Why you should care about the higher education white paper

Things got pretty busy this week in the union offices with the release of the higher education white paper Success as a knowledge economy: teaching excellence, social mobility and student choice on Monday morning; this is the Government’s response to consultation on the preceding higher education green paper, of which there was much criticism. It was essentially 100 pages of half baked, often misconceived ideas. The white paper may be a significant improvement and we are entirely right to celebrate the massive wins that came in response to the green paper consultation. That said, there is still a lot wrong with the white paper – the battle may be won, but the war is far from over.

One of the central principles of the proposed changes to higher education is the Teaching Excellence Framework, TEF. The idea is to have a tiered system whereby universities have to prove their ‘excellence’ in order to move up the levels of TEF, which then gives them the right to charge higher fees. The metrics against which ‘teaching excellence’ was to be measured were shoddy at best – I doubt many will agree that NSS scores stack up to the quality of teaching you receive during your degree.

The white paper also sets out proposals to make it easier for new, private universities to enter the sector and to give the government more power to shut down existing institutions. Ominously, it also seems that the government will seek to have more control over the material which is taught to students.

Another overarching theme in the white paper is that of social mobility. The argument that the government’s proposals will achieve their supposed goal of getting students from disadvantaged backgrounds into high quality universities, to result in higher academic attainment within these groups are wafer-thin. The general theory within the sector is that a tiered system of fees will only result in a ghettoisation of higher education. By this I mean that students from disadvantaged backgrounds will go to low-quality institutions to study degrees with poor graduate outcomes. The wealthy will continue to gain access to high-fee, high-quality institutions, and as a result will get into better paid jobs. As a result, inequality and the wealth gap will increase, entirely contrary to the government's alleged aim of increasing social mobility.

It's clear that the white paper represents some major wins. There are areas government has listened to the criticism of it's paper. That said, these wins are piecemeal, and mostly represent the finer details of the proposal. For example, the concept of uncapping fees was not truly removed, only delayed.

In the green paper there was a brief but ominous section about student unions, which is an area which worries me and the rest of the sector greatly. The insinuation was that unions lack accountability, transparency and regulation. There was a proposal to bring student unions into the trade union bill. The push-back in responses on this from unions was strong and several proposals from the green paper have been dropped for the white paper, however there are still elements that hint that the government will come after unions again.

The white paper states that “responses to the green paper highlighted the role played by students’ unions and guilds in higher education institutions”, however it does not truly recognise that unions play a huge role in helping to shape and enhance student experience through student activities, volunteering opportunities and lobbying within universities for improved teaching and student support. There is also, so far not much in the way of concrete commitments to give students a meaningful voice, or even a seat at the table in the proposed Office for Students, the new body which will regulate universities. For me this feels like a sidelining of students and students’ unions.

As I highlighted strongly in the ICU response to the Green Paper, we work very much in partnership with the College. Our relationship is characterised by a mutual respect for pretty much all areas of the College and we are always consulted and listened to, on issues big and small, which will affect students. I can’t see a lot in the white paper which truly recognises and commits to supporting this style of working as an integral part of the proposed future of higher education.

The government coming after student unions is no new thing; every time unions come out fighting, and often win. Clearly it is entirely possible for student unions to mobilise effectively in a coordinated way, and win big battles like these proposed reforms. These changes will have an enormous impact on students in years to come; we would be failing in our jobs if we did not fight for meaningful student influence in these changes.

ICU will be responding to the white paper, and I want to hear as much student opinion as possible. Although this is a difficult time for everyone with academic pressures at peak levels, if you have any opinions about the white paper which you would like to be incorporated into our stance, you know where to find me.