Other senior management

Crowdsourcing a new configuration for the University of South Australia boosted brainpower and perhaps even institutional loyalty, says David Lloyd

Means-tested fees discounts would remove the rationale for fruitless widening participation efforts, argues Norman Gowar

With such wide disagreements in grading, the research excellence framework’s gravity for careers is unjustifiable, says Philip Moriarty

A punitive attitude towards incarceration limits the access of the US’ uniquely large prison population to college degrees. But there are signs that attitudes are finally shifting. Paul Basken considers the arguments and looks at some prime examples of what can be achieved with a captive audience

Augar’s failure to grasp the differential effect of government policy on different kinds of universities is his report’s Achilles heel, says Greg Walker

The qualification is a valuable tool to recruit students to at-risk programmes that meet projected skills gaps, says the QAA’s Julie Mizon

The New Education Policy breaks with India’s post-independence preference for vocational avenues of upward mobility, says Saikat Majumdar

It is not enough for UK universities with charitable status merely to conduct teaching and research, say Nicola Dandridge and Helen Stephenson

University cuts courses but will become first foreign institution to offer law degree in country

The Advertising Standards Authority is wrong to permit to any provider of training to graduates to declare itself a “graduate school”, says Viv Ellis

Promotion criteria requiring top researchers to also be good teachers and managers undermine the nature of universities, says Andrew Oswald

Overseas branch campuses have mushroomed in the past two decades, but with the risks larger than initially assumed and the returns less certain, stories of abandoned ventures have begun to mount. Ellie Bothwell asks whether the model still has a future 

Asking for higher contributions is painful but unavoidable in such uncertain times, says USS chair Sir David Eastwood

Raising UK outlay to international levels will reap rich technological, social and political rewards for the next Conservative Party leader, says Sarah Main 

Last year’s scandal over the ministerial vetoing of Australian research grants coincided with the centenary of the fabled principle that politicians should keep out of such decisions. But with governments becoming increasingly ideological and desperate for innovation-fuelled growth, does scientific autonomy have a future? Rachael Pells investigates 

Gradual changes to lifestyles will not save the planet. Universities need to go beyond Cambridge's recent lead and think bigger, says Peter Harper

Building education ties along the New Silk Road will strengthen the influence of Chinese higher education, says Futao Huang

Western ‘settler’ nations such as Canada and Australia are wrestling with how to redress historical injustices visited on their native populations. One proposal is for universities to embrace Indigenous knowledge. But what does that mean in practice? Will it achieve its aims? And where does it leave science? Matthew Reisz considers the arguments

The controversy over a Harvard dean’s defence of Harvey Weinstein is no reason to disregard the core academic mission, says Sandro Galea 

The unaffordability of two rents severely restricts the study options of care leavers and estranged students, says Roy Celaire 

The UK’s TEF experience should be a warning to Australia’s re-elected government not to settle for empty accountability, says William Locke 

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Tony Mann assesses an argument about the role of mathematical beauty as a key to understanding how the universe works

A different environment can do wonders for a person; might universities feel a similar refreshment when the UK’s political landscape settles down again?

Consumerism, technology and the culture wars threaten to render critical thinking an unwanted skill, worries Victor Ferrall

Survival depends on institutional buy-in to a fundamental questioning of operating models and cost structures, says Angus Laing

Colleagues’ failure to fully grasp the more hostile lived reality for EU nationals post-referendum is furthering alienation, says Jawiria Naseem

Efforts to accrue more overseas fees could be vetoed by the Home Office and will do little to make UK students more culturally savvy, warns Peter Brady 

Dean was removed following opposition to his role in Harvey Weinstein’s legal team

Recent controversies in Australia over vice-chancellors’ pay, Ramsay Centre funding and the role of academic presses have raised questions about whether university boards have too few – or, perhaps, too many – members from scholarly backgrounds. John Ross chairs the discussion

Stanford University’s insistence that its press break even is another bleak milestone in corporatisation, says David Palumbo-Liu

A review following the latest iteration of the PBRF could lead to radical changes that undermine the gains made, warns Roger Smyth

Falling UK graduate wages reflect not too many students but a flexible labour market’s post-crash adjustment, argues David Willetts

The unfettered pursuit of knowledge is every university’s core value – even if management doesn’t always see it that way, says Dennis Hayes

System expansion is not enough. Admission to higher-tariff institutions must somehow be opened up, says Paul Jump

Proposals for delayed report have to be judged in the round – including implications for those who don’t go to university, says David Robinson

The country’s recent judge-led review is another instance of the global misperception of institutional censorship, say Ian Jacobs and Susan Dodds

Australia’s vice-chancellors must wake up: China's munificence is all motivated by its vast geopolitical ambition, says Nick Forster

The quality of Indian higher education outside a few elite institutions is notoriously poor, and a slew of initiatives aimed at addressing it have made little impact so far. Simon Baker analyses the data to assess the scale of the challenge and asks what more could and should be done

Opponents should learn from Chinese candidates’ successful and potentially formative forays into democratic politics, says Salvatore Babones

US universities might be world-leading in research terms, but there is scant evidence that this has any bearing on their prowess as educators. Why do institutions of higher education show so little interest and aptitude in instilling genuine learning, asks John Tagg 

The recent US scandal is a symptom of the crucial importance of prestige signalling in highly unequal systems, says Gavin Moodie

The UK’s research excellence framework is slow, expensive and disruptive. The time and technology is ripe for a better alternative, says James Tooley

Big datasets linking higher education participation to a range of socio-economic factors are useful and fascinating, but their translation into policy remains fraught 

The advent of datasets linking graduates’ income to their student records has fuelled calls for certain courses and universities to be excluded from public funding. But, ahead of England’s Augar review of post-18 education, the minister who commissioned the longitudinal education outcomes project, David Willetts, warns against such abuses of the data

A Labor victory in May’s election could still see funding conditional on universities’ employability, diversity or research records, says Andrew Norton

Tough stances on grade inflation, unconditional offers and senior pay will help maintain global excellence, says Michael Barber 

Bin Yang tells THE summit that Chinese universities lack ‘original, innovative ideas’

Sweden’s KTH Royal Institute of Technology has integrated sustainability into all parts of its business, says Göran Finnveden

If Americans lose faith in alternative routes to success, entry to top universities could become as cut-throat as it is in South Korea, says Stephanie K. Kim

Despite thin pickings this time around, Trudeau’s Liberals have probably done enough to win the science vote in October’s election, says Creso Sá

Market-like mechanisms within higher education are unpopular with academics but can have positive effects, say Rebecca Natow and Kevin Dougherty

A greater willingness from facilitators to listen to feedback could transform collective decision-making, say Liana Kreamer and Steven Rogelberg 

For those reliant on EU funding, seeking appointments at continental universities is the only sensible course, says Peter Coveney

HKU’s history, location, social context and educational and research ambitions combine to create a truly global university, says Ian Holliday  

Complaints about depictions of contentious historical figures should be met with sensitivity and a firm grasp of the facts, says Felipe Fernández-Armesto 

Cutting the number of people who benefit from a university education will do nothing to improve the lot of those who do not, says Graham Galbraith

Recruiting a five-year, full-time president could transform the umbrella body’s ability to defend the sector, says Sir Anthony Seldon

Universities’ vocal opposition to government plans for vastly increased international fees has yielded only minor concessions, says Juliette Torabian 

A student’s mysterious accusation of racism saw P. K. Newby removed from her course – and another woman lost from the leaky pipeline