Tag Archives: uuk

weeknotes

Is it a bird… Is it a plane… No, it’s a super-university! – Weeknote #341 – 12th September

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The big news this week was the announcement of the merger between the University of Greenwich and the University of Kent. It is being called the creation of the “first” super university. I wrote about this on the day of the announcement. Degrees from the new super university will still be awarded in the name of Kent or Greenwich. I think that this is a wise move and needs to be supported, mergers don’t and shouldn’t always means the loss of institutional identities.

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

Also this week I published a couple of vision pieces on The University Group™ and The Specialist University Centre. With the recent announcement of the “first” university super merger between Greenwich and Kent, I was reminded of a piece of work I wrote last February, which never got further than my hard drive (well cloud storage). Also last week was the UUK Annual Conference, the then science secretary Peter Kyle was speaking on the second day, and calling for increasing specialisation and collaboration in higher education, which reminded me of another vision piece. So, I put them both on the blog.

One of the reports I have been working on this year was on subject collaboration within higher education. We did reference a previous British Academy report, so it was with interest that I read their recent report, which obviously focuses on the arts and social sciences. I wrote up some thoughts on the report and the implications for the UK higher education sector.

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Image by fancycrave1 from Pixabay

On the 1st September we published a version of one of the reports I have been working on, this week I have been  working with others finalising the second report which will be sent to UUK members.

The NRENS 4 Education group I am part of had a meeting with the European Commission. The last time we met, it was in-person in Brussels, this time it was a Teams meeting, so no Belgian chocolates for me this time.

We had a discussion and reflected on UUK’s annual conference, which took place last week. Positive attitudes to collaboration, however still understanding the challenges in making it happen. The Kent and Greenwich merger may demonstrate one way forward.

Writing up a business case for visit to Netherlands and attendance at Learning Impact Europe 2025 Conference.

I have been invited to be a speaker at HE Transformation 2025, taking place 19 – 20 November at the NEC, Birmingham.

I did make it to our office in Bristol and London this week.

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Opportunities for efficiency – Weeknote #340 – 5th September

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Back to work after a week off. August is quite quiet for Jisc, partly as it is quiet for higher education. September though, is when it all kicks off. Though saying that, last week another blog post on the Jisc websites, Setting the foundations for successful collaboration was published.

Convincingly making the case for collaboration across the higher education sector for better student experiences is crucial, but how do you get key people on board for institutional and personal buy-in?

As with most content that I have published on the Jisc website, it was a group effort in writing it. It has developed and changed since I originally proposed the idea. It complements the post It’s better together – how to make the case for collaboration which was published the week before.

This week saw the publication by UUK and Jisc of the report, Opportunities for efficiency through shared services.

The Universities UK (UUK) commissioned report, led by Jisc, presents a compelling case for a sector-wide action plan. New recommendations, published today, outline opportunities for smarter collaboration across the UK higher education (HE) sector, drawing on the long history of successful shared services that play a vital role in securing improved user experience and significant university cost savings through greater efficiency.

The report, developed under the UUK Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce, calls on universities to make best use of existing, underutilised shared services to fully support entrepreneurial, locally driven initiatives and encourage nationwide growth. It highlights that while shared services like UCAS and Jisc’s Janet Network are used right across UK HE, most others remain underutilised due to lack of awareness, funding, and strategic coordination.

I did a significant amount of work on this report; it was one of three that we worked on as part of strand 2.

I was invited to attend the Universities UK’s Annual Conference 2025 which was taking place this week at the University of Exeter. Exeter is just over an hour away down the M5, so quite an easy place to get to. Jisc’s CEO was delivering two sessions supporting the publication of the report.

It was a good conference with some very good sessions and insights.  I am though reminded of the recent post I wrote about hindsight in which I looked at the challenges and change that Intel and Kodak faced, and some would say failed to adapt to. I had listened to a podcast, which discussed how Kodak did not adapt well to the digital revolution in photography. It was interesting as it wasn’t as though Kodak ignored digital, they actually produced a handheld digital camera back in 1975.

The current economic climate and the state of financial sustainability is here, and universities know this. This was expressed many times during the conference. However universities may know and realise that they need to change, but they can’t afford to make those changes now. As a result they may never change.

Usually at the time of year I would be off to the ALT Conference, well I didn’t go last year. This year the conference is taking place later in October up in Glasgow. As my role is less about learning technology and more about strategic operational issues, the value of the conference to my work is less than in other years. There are some interesting looking sessions on the programme, so it’s on my list of possible conferences, but we will have to see.

