Last week, Times Higher Education announced their World Reputation Rankings 2016, in which we saw the positions of the only two UK universities in the top ten decline.
A number of newspapers blame this slip in rankings on Government’s commitment to widening participation and diversity. The Telegraph, for example, published that top universities are ‘under huge political pressure to take on minority students’ and that ‘they are forced to focus on diversity and recruiting from disadvantaged backgrounds’.
The Express pointed the finger at ‘government interference’, blaming Government’s commitment to make HE more accessible to disadvantaged students forcing universities to ‘take their “eye off the ball” in terms of improving quality of research and teaching’.
University of Sheffield Vice-Chancellor Keith Burnett quickly responded to these claims last week in The Telegraph. Below are some extracts from his article:
‘The public perception of UK universities is that we have had an injection of student cash from tuition fees. What many don’t realise is that this only replaced lost income from Government and that overall, resources are diminishing.
‘The real picture reveals not enough money for scholarships from Government and visa conditions that are obstructing the flow of international students to the UK.
‘Every country in the world now knows that higher education is a vital part of a growing economy…
‘Countries in Asia are pouring dough into their university system for these reasons…
‘Other countries are investing in higher education [and]…they also want their industries to have the innovations they need to keep their productivity rising.
‘… the money now coming to our universities is not nearly enough to hold our global position in the long term…’