The quality of teaching at universities has emerged as one of the key priorities for the new Conservative majority government. In a recent speech to Universities UK, Jo Johnson the new universities minister, said he wanted to see universities in England enhance teaching quality, bear down on grade inflation and achieve parity of esteem between teaching and research.
Driven by a desire to give student consumers better information about where to study based on the excellence of a university’s teaching, his plan is to introduce a long-mooted Teaching Excellence Framework. He said that this:
creates incentives for universities to devote as much attention to the quality of teaching as fee-paying students and prospective employers have a right to expect.
One problem that might hinder Johnson’s chances of succeeding is that, while each of the particular aspirations on his wish list are credible, together they appear somewhat contradictory. For example, take grade inflation – above-trend increases in the numbers of firsts and 2:1s granted by universities in recent years. How much this reflects higher student achievement is unclear. But the elevation of the “student-as-consumer” in the era of £9,000 per year fees and the competitive marketisation of the higher education sector, which Johnson advocates, may bear some responsibility for unwarranted classification hikes.
