Would that mean dropping the ‘sponsored by Reform’ tagline?

It’s a good article, but much of the benefit is dependent on universities being willing to change their processes and policies and to standardise. Then the tech can really support. In my view you need a tech vision and an institutional rather than siloed cultural response.

One element I don’t see covered is the impact of more reporting / regulation on increasing administrative costs. Every policy, e.g. UKVI monitoring, is a new cost. What sector is caused by OfS regs rather than HEFCE days. I’m not making moral judgment about either, just noting financial impact.

In my experience (of multiple universities) they tend not to recognise and fully appreciate the differences in very different models and don’t align skills, tech, governance or investment, rather trying to flex from existing models. There are, of course, those that do, and have very successfully!

Nice article. I was involved in a joint venture of 2 UK universities offering global DL/online programmes. We had clear processes, dedicated systems and specialist functions. The closer to the traditional university the more it was compromised by trying to fit to existing ways of working.

Oslo a couple of months back. Fantastic, thoroughly recommend, and a place where runners, pedestrians, cyclists and electric scooters all appear to coexist sensibly without angry exchanges unlike some cities in the UK.

Have you come across any good discussions about whether we actually should be trying to retain all the current universities? This seems to be a comfortable assumption without evidence one way or another?

'James Brackley...co-author of a recent paper that ascribed a risk score to every UK university based on several factors including debt levels and net cash inflow, said there were universities in trouble “in every category”'. More data, more bleak. 3/3

But yes, the danger of shiny distractions doesn’t help. AI anyone?

I suspect some fall exactly into that. I think buildings and physical infrastructure are part of lived experience from childhood, so take little effort, but IT has to be learnt (repeatedly) and so links and impacts are not natural responses. System 1 versus system 2 thinking as Kahneman would say.

One of the reasons less discussed (in my view) is because much of tech infrastructure is not visible or understood by non-IT. If you say a building’s foundations are crumbling then everyone intuitively understands the problem and the consequences. The same can’t be said for IT foundations.

I agree. As usual look for who set the rules of the game, not just who participated. That being said, everyone makes their own choices.

Happy New Year Lawrie. Looking at LinkedIn, so many “congratulations to..” or “my company is amazing because…” it’s becoming organisational instagram. We could probably write 80% of the posts with AI.

Good article. So many times we hear/say we will need to train/upskill/develop our people, but when universities are increasingly run so lean there is no time to do this. The article calls this out well.

That’s deeply unpleasant. The demise of Twitter is a shame, for a while it was one platform that was useful, informative and enjoyable. Nothing last forever, but different groups have found different answers which, for me, loses some of the surprise factor.

Morning Helen, part of the Twitter exodus (or X-odus?), nice to see you here.

Worryingly nothing about digital capabilities and creativity for academics, professional services or students?

Unsurprisingly my usage, reading and posting, in Twitter has also decreased, my use of Flipboard has increased. I suspect it’s part device, part time of day, but it has changed the balance of subjects I tend to engage with. It’s a lot more fragmented.