Higher Education Research Cluster

The Consequences of Brexit on Higher Education

Dr Vassiliki Papatsiba is researching the likely consequences of Brexit as perceived in UK higher education institutions. She is Co-Investigator in the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded research project ‘Brexit, trade, migration and higher education’ which ran from June 2017 until November 2018.

The aim of the research project is to investigate senior managers’ and academics’ perceptions of the key implications of Brexit for their higher education institution (HEI), and how these institutions are responding to the current challenges and/or opportunities. The challenges include research funding and capacity, attracting and retaining EU staff, international student recruitment, financial management and sustainability, strategy and institutional decision-making in a difficult, unpredictable and fast-changing policy environment. This research is also examining the steps taken in institutions to monitor the policy environment, manage planning and data analysis, enhance the capacity to make and implement quick decisions, develop new lines of activity beyond Europe, and cope with the high uncertainty and multiple possibilities. The research project is part of the ESRC’s UK in a Changing Europe initiative, which emphasises policy impact throughout the duration of the research. The Principal Investigator of the project is Professor Simon Marginson from the Centre for Global Higher Education (CGHE), based at the University of Oxford. Vassiliki has contributed to the section on Higher Education in the Article 50 – One Year On report by The UK in a Changing Europe.

In connection with this project, Dr Vassiliki Papatsiba, Dr Heather Ellis and Prof. James Wilsdon are planning to hold a one-day symposium in Sheffield developed in collaboration with CGHE on the theme ‘The Global University in the Brexit Era.

British Students Study Abroad: From Robbins to Erasmus

Dr Heather Ellis is Principal Investigator in a research project funded by a 2020 Anniversary Award from the Society for Educational Studies entitled ‘British Students Study Abroad: From Robbins to Erasmus.’ The project has two related aims. Firstly, it seeks to investigate how widespread positive attitudes towards the study of British students abroad were within British government circles in the period between the publication of the Robbins Report in 1963 and the beginnings of the institutionalisation of study abroad (in a European context) with the piloting of the Erasmus scheme in 1981. It will ask how closely the promotion of the idea of overseas study and exchange was linked to a broader governmental agenda of cultural diplomacy in a Cold War context. Crucially, it will seek to establish to what extent such attitudes and aims were embedded within governmental legislation and regulatory reform in this period. Secondly, it seeks to produce, for the first time, a comprehensive data set detailing the numbers, destinations and subjects studied by British students studying abroad in this period and how these changed over time.

Heather will be talking about the initial findings of the project at the 2019 Annual Colloquium ‘Educational reform legislation in a changing society’ in September to be held at Oriel College, Oxford.