I had a couple of meetings about NRENS 4 Education (or E in NREN as I have bene referring to it on the blog).

weeknotes

Towards a new era of collaboration – Weeknote #327 – 6th June 2025

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Titanic Belfast
Titanic Belfast by James Clay

Having spent last week in Brussels, this week I was over in Belfast attending the EUNIS 25 Congress. I was supporting a workshop session on student mobility. as part of our work on NRENs for Education, or as I have been calling it internally E in NREN.

There were lots of interesting sessions, I think for me one of the challenges the sector faces, is that yes there are data and technical issues that need resolving, but there are only part of the solution. Some of the real challenges is rethinking the operating model and making those cultural process changes required to take advantage of the work being undertaken with standards and data.

Spent some time preparing for events and meetings I am attending in Brighton at TNC25.

The Universities UK Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce have published their first report, Towards a new era of collaboration.

Universities UK’s (UUK) transformation and efficiency taskforce was established in response to significant financial pressure on the higher education sector in all four nations of the UK. Our aim is to tackle the challenges we collectively face, to support the efforts of individual universities to achieve greater efficiency, and to seek opportunities for collective action to help our universities go further and faster than they can alone. This report is the first of three outputs from the taskforce, and together these mark Phase 1 of a long-term commitment to embark on a new era of collaboration.

I have been working on phase two of the work, though not sure if there will be a similar public facing publication.

As with much of the communication about collaboration, the challenges facing the sector, means the real challenge for many universities will be taking that first step towards collaboration. What and where should a university collaborate and with whom.

WonkHE had this perspective on the publication.

The case for university collaboration in the UK has been made with increasing frequency as the financial squeeze starts to make itself felt in profound ways. That said, there has been little tangible activity – the report points to longstanding structures such as the University of London federation, existing networks of research collaborations, and strategic working with local stakeholders. The taskforce adds the multi-academy trust-esque group structures employed by the (HE and FE) University of the Highlands and (cross sector) London South Bank to the list., and there is a nod to the world of sharing expensive research infrastructure too.

Interesting blog from the Competition and Markets Authority

Our universities are one of the UK’s greatest success stories – they produce world-class research, drive innovation across the economy and remain critical to equipping people with the skills they need to get on in life. Skills are, of course, crucial to economic growth and a successful industrial strategy, both of which we support. However, we know that many higher education providers are facing very challenging financial situations and that greater collaboration between universities could help support the sector. This is where competition law – and the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) – can play a role. While some collaborations are more problematic under competition law, there are many areas where they are beneficial and pose no competition law risks. We can also support collaborations that benefit the UK by making clear that we won’t prioritise enforcement.

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The answer is 43% – Weeknote #323 – 9th May 2025

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This was a shorter week, as not only was there a bank holiday on Monday, but I also took a day’s leave.

On Tuesday I was down in Southampton for a meeting. Though there are many advantages to Teams and Zoom, sometimes participating in an in-person meeting gives you more insights than the online version. There are affordances with digital, so I always consider them just different, rather than one being better than the other. Also, less train travel with an online meeting.

Spent most of the rest of the week working on the collaboration project we are doing with UUK. There were a few administrative meetings as well in my diary.

Friday I had an early start for an NRENs4Education (what I have been called in these weeknotes E in NREN) meeting about a future meeting in Brussels. As a group we have quite high aspirations, but there are many challenges that we face as we look at student mobility across Europe.

The press this week as been full of depressing detail about the financial state of higher education.

WonkHE did an illuminating article, What the latest HESA data tells us about university finances, in which David Kernohan notes:

I’m a fan of net liquidity days (a measure showing the number of days a university could run for in the absence of any further income). Anything below a month (31 days) makes me sit up and take notice… there’s 10 large-ish universities in that boat including some fairly well-known names.

The BBC News site also had this on on the 43% of universities who face financial challenges.

More than four in 10 universities in England are expecting to be in a financial deficit by this summer, according to new report from the Office for Students (OfS). The OfS, which regulates higher education providers, said universities were closing courses and selling buildings to cut costs, but “significant reform and efficiencies” were needed to turn the tide. It said a drop in international students coming to the UK was the main reason for the worsening financial position. The report found that 117 of 270 higher education institutions (43%) registered with the OfS expected to be in deficit by the end of July – despite course closures, job losses and selling off assets.

