Opinion

The choice is to innovate or, potentially, to die. Focusing on customer experience and tech is the best way to avoid the latter, says Eric Skipper

The year is ending with an ongoing permacrisis for higher education. Political rhetoric has improved but the sector still needs a vision for its future

Publishers used to recognise that theirs was a relationships business. But now the road to immortality is much lonelier, says Adrian Furnham

We’re already not as susceptible as we were, but the threat posed by deepfakes has not gone away, say Andrew Chadwick and Nick Jennings

To maintain vital internationalisation, US institutions might have to partner with industry to expand their overseas footprints, says Fernando Reimers

Higher education funding in the UK may still be inadequate, but cost-cutting cannot come at the expense of social mobility, says Fiona Devine

Scholars who win foreign scholarships will have no jobs to return to in Afghanistan if they decide to take them up, says an Afghan academic

The new commission must answer the big questions without delay and consult universities, say Jan Palmowski and Kurt Deketelaere

We can no longer deem as educated a student who knows nothing about statistics, data analytics or computing, says Daniel Diermeier

The financial woes can’t be solved without job losses; the key issue is to ensure they set the university up for a realistic long-term future, says Malcolm Prowle

But their long-term sustainability needs a clearer political strategy, including reflection on whether there are too many, says Luc Sels

Avoiding layoffs is the issue of the hour. The UCU would do better to prioritise negotiations on pay-related issues such as workload, says Jak Peake

Better to revise the previous government’s tuition fee hikes than redirect taxpayers’ money into wealthy graduates’ pockets, says Maxwell Yong

As questions about the size and shape of UK higher education persist, debates about the part number controls could play are making a comeback

Encouraged to use ChatGPT to help them with the hard stuff, my students let it do all their thinking for them. Maybe I should give up, says Dan Sarofian-Butin

Burnout is rife in an era when the traditional attractions of academia to obsessives are diluted by many new duties, observes Joseph Cronin

Enthusiasts claim that authentic tasks boost work-readiness, promote inclusion and diminish cheating, but the evidence remains unclear, says Tim Fawns

The controversy over Dhankhar’s poor choice of words has overshadowed the wisdom of calling for poorer Indians to be better informed, says Pushkar

As universities are encouraged to undertake ever more local engagement, my four Bs framework will help them think it through, says Craig Jeffrey

A tactical takeover might have been easier in the short term, but Adelaide University will be better for being a marriage of equals, say David Lloyd and Peter Høj

Misappropriation of junior colleagues’ ideas is a betrayal. Requiring them to wait years for redress adds insult to injury, says Wyn Evans

Universities often say they are pursuing transnational education for both love and money. But that can make for a strategic muddle, warns Stephen Thomas

Political interventions on a host of issues suggest marketisation’s opponents are wrong to see neoliberalism as the root of all evil, says Gerbrand Tholen

The rules should quash the idea that a formal investigation is the only way to take action on disclosures or rumours of abuse by staff, says Anna Bull

But we must be sure to protect research and future subscription budgets, as well as building a sensible authentication system, says Cathy Foley

Inflation-linked increase is only a sticking plaster for crisis-hit universities, but shows a willingness to work towards a more sustainable funding system

Breezy assertions about what research shows undermine public trust as, however confidently stated, they are easy to challenge, says Rob Briner

However we feel about the election result, we must strive to make education and democracy protect and nurture one another, says Michael Roth

Neurodiverse academics and those from non-English backgrounds can struggle with verbal etiquette – but we don’t mean to offend, says a UK academic 

Alerts about troubling material project ethical universality but trumpet some forms of injustice while conveniently bypassing others, says Eric Heinze

England’s Knowledge Exchange Framework unfairly marks down an arts cluster whose impact is not directly reflected in cash, says Michelle Phillips

The global cost pressures imposed by sector expansion oblige universities to embrace technology that is finally fulfilling the hype, says Anthony Finkelstein

This year’s Maddox Prize nominations suggest that institutional challenges may be a bigger problem than online abuse, says Tracey Brown

Forcing changes to the peer-review process would probably come with unforeseen and unwanted consequences, says Sheldon H. Jacobson

It’s tempting to dismiss the Ohio senator’s attacks on higher education as MAGA rabble-rousing, but he is right in some respects, says Lincoln Allison

Addressing the sector’s woes has, at best, been kicked down the road to next year’s spending review. How disappointing, says Nick Hillman

Misleading claims that some undergraduates are unjustly receiving extra help obscure how many universities are actually failing to provide sufficient support to disabled students, says Chris Pepin-Neff

Concerns around scholars using excessive self-citations are valid, but banning them entirely is not the right approach, says David Watkins 

With ethnic minority students missing disproportionately more classes, traditional timetabling risks widening attainment gaps, says Christopher Byrne

With its focus on breakthrough research and innovation, Manuel Heitor’s plan for European research should be commended, says Jan Palmowski

Tailored guidance, standards, tools and infrastructure are needed to make data more accessible and interoperable across the globe, says Daniel Keirs

Wales’ groundbreaking Medr must boldly rethink how education and training work for society and the economy, says Ellen Hazelkorn

THE’s flagship summit began with a focus on immediate funding woes but ended with a reaffirmation of universities’ founding principles

Better to work with an exercise that justifies block funding and drives many desirable behaviours within universities, say Anton Muscatelli and Miles Padgett

A ‘Fortress Australia’ that remains open to international trade and talent needs an educated, innovative and globally minded population, says Philipp Ivanov 

Credentialing is a key good offered by universities, but giving some students more help than others undermines it, says Justin Noia

Some days all I can do is watch Gilmore Girls. But on others I may come up with an idea that changes my whole research field, says Vikky Leaney

Prioritising volume over quality by abolishing master’s-level funding will damage the pipeline of skilled workers, says Tyler Harvey-Cowlishaw

Let's not overlook the transformative power of education to spark curiosity, build resilience and drive positive change, says Rahim Somani

Civil servants appreciate a relational approach that responds to their needs and convenes evidence they will actually find useful, says Sally Hogg

If elected, I will use my vast experience of higher education to help Oxford lead the way through the big challenges facing UK HE, says David Willetts

Speaking Spanish is seen as a problem to be erased. But in Puerto Rico it is key to our success, say Jeffrey Herlihy-Mera and Héctor José Huyke

Policymakers must recognise that international education is a lifeline for low- and middle-income countries, say Maia Chankseliani and Joonghyun Kwak

UUK’s Blueprint is right to call for greater FE-HE collaboration so both sectors can complement each other’s strengths, say Sam Parrett and Nick Whitehouse

English higher education is already very diverse. Aggressive top-down attempts to diversify it further will do more harm than good, says B.V.E. Hyde

A story of UK decline in this year’s rankings reflects higher education’s years out in the cold – a funding thaw is needed, but so too is sector-led reform

In this age of widespread mis/disinformation, non-scientists need help to better grasp which claims bear rigorous scrutiny, says Gary Atkinson

Partnerships with the public and private sectors can be slow-going or episodic. Urgent challenges demand a step change, says Daniel Diermeier

Victims may feel more comfortable disclosing incidents to supervisors than to the killjoys who shut down their 4am corridor parties, says George Bass

When my babysitter fell through, why couldn’t an exception be made so I could attend the fancy £90 dinner, asks Eve Hayes De Kalaf