Imperial College Union has responded on behalf of Imperial students to the Government's proposals for reforming funding and oversight of the Higher Education sector.
Govt proposals:
- A Teaching Excellence Framework , which would allow institutions to increase tuition fees if they meet certain standards of teaching quality
- Enabling the Secretary of State to increase tuition fees without Parliamentary approval
- A new Office for Students , which would replace the current Higher Education Funding Council England, to oversee the Higher Education sector
- New powers to compel universities to improve widening access and social mobility schemes
- Making universities exempt from Freedom of Information legislation
- Measures to control and regulate students' unions
Our Response, available below, was written by Jennie Watson, Deputy President (Welfare), with input from Chun-Yin San, Deputy President (Education) and Lucinda Sandon-Allum, Union President.
Imperial College Union opposes the majority of the proposals set out in the paper. We consider these proposals to be rushed, reliant on poor and inappropriate datasets, bound to create damaging perverse incentives, and an undemocratic centralisation of power away from Parliament into the hands of a Secretary of State.
Our criticisms:
- Allowing the Secretary of State to set tuition fees with Parliamentary approval is deeply undemocratic
- The proposed timeframe for the Teaching Excellence Framework is completely unworkable
- The proposed datasets for the Teaching Excellence Framework are already considered to be weak and unvalidated indicators of teaching quality
- As spenders of large sums of public and student money, Freedom of Information legislation must remain applicable to universities
- Claims that students' unions are undemocratic or fail to be transparent are untrue, as charity legislation and the Education Act 1994 mean we are a mongst the most open and accountable organisations across the entire third sector and Imperial College Union has more student participation and engagement than any other students' union in England & Wales
