Abstract:

Like many other sectors in the UK, the Higher Education (HE) sector has been witnessing major reforms. Ball (2007, p.18) commenting on the public sector reforms in the UK states that ‘during Thatcher’s terms as prime minister the landscape of economic and political understandings of welfare changed irrevocably’; the boundaries between the state, the economy and the public sector were ‘discursively reconstituted’. This meant that some public sector systems were subjected to new modes of management that closely matched other commercial market institutions (Ball, 2013). At the risk of over simplifying, I use the concept of managerialism to explain the current forms of public sector management.

In the UK the last few decades have seen the massification of HE, for example, the number of 17-30 year olds in HE rose from 12% in the 1980s (Shelley, 2005) to 49.8% by 2016/17 (Department for Education, 2018). Additionally, universities have seen a significant increase in ‘overseas’ student numbers. In the mid 1980s students from outside the UK numbered approximately 20,000, while by 2015/16 this had grown to 438,010 (HESA, 2017). The consequence of this expansion is the question of funding, and the successive UK governments needed to either increase the fees and/or public investment (Allen, 2012). However, one of the major reforms that can be observed in the UK HE sector is the deliberate attempts by successive UK governments to reduce their public expenditure on HE. Given this background, the gradual reduction in the level of government funding has compelled Higher Education Institutes (HEIs) in the UK to review their financial situation (Hodson and Thomas, 2001). As a result, HEIs have begun to both diversify income streams and control costs. In this context, HEIs have recognised that ‘their course portfolio and awards have commercial value and have taken a decision to realise some of this value by marketing their courses through collaborative provision’ (Hodson and Thomas, 2001, p.102; De Vita and Case, 2003). I use the term collaborative provision in HE to identify arrangements for delivering learning and teaching opportunities with organisations other than the degree-awarding body (QAA: Chapter B10, 2012). Contemporary arrangements in HE also involve publicly funded (i.e. with recurrent funding from the Funding Councils or other public bodies) HEIs with degree-awarding powers establishing collaborative arrangements with private providers.

This paper examines collaborative HE arrangements between publicly funded (i.e. with recurrent funding from the Funding Councils or other public bodies) HEIs and other private providers. The focus is on understanding the rationale for such collaborations and the complexities emerging from the opening-up of HE markets to private providers in the UK. It used data collected, involving 19 higher education stakeholders (i.e. management, staff such as link-tutors and policy-makers) representing public-private HE provision in the UK. The paradoxical policy landscape and the financial distancing of the state have compelled institutions to source income from non-governmental means. Working with private partner colleges in the UK and overseas is therefore perceived to have an economic motive and collaborative partnerships are seen as a solution to the difficult financial situation of HEIs. This is re-arranging the priorities of HEIs.

Keywords:

Marketisation, collaborative HE, policy, private providers, funding.