This demonstrates once more for the need for the sector to rethink their operating model. This can’t be just about more money, as we do need to consider the impact that (continually) raising fees will have on students, student wellbeing, and future student recruitment.

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Is anything changing? – Weeknote #322 – 2nd May 2025

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wood

Spent much of the week working on the UUK Collaboration project with various meetings and events.

I was in London for the UUK’s The University Transformation and Efficiency Summit, where I delivered a workshop on shared services.

HE has many existing shared services. Some are so fundamental it is now hard to imagine the sector without them: e.g. the UCAS admissions service, and the Janet network. Getting a new shared service off the ground feels difficult, but with hindsight successful shared services appear obvious.  

Good shared services are built on strong relationships and trust between the parties. They require standardisation and alignment: institutions willing to adapt their ways to working to fit with the wider group. Join this session to meet others and become part of the coalition of the willing, those working together to share services, for the benefit of all. 

This session will present findings from the Jisc/KPMG report ‘Collaboration for a Sustainable Future’. It will hear case studies of institutions currently offering their services to other universities, and what they learnt through establishing them.

The workshop went down well, but on the train home I reflected if the real challenge was talking to those institutions who didn’t attend and aren’t engaged with the transformation possibilities that are being discussed as part of the work of the Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce.

As well as presenting in London I also was attending and presenting at the online HE Shared Services and Structural Collaboration Conference.

I delivered a session entitled A Roadmap for Shared Service Collaboration on Data, Digital and Technology.

  • The starting point: Where does successful tech collaboration exist already in the sector and what are the priority areas for partnership?
  • Where is there potential for shared procurement and system management that continues to support differentiation?
  • What are the opportunities for rationalisation through shared digital services?
  • How can the sector support meaningful transformation through common models, standardisation and central coordination?
  • What are the next steps from Jisc and the wider sector to drive this agenda forward?

There are some real challenges in moving to an operating model that takes advantage of the potential lower costs and efficiencies in using shared services, but there are also the compromises that have to be made.

weeknotes

Through the medium of dance – Weeknote #319 – 11th April 2025

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Image by Bernard-Verougstraete from Pixabay

On Monday I was prepping stuff for the rest of the week. In the main developing and writing activity for UUK Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce meeting. This involved diamonds and scissors.

I spent the day in London on Tuesday, the afternoon was taken up with the UUK Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce meeting, however as I had a two hour online meeting with the HEAnet Group Advisory Forum I spent the morning in the office.

I had some necessary Dovetail admin and Miro admin to do this week. I hadn’t used Miro for weeks and then all of a sudden, I was asked to input to an influx of Miro boards. I do use Miro, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. I don’t much like the alternatives either.

We had a discussion about capturing the senior voice and then what do we do with that once we have that. A bit of we can’t please all of the people all of the time.

Spent some time planning a session for AHUA Conference next week, which is taking place at Swansea University.

Recognised the need to plan out E in NREN work I am undertaking in some more detail. It has been agreed that this will continue into 2026.

I am attending and presenting at a couple of online conferences later this month, so spent time planning, developing and writing those presentations. Yes you would be right in thinking there will be lots of photographs.

Image by Tom from Pixabay

Noted that the situation in higher education is still not good, and in some sense is getting worse.

As higher education institutions shed thousands of jobs, Times Higher are tracking developments and bringing together latest analysis with resources for affected staff and students.

As a mounting financial crisis grips UK universities, thousands of jobs are being axed across the sector. This page tracks latest updates, exploring the reasons behind the redundancies, how they will affect staff and students, and the long-term impact on higher education and research.

In similar news the sustainability of higher education was discussed at Parliament. Where the Augar report was reviewed as Education Committee learn about university finances

Notably, Augar argued that no university should fail – the impact on local areas and the international reputation of the sector would be too big – and called for “behind the scenes” support for struggling providers. Universities UK’s Malcolm Press argued once again for a transformation fund to support universities in adapting to the current circumstances.

Our work with UUK was mentioned in passing.

Malcolm Press (vice chancellor at Manchester Metropolitan University, at the committee representing Universities UK) emphasised just how hard universities were working to drive efficiencies – highlighting examples of collaboration, and the ongoing Universities UK project in response to the government’s reform agenda.

Made me smile for the end of the week. This from WonkHE on Sussex on taking the position that universities can’t prohibit any speech unless it’s already explicitly banned by civil or criminal law.

