departments, but it is higher education that has seen the most draconian reduction in…

Massification of higher education has not been able to solve societal issues in the UK to the extent originally envisaged. Whilst universities have achieved increased student numbers and widened participation from various societal groups, those coming from socially disadvantaged groups can still often have a very different experience of university…

Perhaps more than any other country in Europe, the UK has well-established equality law and practice, originating with the Race Relations Act of 1965, but based on a longer history of struggle for equality. In 2011 public bodies, including higher education institutions (HEIs), were required to respond to the implementation of the Equality Act…

Legislation to outlaw discrimination has existed for over forty years. The Equality Act (2010) states that it is unlawful for an employer to discriminate against a candidate for a job because of their age, disability, race, belief, sexual orientation or gender in any part of the recruitment process--in job descriptions, person specifications,…

The two big events in higher education during 2010 were the implementation of the Equality Act, and the introduction of a new dispensation on fees and funding. The former is intended to promote equality, the latter is premised on the need for economy. In this article, the author focuses on the effect of the latter on the former. He considers this…

This article tells the story of a conversation-based review process and subsequent re-structuring that has transformed the supporting administrative infrastructure at the Scarborough campus of the University of Hull into a highly centralised model, breaking long-standing organisational silos and putting the student perspective into central focus.…

In this article, the author reflects on research management and administration (RMA) as a profession. RMA arose from the need to manage growth in the number and complexity of research awards over the last fifty years, and is an activity and profession that continues to mature. It has grown in parallel with the increasing complexity of research…