Policy – Gold Leaf

In November 2017, the UK government asked HEFCE (now UKRI / Research England) to introduce a “Knowledge Exchange Framework” [KEF] to measure effective collaboration and knowledge exchange with industry and business. It is designed to complement the already established REF[1] and TEF[2] and to evaluate the contribution universities make to the exploitation of knowledge.

After a consultation and pilots run with 21 universities in 2019, the KEF decisions report and metrics were published on 16 January 2020, followed by the Clustering and Narrative Templates report on 2 March 2020. In these reports, detailed information about the metrics and procedures can be found. The main thing to be aware of is that -unlike the REF and the TEF – it is NOT an excellence framework which measures quality. It is a purely quantitative ranking exercise that – certainly at first – will be purely of informative character.

The first iteration of the KEF will be launched in the current academic year (2019/2020) with Higher Education Institutions [HEIs] submitting their narratives between now and the end of May 2020 and results to be published in summer 2020. Similar to the TEF, the KEF will take a metrics-driven approach, though with a narrative component consisting of three brief statements in the areas of institutional context, local growth and regeneration and public and community engagement. The metrics are based on existing data sources that are available to UKRI and do not have to be submitted by the universities; the metrics will automatically be calculated but not automatically be published unless the institutions opted to participate (i.e. submitted a narrative). In the first year, participation is not compulsory, but it is highly likely that full participation will become a condition for Research England funding in future.

The key perspectives and metrics used will be

Research Partnerships (Contribution to collaborative research and Co-authorship with non -academic partners)
Working with business (HE-BCI[3] Contract research income with SME and non-SME business and HE-BCI Consultancy income with SME and non-SME business)
Working with the public and third sector (HE-BCI Contract research income with the public and third sector and HE-BCI Consultancy income with the public and third sector)
Skills, enterprise and entrepreneurship (HE-BCI CPD/CE income, HE-BCI CPD/CE learner days delivered and HE-BCI Graduate start-ups rate)
Local growth and regeneration (Regeneration and development income from all sources and additional narrative)
IP and Commercialisation (Estimated current turnover of all active firms, average external investment and Licensing and other IP income)
Public and community engagement (Provisional score based on self-assessment developed with NCCPE[4] and additional narrative)

For most metrics, a three-year average will be used.

In order to make the data comparable, HEIs will be split into clusters with individual benchmarks for each cluster. The following clusters are being used in the initial year:

Cluster E: Large universities with broad discipline portfolio across both STEM and non-STEM generating excellent research across all disciplines.
Cluster J: Mid-sized universities with more of a teaching focus (although research is still in evidence) and academic activities across STEM and non-STEM Disciplines
Cluster M: Smaller universities, often with a teaching focus
Cluster V: Very large, very high research intensive and broad-discipline universities undertaking significant amounts of excellent research.
Cluster X: Large, high research intensive and broad-discipline universities undertaking a significant amount of excellent research
Arts specialists: Specialist institutions covering arts, music and drama
STEM specialists: Specialist institutions covering science, technology, engineering and mathematics

For the publishing industry the metric “Co-authorship with non-academic partners” will be the only relevant one; however, it is interesting to see that this metric is the only one for which no data source has yet been found. And how should there be? No-one is collecting this data and there is certainly no such thing as a central place for comparison of this. Therefore, it remains to be seen whether this metric will survive or whether it will just become a part of the narrative and therefore based on anecdotal evidence.

Like any metrics-based system, there are different ways of looking at the data and variation of interpretation. The KEF will create a numeric ranking system of universities’ interaction with business and the public, but how meaningful this will be and what exactly it will tell us, is unclear.

[Written by Annika Bennett, Gold Leaf]

[1] Research Excellence Framework

[2] Teaching Excellence Framework

[3] Higher Education Business & Community Interaction (HE-BCI) survey

[4] National Co-ordinating Centre for Public Engagement

“Post-18 report” or “Augar report” – there has been talk about this long-awaited report in the HE sector for a while, and it played a pivotal role in the discussions at the ABT Conference (see our last blog post). Yesterday, it finally was published, but what is all that about??

Last year, for the first time in more than 50 years, the government commissioned a review into student finance to inform the sector. The report was conducted by an independent panel following an initiative by businessman Philip Augar, and was originally expected to be released in February 2019. With much delay and long awaited, the “Review of Post-18 Education and Funding” was finally published on May 30^th. 216 pages long, it gives a wide variety of recommendations (50 in total) and considers many details that affect student finance and the cost of Higher (and Further) Education. What’s remarkable is that it includes all post-compulsory education funding, so covers both HE and FE.

And one of its most important conclusions is that Further Education is in much greater need of support than the Higher Education sector. A new mission is needed for Further Education, and it needs solid financial backing. The three main recommendations for this sector are the protection of the title “College” (just in line with that of “University”) to enhance the knowledge of its meaning in society and a certain quality-control, a creation of a coherent network of colleges across the UK that deliver skills (focussed on levels three to five), and a substantial increase in funding.

On apprenticeships, the main recommendation is a growth in degree-level and level seven apprenticeships, though acknowledging the expense of that route. One suggestion is to limit the funding for apprenticeships to those apprentices who do not already hold a degree-level qualification. The panel sees a need for Ofsted to assume responsibility for assessing all levels of apprenticeships.

The recommendation that Higher Education should reduce the tuition fee cap to £7,500 (and then freeze it until 2022/23 before increasing it in line with inflation) has made the national news over the past 24 hours. The recommendation also says that the income gap should be closed by the increase of teaching grants by the government, and should be adjusted on a subject-level basis, according to the cost of each subject. According to the report, the funding for widening participation should not be taken out of a proportion of the student fee (the current system), but instead a funding system comparable to the schools’ Student Premium should be introduced. Using this method, a university would receive its grant based on the actual intake numbers of socially and economically disadvantaged students.

On the wider topic of student finance (which affects all above-mentioned kinds of non-compulsory education), the basis of the recommendations is that the tax-payer should be covering a smaller proportion of the student finance system. Based on research conducted by the Department of Education that suggests that people would prefer higher monthly repayments and a longer repayment period in return for lower fees and lower interest rates (surprisingly!), the recommendations say that there should be zero interest applied during the study, that the repayment threshold should be reduced (to median non-graduate salary) and that the repayment period should be extended to forty years. There are also suggested changes to interest rates and the lifetime repayments to avoid those who earn more later in their careers being penalised.
However, the most interesting recommendation for the sector is perhaps the re-introduction of maintenance grants of at least £3,000 per eligible student. The panel also recommends that the expectation of parents’ contributions (of families of higher income) should be made clearer, so both students and parents know what kind of financial support a student could or should expect from their parents.

Overall, the report has been conducted in a mindful way, with awareness of current pressures on student finance, addressing the needs of Further Education and a sense of detail about university finance. Whether the report reflects the realities faced by students and universities and supports their interests more widely is another question. Whether any of these recommendations will be carried out, given the current political climate, is an entirely different issue.

The full report can be downloaded from the Gov.uk website.

Category: Policy

KEF – Knowledge Exchange Framework: what is it?

HE and Student Finance: The “Augar Report” – what’s in it?