 “The University would have to tolerate an academic conducting every lecture through the medium of song or mime (noting that freedom of speech protects the manner of speech as well as the content).”

weeknotes

Writing up stuff – Weeknote #314 – 7th March 2025

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Much of the week was about working on the UUK project on collaboration.

I have been working on supporting the work on 12 ideas; combine that with review meetings, writing content, tidying up slides for a presentation, and then some.

Also been working on the E in NREN work looking at student mobility across Europe.

Attended the Wonkhe and Mills and Reeve Connect More webinar realising opportunities for strategic collaboration in higher education which was very interesting and relevant to my current work.

Attended a briefing for Digifest which is happening next week.

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Raising the standards – Weeknote #308 – 24th January 2025

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I was off to London again this week. I was attending an 1EdTech Event in London, Innovate your way out of the funding crisis. This was my first engagement with the standards community for some time. Before I joined Jisc and when I was working in Further Education I did a lot of work looking at standards in relation to moving student data around so it could be imported into the VLE. Then there were standards for learning objects and ensuring that they would work on the VLE, both importing and exporting the right data. I also being very impressed with LTI and what it would enable in allowing students to use a WordPress installation for blogging. Blogging, what was that, and is it still around?

We are starting work on a collaborative project with UUK on collaboration. Part of that is reviewing the original terms of reference and bringing in a consultant to undertake some of the work as well.

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Image by fancycrave1 from Pixabay

I have been spending time researching, planning and writing initial draft for a higher education state of activity report.

In February Jisc has one of its regular meetings with the OfS and I have been preparing some notes for that meeting.

Spent time on the planning and logistics for a workshop I am attending in Helsinki in February. The workshop is about NRENs for Education. NRENs are the National Research and Education Networks that most countries have for connecting their universities and research institutes. In the UK Jisc is the NREN. This workshop is bringing together a group of like-minded NRENs to work together on essentially student mobility.

I am anticipating that Helsinki will be cold. I have been before, for an EU e-Learning Conference which took place in July 2006 in Finland. I reminisced about that conference back in a weeknote in July 2019.

I also signed up for TNC in Brighton in June. It’s the first TNC I go to, and it’s in the UK. Reminds me when I got funding to go to the international conference mLearn, and the year I went, it was in Dudley.

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I haz a cold… – Weeknote #307 – 17th January 2025

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The week started off well, but by the end of the week I was off sick with a bad cold.

Have been having meetings with UUK in regard to strand two of the work of UUK’s Taskforce on Efficiency and Transformation in Higher Education. Strand two covers: Developing detailed business cases on options for national collaboration, which will be externally published, and will give the sector clear paths towards transformation. This builds on the recent report I worked on, Collaboration for a sustainable future which looked at collaboration and shared services.

On Thursday, decided I would get to London for our team away day. It was exhausting and certainly I regret a little bit in heading off there feeling rough as I did.

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Conditional creativity – Weeknote #303 – 20th December 2024

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Image by mohamed ramzee from Pixabay

An interesting blog post from WonKHE about the challenges that exist with restructuring higher education. It’s not as simple as we think it is. There is a lot of resistance and scepticism about merger that we have seen elsewhere as well.

Connect more: creating the conditions for a more resilient and sustainable HE sector in England

There is a startling dearth of law and policy around structural collaboration for HE; some issues such as the VAT rules on shared services, are well established, while others are more speculative. What would the regulatory approach be to a “federated” group of HE providers? What are merging providers’ legal responsibilities to students? What data and evidence might providers draw on to inform their planning?

Alignment, standardisation, rationalisation, and commonality, though requisite for merger, you don’t need to have merger to undertake the work to allow for greater alignment.

The Times Higher Education published an article about collaboration, and mentions the Jisc collaboration report by name.

A recent, comprehensive report on “collaboration for a sustainable future” by Jisc and KPMG celebrated more examples – but also made a compelling case for the sector to keep pushing itself on this.

In addition, Jisc is involved in and working with the Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce. I am working in collaboration with UUK on a joint project working on the following strand:

  • Developing detailed business cases on options for national collaboration, which will be externally published, and will give the sector clear paths towards transformation

The launch of the taskforce is on the UUK website as well. I like this quote:

“While institutions have been doing more and more to be as efficient as possible, they have largely been doing so at an individual level. Truly impactful transformation will best be delivered through partnership and collaboration at both a regional and a national level. It is time for some blue sky thinking on what that looks like.”