This report summarises findings from research commissioned by the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) into privately funded providers of higher education (HE) in the UK. The 2011 Higher Education White Paper, ‘Students at the heart of the system’, and the accompanying technical consultation included a commitment to open up the higher education market, including to privately funded organisations. The government aims to ‘drive competition and innovation’, through a more market-based approach to higher education, allowing students to choose between a range of types of providers. H
... Show more
This report summarises findings from research commissioned by the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) into privately funded providers of higher education (HE) in the UK. The 2011 Higher Education White Paper, ‘Students at the heart of the system’, and the accompanying technical consultation included a commitment to open up the higher education market, including to privately funded organisations. The government aims to ‘drive competition and innovation’, through a more market-based approach to higher education, allowing students to choose between a range of types of providers. However, a lack of information hampers an accurate understanding of what privately funded provision in the UK is and what it can offer. Given the complexity and challenges of mapping the privately funded HE market, BIS commissioned [the Centre for Enterprise] CFE, in partnership with the British Accreditation Council, to undertake exploratory research to develop our understanding of these providers and their students. The main aims of the research were to gather a set of quantitative information about privately funded HE providers in the UK, and to understand more about the students who choose to study at privately funded HE providers.
The findings confirm and underscore the broad conceptions that have commonly been held about the sector. The number of providers identified in the UK is somewhat higher than previous estimates, but still within a similar scale. Privately funded HE provision in the UK is diverse and complex, covering a wide range of institutions. Overall, this project has developed our understanding of the privately funded HE providers currently operating in the UK, and of the experiences of their students. As this is a dynamic, changing marketplace, the report makes a number of recommendations, including undertaking future research, or other forms of data collection, to update and extend this study and to track trends within the sector.
Excerpts from publication.
Show less
