Scotland eyes collaboration for ‘geographic and sector coherence’

“Accelerated collaboration” between Scottish tertiary education institutions is key to their future, including for reasons of “geographic and sector coherence”, according to a Scottish Funding Council (SFC) review, which calls for more strategic planning but does not advocate nationally planned mergers.

The SFC review of the tertiary education system, published on 29 June after being commissioned by the Scottish government in June 2020, also backs continuing with the current system of funding research excellence wherever it is found rather than concentrating further, but calls for a shift to more mission-oriented research.

In its key recommendations, the report says there should be a “clear strategic, longer-term vision and intent for the future of tertiary education and research undertaken by colleges and universities in Scotland that incorporates multi-year funding assumptions and commitments”. There should also be “a new National Impact Framework to enable the sector to better plan provision for students and employers, secure excellent research and international reputation, and adapt business models and drive collaborations to remain sustainable and achieve desired outcomes”.

There should be an aim to “protect excellent discovery research and develop mission-orientated research and knowledge exchange activities, in order to create knowledge of immense social, economic and cultural value”, it continues.

The report calls for a greater focus on lifelong learning, for an emphasis on international education connections and global research standing as key to Scotland and its higher education sector, and for “a more systematic approach to the way we collectively plan coherent tertiary education and skills provision and investment, so that it responds better to current and future needs of pupils, students, employers and broader economic and social drivers, while holding in balance the policy imperatives of promoting fair access and equalities, and the journey to a net zero carbon future”.

And it says there should be “a Scottish level standard for online and blended learning to support institutions to deliver an excellent experience for learners”.

There have previously been calls for mergers between institutions in Scotland to offer a more strategic approach.

“Accelerated and deeper collaboration is the key to the future!” says the SFC report Coherence and Sustainability: A Review of Tertiary Education and Research.

“This means encouraging a greater exploration of different structures and models to secure sustainability and more coherent provision and collaborative research,” it adds. “If we collaborate for change – colleges, universities, students, employers and key interests – in an iterative way, we firmly believe we will bring forward better options for the future than imposed national structural change.”

The report also says that “collaboration is required now more than ever”, for reasons including ensuring “coherent provision, both geographic and sectoral”, “cost reduction and efficiencies” and “achieving sustainability through scale”.

It continues: “We expect institutions to explore internal efficiency measures, for example, increasing class sizes, reducing the percentage of income spent on staffing, ensuring support staff arrangements are appropriate to the size of the institution and what it can afford, and examining curriculum delivery to reduce duplication and poorly performing courses while making the most of blended learning. Many institutions are already taking these sorts of measures at an individual level, and may need to explore further ways of working more closely with others, rationalising offers and ensuring greater value for money.”

In research, some have called for greater concentration of funding.

But the SFC review says: “Our judgement is that, within a finite resource and given the underpinning policy assumption that universities ‘do research’ as well as learning and teaching, we are currently on the edge of retaining a credible distribution across 18 institutions (not including the Open University Scotland) and that any move to concentrate our funding further could have dramatic consequences for smaller institutions without having a significant beneficial effect on larger institutions.

“We believe that Scotland derives best value from SFC’s sustained and flexible investment in our world-leading research base if we target that support at excellent research, wherever it is found, and empower the recipient universities to use our funding to develop that research and explore new and emerging research areas.”

john.morgan@timeshighereducation.com