The following speech was given to the 1994 Group's fringe event at party conference on the 4th October. It is no surprise that discussions on Higher Education policy have been dominated in both media coverage and in the minds of students by the increase in tuition fees. So it is very heartening to be invited here to discuss HE reforms in the context of student and university empowerment, and not simply to rehash the debate around fees. I believe that the proposals put forward in the White Paper, Students at the heart of the system, will do exactly what it says on the tin, put students at the heart of HE rather than at the margins. Yet this has so far been a narrative missing from mainstream discussions. Indeed just last week the Labour Party announced their own reforms to Higher Education, an unfunded commitment to cap fees at £6,000. But yet they failed to agree with, or even to pass comment, on the proposals in the White Paper. For a party that was obsessed with central control in government, it is perhaps no surprise that they want to avoid giving any consideration to students and universities having more, as opposed to less control. In fact, in April, John Denham was calling in the Guardian for a Higher-Education white-paper, yet when it came in June all he was interested in talking about was the fee regime and how much universities planned to charge. Nothing on student choice, nothing on university freedom. So something that I believe is vital in our discussion today is how do we move the debate on? Not just in meetings of the 1994 group or vice chancellor get togethers, but in the population at large? How do we ensure that students know more about the power they can wield, and how do we use that new-found power for the good of the individual and of the sector? Choice Our Universities are a vital part of our nation, our heritage and our future. Our standing in the world is raised by the quality of our universities, both in terms of their teaching and their research capabilities. Not to mention being one of our most famous exports. So if that’s the case then why reform, why change anything? Ultimately the entire direction of travel of this government is about giving people choice. Moving the decision maker closer to those affected by the decision, and giving people more control over their lives. Why? Because we believe that the individual knows better than the bureaucrat in Whitehall. Whether it is in how you spend the money allocated for your social care, how many houses should be built within a district, or the freedom of Academies; we’re sure that the individual knows best. Call it localism, call it choice or call it freedom it’s where we’re heading and at its most basic it’s what people want. In the case of Universities I think it’s totally true that the student can make a better decision about where they want to study than the state can. Our job isn’t to make the decision for them, or to limit their choices with per institution quotas, but to give them the information to help them make an informed choice. And if we’re going to give students increased choice and increased freedom then we have to do the same for universities. Remember, no one who works in a university is part of the public sector. Yet with an ever increasing percentage of funds coming from government grants that’s how the previous government began to think and behave. The result; an ever increasing set of intrusive rules and regulations telling universities how they should run themselves. That isn’t to say that in a system with more choice and more freedom there won’t be challenges to Universities. If Universities are to thrive in a system where the money follows the student and students have more freedom to go where they want, rather than where the state says they can, then universities will undoubtably have to make themselves more attractive. After all, in a world where a student is empowered to chose with less limits they can also be more demanding, but this in itself isn’t a bad thing. Whilst some will say that this is negative, that it will result in some institutions failing as numbers dwindle I must disagree. Just as we’ll see with our reforms that push power to local GPs or Local councillors I believe that we’ll see a levelling up not a levelling down of standards and quality. Thriving So how can a university thrive in this new environment? With my background it’s probably no surprise that I’m a big believer in evidence based strategy. So I firmly believe that to become more responsive universities will have to develop a greater understanding of what students want and what satisfaction really means for them. The 2010 National Student Survey showed that 82% of students were happy with their course overall and 83% were satisfied or very satisfied with their teaching. But what else do students have to compare their experience to? It’s not like comparing mobile phone companies, or retail experiences. Most students will only experience one institution in their lifetime after all, so this figure is a measurement of satisfaction against their expectations rather than against alternatives. To attract students and thrive under the new system I think that universities will have to look at the entire student experience, focusing not just on teaching, but also areas such as accommodation and student life. Already surveys show that students worry as much, if not more, about the affordability of accommodation and living costs, as the quality of teaching. So how can universities leverage this into the entire package? Ultimately I think universities will need to do just this, provide a package. Create a compelling student offering that includes the pre, during and post university experience and communicates this offering to what will become ever more sophisticated students. To many this will sound too much like the words of a marketing executive not an educator. University should be about the education they will say, not about the quality of the student union, the bars or the job someone gets afterwards. But with increased choice comes the need to communicate your offering in a way that makes more sense to students and that will attract those students. Take for example the cost of a course. Without extra information will a humanities student really be willing to pay £9,000 a year for 4 hours of contact time a week, whilst they know their flat mate studying physics is getting more than 20 hours for the same cost? Presumably they will if they really want to study history, but they’ll also be more willing to part with their cash if they know that as well as the cost of a lecturer their fees are also going on stocking and running the library and IT facilities say. But in the absence of that information there’s a risk that they’ll just think it’s all going on biscuits for the lecturers common room and academics attending overseas conferences. Ultimately then it is transparency that will resolve the question students have over value for money. In local government we already see this in the graphs attached to your council tax bill that show where your money is going. The White Paper suggests that universities should produce something similar and I also see no reason why this shouldn’t be the case. So how can universities thrive? By grasping the freedoms that are being offered to them, rather than being scared by the new world. By really working out what students want, rather than thinking they know, and by better communicating what they offer.